Skip Navigation Links
Richard Strauss-Richard Strauss: Orchestral Works

Richard Strauss: Orchestral Works [CD]
~ Richard Strauss

$29.72

List Price: $44.97
You Save: $15.25 (34%)
Inventory: Instock (only 2 left), Ships in 24 Hours
ยป Email A Friend

Product Reviews

Let's get it straight from the start -- this set of the orchestral works of Richard Strauss recorded in the early '70s for German EMI with Rudolf Kempe leading the Staatskapelle Dresden is, far and away, the best set of the orchestral works of Strauss ever recorded. It has fabulous sound: rich, deep, glowing German EMI sound ideal for Strauss' lushly opulent scores. It has fabulous playing: the Staatskapelle Dresden had the best instruments in East Germany and with them it made lavishly sensual and technically impeccable music out of Strauss' highly virtuosic scores. It has terrific conducting: Rudolf Kempe, a warmhearted professional, always emphasized the dramatic over the rhetorical and the lyrical over the epic in his interpretations, and these qualities suited Strauss' deeply human scores. It has almost everything he composed for orchestra -- Kempe and the Staatskapelle recorded almost every one of Strauss' sometimes over-expansively executed scores from the best-known works -- Also Sprach Zarathustra, Ein Heldenleben, Don Juan -- to the least-known works -- MacBeth, Schlagobers, and Panathen enzug -- without, thankfully, including the entire interminable Josephslegends ballet or any of the endless Die Frau ohne Schatten Symphonic Fantasy. It has consistently first-class performances -- there have been other great Strauss recordings over the years from Krauss, B hm, Reiner, Karajan, and Strauss himself, but, performance for performance, Kempe and the Staatskapelle are just as exciting, often more insightful, and perhaps more sympathetic than any of them, and no other conductor and orchestra recorded as many of Strauss' lushly, deeply, expansively beautiful scores. ~ James Leonard, Rovi

Classical Data

652:50
Romantic
Rudolf Kempe
Germany
One of the great unsung conductors of the middle twentieth century, Rudolf Kempe enjoyed a strong reputation in England but never quite achieved the international acclaim that he might have had with more aggressive management, promotion, and recording. Not well enough known to be a celebrity but too widely respected to count as a cult figure, Kempe is perhaps best remembered as a connoisseur's conductor, one valued for his strong creative temperament rather than for any personal mystique. He studied oboe as a child, performed with the Dortmund Opera, and, in 1929, barely out of his teens, he became first oboist of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra. His conducting debut came in 1936, at the Leipzig Opera; this performance of Lortzing's Der Wildsch tz was so successful that the Leipzig Opera hired him as a r p titeur. Kempe served in the German army during World War II, but much of his duty was out of the line of fire; in 1942 he was assigned to a music post at the Chemnitz Opera. After the war, untainted by Nazi activities, he returned to Chemnitz as director of the opera (1945-1948), and then moved on to the Weimar National Theater (1948-1949). From 1949 to 1953 he served as general music director of the Staatskapelle Dresden, East Germany's finest orchestra. He then moved to the identical position at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, 1952-1954, succeeding the young and upwardly mobile Georg Solti. During this period he was also making guest appearances outside of Germany, mainly in opera: in Vienna (1951), at London's Covent Garden (1953), and at New York's Metropolitan Opera (1954), to mention only the highlights. Although he conducted Wagner extensively, especially at Covent Garden, Kempe did not make his Bayreuth debut until 1960. As an opera conductor he was greatly concerned with balance and texture, and singers particularly appreciated his efforts on their behalf. Kempe made a great impression in England, and in 1960 Sir Thomas Beecham named him associate conductor of London's Royal Philharmonic. Kempe became the orchestra's principal conductor upon Beecham's death the following year, and, after the orchestra was reorganized, served as its artistic director from 1963 to 1975. He was also the chief conductor of the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra from 1965 to 1972, and of the Munich Philharmonic from 1967 until his death in 1976. During the last year of his life he also entered into a close association with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Interpretively, Kempe was something of a German Beecham. He was at his best -- lively, incisive, warm, expressive, but never even remotely self-indulgent -- in the Austro-Germanic and Czech repertory. Opera lovers prize his versions of Lohengrin, Die Meistersinger, and Ariadne auf Naxos. His greatest recorded legacy, accomplished during the last four or five years of his life, was the multi-volume EMI set of the orchestral works and concertos of Richard Strauss, performed with the highly idiomatic Dresden Staatskapelle. These recordings were only intermittently available outside of Europe in the LP days, but in the 1990s EMI issued them on nine compact discs. ~ James Reel, Rovi
Let's get it straight from the start -- this set of the orchestral works of Richard Strauss recorded in the early '70s for German EMI with Rudolf Kempe leading the Staatskapelle Dresden is, far and away, the best set of the orchestral works of Strauss ever recorded. It has fabulous sound: rich, deep, glowing German EMI sound ideal for Strauss' lushly opulent scores. It has fabulous playing: the Staatskapelle Dresden had the best instruments in East Germany and with them it made lavishly sensual and technically impeccable music out of Strauss' highly virtuosic scores. It has terrific conducting: Rudolf Kempe, a warmhearted professional, always emphasized the dramatic over the rhetorical and the lyrical over the epic in his interpretations, and these qualities suited Strauss' deeply human scores. It has almost everything he composed for orchestra -- Kempe and the Staatskapelle recorded almost every one of Strauss' sometimes over-expansively executed scores from the best-known works -- Also Sprach Zarathustra, Ein Heldenleben, Don Juan -- to the least-known works -- MacBeth, Schlagobers, and Panathen enzug -- without, thankfully, including the entire interminable Josephslegends ballet or any of the endless Die Frau ohne Schatten Symphonic Fantasy. It has consistently first-class performances -- there have been other great Strauss recordings over the years from Krauss, B hm, Reiner, Karajan, and Strauss himself, but, performance for performance, Kempe and the Staatskapelle are just as exciting, often more insightful, and perhaps more sympathetic than any of them, and no other conductor and orchestra recorded as many of Strauss' lushly, deeply, expansively beautiful scores. ~ James Leonard, Rovi

