Strauss: Ein Heldenleben [Hybrid SACD - DSD, Import, Live]

Richard [1] Strauss (Composer), Mariss Jansons (Conductor), Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Orchestra: Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
• Conductor: Mariss Jansons
• Composer: Richard [1] Strauss
• Audio CD (January 11, 2005)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Hybrid SACD - DSD, Import, Live
• Label: Rco Live Holland
• ASIN: B0006OR0C6
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #464,342 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lush and exciting, October 8, 2005

By 

Pater Ecstaticus (Norway) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Strauss: Ein Heldenleben (Audio CD)

This must be the first recording of this work by Richard Strauss which had me really captivated by the music from beginning to end, and as such making me love the music and further explore and appreciate other wonderful recordings of this music. (Such as the grandiloquent, exquisitely balanced and natural-sounding Previn/Vienna Philharmonic.)
My appreciation of this specific recording from Amsterdam must certainly have to do with the fact that this recording is both lush and detailed - although maybe the orchestra is a little too 'distantly' recorded and sounding a little constricted in climaxes. Generally I like more directly recorded sound within a 'natural' sound stage, as much as possible reflecting the original acoustics of the recording venue (if they are nice, which they certainly are in this case). But all in all, this recording makes for an exciting listening-experience. Mariss Jansons here does simply what is asked of this music: to play it as beautifully as possible (without unidiomatic excentricities). The beauty of this performance as well as the recording-quality are certainly uncontested(even if it is not as clear or evenly balanced as could be - like for example the recording by Andre Previn and the Vienna Philharmionic Orchestra). We really have a wonderful orchestra here, and a magnificent, acoustically perfect, hall they can luckily call their home. And how fortunate we are to have Mariss Jansons at the helm, chief conducting 'our' greatest of orchestras. Just beautiful.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A middle-of-the-road performance graced by lovely playing, February 10, 2006

By 

Santa Fe Listener (Santa Fe, NM USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Strauss: Ein Heldenleben (Audio CD)

The Royal Concertgebouw enters the field with its own label, a tactic that has proven very successful for the London Sym. This live performance of Ein Heldeleben is caught in ripe but somewhat distant sonics that tone down the excitement a bit, all the more because Jansons seems satisfied with a scrupulous, detailed account that holds back on drama--I supose he doesn't want the piece to sound garish. But why not? Heldenleben isn't much unless you play the wheels off it. Compared to Simon Rattle's outstanding new version with the Berlin Phil., this one is middle-of-the-pack, despite the warm, gorgeous playing of the orchestra (and a particularly fine solo violin in the long obligatto part). I find nothing to criticize here and next to nothing to rave about.

2.0 out of 5 stars SACD disappointment, November 24, 2011

By 

Judy Spotheim "SpJ Judy" (Belgium, Europe) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Strauss: Ein Heldenleben (Audio CD)

To the topic of this and other SACD on the Concertgebouw/Label recording properties:
The local Dutch recording engineers hired by the Concertgebouw to "immortalize" this or other live concert for posterity and market it in the SACD version, in the process they have come up with a faulty product.
Be it as it may, from the stand point of interpretation (reading) which is not the concern here, the end product is disappointing in the Audio sense.

The equipment used by the recording team here might easily be one the most advanced there is; It is capable of capturing the sound in almost all of its clarity, with great wide frequency-range and sometimes great dynamics, but the concept of where to put the microphones and where the sound is captured from is wrong, wrong, wrong.

It is wrong in the sense that they offer us a sit at the back of the Concertgebouw hall balcony, distanced and far away from where the action takes place, when there is so much better prospective over the orchestra and hall acoustics from middle of the hall, or from a sit closer to the orchestra.

We should not dream here of the golden age, the dawn of the stereo era (Reiner/Strauss Also Sprach Zarathustra, a two channel recording technique immortalized by Leslie Chase for RCA, 1954) that would be a bit like comparing oranges with apples.
But instead, we can compare various recordings from this present age - recordings made on location at the same Concertgebouw hall with this SACD recording at hand:
To compare, take the Rachmaninov symphony 1 & 2 (DDD):
It has all of the sonic components to boost: Great tonality, great dynamic range - AND - great outlook on the orchestra, great sound-stage and retrieval of hall ambience - all this if compared to the present SACD (the Concertgebouw own label) - the SACD sound stage will barely expand beyond the two front speakers and will sound like a somewhat stretched mono recording; no true spread, no true soundstage (multi-microphones technique went wrong?)

Note in this regards recordings made by Decca and by Philips on location at the Concertgebouw hall were much more successful in conveying the total sound--picture:
Take the Philips ADD recording of Stravinsky/ Firebird, Petruschka, Rite of Spring / Concertgebouw/Colin Davis;
Take the Rachmaninov Symphonies, (Decca DDD recording) with Ashkenazy.
Take the Philips ADD recording of Ravel with Haitink, take the Grieg/Schumann with Arrau and Haitink, and more, much more - all have this property of conveying a concert-hall "feel".

The decision of the Dutch recording team made for the Concertgebouw label of how and from where to capture the sound - I am sure - will not get down the history pages as great achievements the way Mohr-Layton & Leslie Chase (RCA); Cornall-Moorfoot, Culshaw-Perry, Kenneth Wilkinson (Decca) and other team achievements for Philips too.

Simply put; the Concertgebouw "sound" on their propriety label is too distanced, taken from too far away, has a tunnel-like sound-view - a strange and faulty approach to sound engineering.
As such, the Concertgebouw own label is a disappointment.