Customer Reviews

Eugene Ormandy

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It's sad that the "Great Conductors of the 20th Century" reissue series has not gotten more notice on www.Amazon.com and in other places, because it has my vote for the best reissue program thus far of the 21st Century. Drawing from the archives of all the major classical labels (EMI, Sony, BMG, DG, Decca, Philips, Supraphon, etc.), EMI and IMG Artists have assembled a wonderful series of affordable two-disc sets by the leading conductors of the last century. And unlike its counterpart, "The Great Pianists of the 20th Century," which are basically compilations of material already available on other CDs, the "Great Conductors" features rare and, for the most part, previously unreleased performances!

This particular CD, Volume 13, features the great Eugene Ormandy. With so many of Ormandy's recordings available in the Sony Essential Classics series and on RCA/BMG, you would think there could not possibly anything left to release on CD. Well, guess again. Ormandy recorded a Brahms cycle in the late 60s for CBS, but to date they have only issued the first two symphonies on CD via a Sony Essential Classic "Take 2." Someone like me, who is relatively new to classical and can't go thumb through dad's old vinyl collection, has been left to dream at the prospects of Symphonies 3 & 4. Well, at least here we get number four, and it is a giant! I have nearly a dozen recordings of the Brahms 4, and Ormandy's is every bit as good as my personal favorites by Kleiber, Dorati and Szell. Speaking of Sony Essential Classics "Take 2" CDs, Ormandy also did all of Rachmaninov's Symphonies with Philadelphia during his time with CBS, but the version presented here was done for RCA in 1973, and it was Ormandy's first recording of the complete original version of the work. This set also features the world premiere recording of Anton Webern's "Im Sommerwind." But if those three items are not enough, then use this set as a rare opportunity to hear Ormandy away from the Philadelphians. Ormandy joins the Bavarian RSO for two live performances -- Struass' "Don Juan" in 1959 and Kabalevsky's "Colas Breugnon" Overture in 1965.

Whether you are a serious collector of classical music or a beginner, the "Great Conductors of the 20th Century" has something for everyone. If the prized, rare performances previously unreleased on CD (or ever!) doesn't excite you, then use this as an opportunity to check out one of the greatest conductors ever recorded. Since stores are offering increasingly homogenized classical music sections, this conductor may not be in your collection, and that would truly be a shame.

Recently I sat all my Nielsen First Symphonies all together and did a side-by-side on the first bars of the last movement. Something remarkable happens there that requires precision work to get it right and nobody (including Blomstedt) came close to Ormandy in this horse race. On recommendation I snickeringly tried Ormandy's Beethoven Fifth and it bowled me over--it's now my favorite, bar none. I'm completely at a loss to find better Shostakovich and I would love to get my hands on Ormandy's Mahler 10 recorded decades ago. What gives? What gives is that Eugene Ormandy and his over-hyped Fabulous Philadelphians were, despite everything, one of the greatest music producing engines ever. Throw your copies of Fanfare, the Goode Guide, and Penguin away, those reviewers clearly have pickles in their ears (I left out American Record Guide because, lo and behold, the editor has noticed this appalling phenomenon too). What Ormandy does, and does magnificently, is stand back and let the music speak through one of the world's finest orchestras. This lack of ego seems to bother some people, probably the same people who write reviews complaining about Berlioz's compositional skills. Elements of this somewhat feeble culture have a tendency to try to ride herd over their betters.

This is also one heck of a collection, especially for the Brahms and the Rachmaninoff (interesting that both Shostakovich and Rachmaninoff had high regards for the "mediocre" Ormandy). Just buy it!

[You'll note the same curious phenomenon with the equally reviled Leinsdorf [Mahler! Prokofiev! Dvorak!] and Van Beinum [untouchable Debussy! Brahms! Bartok! Stravinsky!]--if you tossed in Jochum and maybe Munch I could easily put together a first-class collection of the Classics without ever coming close to the usual list of razzle-dazzle superstar and wunderkind conductors. This is really making me wonder about a lot of things!)