Details

Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss: Orchestral Works
Classical & Opera
Classical Composers
28 February 2012
Staatskapelle Dresden/Kempe ~ Discs:9
Brilliant Classics ( BRIL )
Compact Disc
7591
Yes (additional shipping cost)
842977075915

Similar To: Richard Strauss

Violin Concerto In D Minor     Violin Concerto In D Minor Richard Strauss ~ $5.59
Richard Strauss: Capriccio     Richard Strauss: Capriccio Richard Strauss ~ $20.17
Hiroko Shiraishi Singt Richard Strauss Lieder     Hiroko Shiraishi Singt Richard Strauss Lieder Richard Strauss ~ $13.48
Melodies Orchestrales     Melodies Orchestrales Richard Strauss ~ $6.29
Richard Strauss Dirigiert Eigene Tondichtungen     Richard Strauss Dirigiert Eigene Tondichtungen Richard Strauss ~ $24.72
Richard Strauss: Complete Chamber Music     Richard Strauss: Complete Chamber Music Richard Strauss ~ $82.39
Richard Strauss: Complete Chamber Music, Vol. 2     Richard Strauss: Complete Chamber Music, Vol. 2 Richard Strauss ~ $7.95
Richard Strauss: Complete Music For Winds And For Brass, Vol. 1     Richard Strauss: Complete Music For Winds And For Brass, Vol. 1 Richard Strauss ~ $7.95
Richard Strauss: Piano Music     Richard Strauss: Piano Music Richard Strauss ~ $12.36
Strauss: 14 Lieder     Strauss: 14 Lieder Richard Strauss ~ $13.48

 

Notify Me If Price Drops

Email:
   
Price To Drop Below:
Current Price: $29.72
Notify Price:  
Notes: (For your own use, included in our email to you. Text only, no html)
 
Portions of Content Provided by All Music Guide®  ©2012 Macrovision Corporation.
All Music Guide® is a registered Trademark of Macrovision Corporation.
AMG