Stravinsky: The Firebird (Complete Ballet); Fireworks [Hybrid SACD] [Hybrid SACD - DSD]

Igor Stravinsky (Composer), Antal Dorati (Conductor), London Symphony Orchestra (Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra
• Conductor: Antal Dorati
• Composer: Igor Stravinsky
• Audio CD (October 12, 2004)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Hybrid SACD - DSD
• Label: Philips
• ASIN: B0000DC15L
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #259,577 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best sound SACD reissue yet, December 20, 2004

By 

Ofer Refaeli (Israel) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stravinsky: The Firebird (Complete Ballet); Fireworks [Hybrid SACD] (Audio CD)

Best sound SACD reissue yet:
clear, detailed, resolution, sound-stage, dynamics. Either 2 or 3 channel DSD SACD. Good old Dorati's performance has drive, good tempi.
Recommended !

20 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Analog to SACD done right!, October 16, 2004

By 

S. Baird (Baton Rouge, LA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Stravinsky: The Firebird (Complete Ballet); Fireworks [Hybrid SACD] (Audio CD)

This new release of this near-legendary 1959 Dorati/LSO performance goes to the head of the class. Using the earlier CD release as a sonic guide (the series was originally overseen by Wilma Cozart Fine), Universal's audio engineers have, again, given us a nearly perfect transfer of the original master tape to this newest, most advanced digital medium. I can't imagine something more musically satisfying.

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Stravinsky Jump Starts the Twentieth Century In this Legendary Recording, February 22, 2008

By 

Doug - Haydn Fan (California) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Stravinsky: The Firebird (Complete Ballet); Fireworks [Hybrid SACD] (Audio CD)

No restoration of a classic series of performances has received anything quite resembling the intense loving attention doled out for these classic Dorati recordings of Stravinsky on the Mercury Living Presence label. The results are beyond sensational: this is one of the pivotal recordings of classical music in the last century. Listening to these performances today, half a century later, is nearly a religious experience, and the phenomenal quality fo both sound and performance fully justifies all the time and energy put into their re-release in the SACD format. This is the real thing, the goods, the cat's meow!

Anyone wishing to hear just how great a composer Stravinsky was at the very outset of his career need only sit down to the complete Firebird as played here by the London Symphony. It's quite astonishing to hear such detailing, such superb balances, from an orchestra still unfamiliar with the modern ultra-filigreed works of a Boulez or a Ligetti. Dorati's conducting reminds us of his fabulous work with not only other Russian composers, but moderns, such as Schoenberg. The distinctive clarity of Stravinsky's orchestration; the novelty and freedom from cant of his musical language; his stunning ear for striking color contrasts; all these burst forth in overwhelming display in even Stravinsky's earliest works.

This is what 20th century classical music is all about. If you're curious about the greatest classical composers of the last century you can't do better than begin with this CD.

Highest possible recommendation!