Great rendition of Brahms' 4th symphony, which happens to be my favorite symphony by one of my favorite composers (he runs neck in neck with Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, and the lead keeps changing hands). I've heard a bunch of Brahms 4ths, including Giulini (1970), Abbado (1992, underrated), Karajan (1978) Kleiber (1980), Solti (1978), Dorati (1961), Jochum (1978), Ozawa (1990), Bernstein (1981), Haitink (1992), Kubelik (1983), and now the Ormandy, from 1967. The Ormandy is one of the oldest, and it sounds old (my only misgiving on this recording is the muddiness when it gets loud), but it is still up near the top of the heap in terms of interpretation. I would probably rate the Dorati, Giulini and the Kleiber ahead of it, with the Abbado and Karajan trailing just behind. I have lately found myself getting into Ormandy after hearing a recording of Dvorak's 9th with Ormandy/Philadelphia from an old LP of my dad's. If you are an Ormandy fan, then this is a must have, since you can't get the Brahms 4th anywhere else.

To be honest, the rest of the disc is nice, but I bought it for the Brahms. At this price, it is still worth it.

Ormandy's Brahms 4th symphony recording from the late 60's
is my favorite recording, bar none. It has a rhythm, musicality
momentum that I don't hear in other recordings of this masterpiece. The finale is played with tremendous power, drama
and a thumping rhythm . Solos are played beautifully.
The Sibelius piece is also brilliant.
I highly recommend this CD.

Get this for the Brahms 4th alone, although everything on these two discs only gives credence to the reputation of the most recorded conductor in history. Since these were recorded later in Ormandy's career for the most part, the sound is quite good. The sheer sonic power of the playing in the 4th is amazing and brings back wonderful memories for those of us who heard Ormandy and the Philadelphians play in a good hall.

This is a strange collection, considering that the Great Conductors series has been notorious for taking eminent conductors and showing them off poorly or at best in mediocre, obscure performances. Here they turn the tables and make Eugene Ormandy sound like a genius. As a survivor of the Ormandy era, I side with the nearly unanimous opinion that he was skillful, unimaginative, and enormously successful with the general public.

In this compilation, however, he is much more than that. The Brahms Fourth on CD 1, in excellent stereo, is full of energy and fantastic playing. We're not talking aobut anything profound on the order of Furtwangler and Klemperer, yet the performance carries you along from first to last. The mono reading of Strauss's Don Juan with the Bavarian State Radio Orch. is as good as anybody's, full of orchestral panache. Ormandy was a total reactionary so far as modernism went, so Webern's Im Sommerwind, an early, lush, tonal effort, shouldn't fool anyone into thinking that he favored the Second Viennese School--this performance is the ultimate in sensual lushness, I must say.

CD 2 is dominated by the Rachmaninov Sym. #2, an Ormandy specialty. Those who champion this much-neglected conductor always throw into the face of naysayers that Rachmaninov himself chose Ormandy to record with. In return, Ormandy doted on the composer's music. Having said that, this Second Sym. is plush, smooth, and glib. The Russians have invaded since Ormandy's death in 1986, and we're used to more character and deeper feelings. You won't find a better played version, however, and as always the Philadelphians sound magnificent. Ormandy was a notable Sibelius condcutor, and his Lemmenkainen's Return that ends CD 2 is exciting and not at al glossed over.

I've lived thorugh every era of Ormandy's popularity since the early Fifties and never found much to impress me, but if he had made recordings like these year in and year out, he would genuinely belong among great condcutors. This is one of the high points in the whole series.

These compositions show Ormandy at his formidable best. In the Rachmaninoff, the conductor's love for the music and the composer (a personal friend) comes through in each bar: tempi never rushed, balance between each section and the color, oh the color. Brahms' 4 gives the lie to the stupid and facile notion that Ormandy conducted everything with the same romantic stamp. Listen to the Passacaglia of the last movement where this passionate yet classicaly-conceived German masterpiece is both structurally perfect and romantically satisfying at the same time. The Don Juan represents Strauss playing that the present Phila. Orch. can no longer summon. The other pieces, the Sibelius, Kabelevsky and Webern show how versatile and idiomatic the conductor was in all post-classical schools of music.

Dr. Joseph A. DiLuzio, Ph.D.

No Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Bartok or other Eastern European pieces usually associated with Ormandy. Instead you get a knock-out Brahms No.4... with the fabulous Philadelphians.