Even in his own lifetime, Hans Knappertsbusch divided opinion, between listeners affronted by technical slips caused by his notorious aversion to rehearsal and those who saw in him the last representative of a performing tradition dating back to Richard Wagner. Working mostly in the opera houses of Munich and Vienna, he never became music director of a symphony orchestra, but his postwar Decca recordings of central repertoire from Beethoven to Strauss, including three distinguished concerto collaborations with Clifford Curzon, preserve interpretations of a flexibility, sweep and grandeur scarcely imaginable today.
For Decca, Knappertsbusch recorded with the great orchestras of London, Paris, Zurich, Geneva and Vienna. The orchestral discography began with Brahms’s Second Symphony with the Suisse Romande, Wagnerian ‘bleeding chunks’ in the Kingsway Hall in December 1947 and ended in February 1960 in the Sofiensaal of Vienna, conducting Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite with a delicacy and grace that will surprise listeners who think of him only as the high priest of Parsifal at Bayreuth. The box is full of such surprises: an album of Strauss waltzes and polkas that turns on a sixpence; nimble Bruckner scherzos; one of the swiftest versions of Tod und Verklärung on record.
Once introduced to Clifford Curzon, Knappertsbusch was immediately enthusiastic about performing and recording with ‘this great English gentleman’; their versions of Beethoven’s Fourth and Fifth and Brahms’s Second have long been mainstays of the Decca catalogue. Much else here is newly remastered and now widely available on Decca for the first time in many years, such as Wagnerian overtures and preludes with the Zurich Tonhalle (1947) and the London Philharmonic (1948) orchestras.
Bruckner’s Symphonies Nos. 3-5 (1954-6) preserve Knappertsbusch’s profound working relationship with the VPO at its most harmonious. A magnificently trenchant Brahms album with the VPO in 1957 also features Lucretia West in the Alto Rhapsody. For devotees and sceptics alike, this box offers revelations and the opportunity to reassess the art of a conductor held in the deepest affection by many of the musicians and singers who worked with him.
CD 1
BEETHOVEN
Piano Concertos No. 4*; Piano Concerto No. 5°
Sir Clifford Curzon
CD 2
BRAHMS
Symphony No. 2
CD 3
BRAHMS
Piano Concerto No. 2
Sir Clifford Curzon
CD 4
BRAHMS
Academic Festival Overture; Tragic Overture; Haydn Variations; Alto Rhapsody
Lucretia West
CD 5
BRUCKNER
Symphony No. 3
CD 6
BRUCKNER
Symphony No. 4
WAGNER
Siegfried Idyll
CD 7
BRUCKNER
Symphony No. 5
WAGNER
Götterdämmerung (excerpts)
CDs 8–9
BRUCKNER
Symphony No. 8
CD 10
RICHARD STRAUSS
Don Juan; Tod und Verklärung
CD 11
WAGNER – The Polydor Recordings
CD 12
WAGNER – The Decca 78s
CD 13
WAGNER
Rienzi · Siegfried · Parsifal (excerpts)
CD 14
WAGNER
Der fliegende Holländer; Die Walküre · Tannhäuser (orchestral music)
CD 15
WAGNER
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg; Tannhäuser; Tristan und Isolde; Parsifal (orchestral music)
CD 16
WAGNER
Rienzi; Der fliegende Holländer; Lohengrin (orchestral music); Siegfried Idyll
CD 17
VIENNA HOLIDAY
Johann Strauss I; Johann Strauss II; Karel Komzák II; Ziehrer
CD 18
ALL-TIME POPULAR FAVOURITES
Tchaikovsky; Schubert; Weber; Nicolai
MONO (CD1*, 2, 3, 5, 6, 11–14)
STEREO (CD1°, 4, 7–10, 15–18)
CD 1
Recording Producers: Victor Olof (Piano Concerto No. 4); John Culshaw, Erik Smith (Piano Concerto No. 5)
Balance Engineers: Cyril Windebank (Piano Concerto No. 4); Gordon Parry, James Brown (Piano Concerto No. 5)
Recording Locations: Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 4–5 April 1954 (Piano Concerto No. 4); Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 10–15 June 1957 (Piano Concerto No. 5)
Original Decca Releases: LXT 2948 (Piano Concerto No. 4): September 1954; LXT 5391: December 1957, SXL 2002 (Piano Concerto No. 5): August 1958
CD 2
Recording Producer: Victor Olof
Balance Engineer: Arthur Haddy
Recording Location: Radio Studio, Geneva, Switzerland, 30 June–1 July 1947
Disc Transfers: Andrew Hallifax
Editing and Audio Restoration: Mark Obert-Thorn
Matrix No.: SAR234-43
Original Decca Release: K1906–10: August 1949 (Switzerland)
CD 3
Recording Producers: John Culshaw, Erik Smith
Balance Engineers: Gordon Parry, James Brown
Recording Location: Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 21–24 October 1957 (Piano Concerto No. 2)
Original Decca Release: LXT 5434 (Piano Concerto No. 2): June 1958
CD 4
Recording Producers: John Culshaw, Erik Smith
Balance Engineers: Gordon Parry, James Brown
Recording Location: Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 10–15 June 1957
Original Decca Release: LXT 5394 (mono): January 1958 (UK, and as ECS 701 in March 1974, as stereo); CS 6030 (stereo): September 1958 (USA)
CD 5
Recording Producer: Victor Olof
Balance Engineer: Cyril Windebank
Recording Location: Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 1–3 April 1954
Original Decca Release: LXT 2967: October 1954
CD 6
Recording Producers: Victor Olof, Peter Andry
Balance Engineer: Cyril Windebank
Recording Location: Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 29–31 March 1955 (Bruckner), 1 April 1955 (Siegfried Idyll)
Original Decca Release: LXT 5065–66: August 1955
CD 7
Recording Producers: Victor Olof, Peter Andry
Balance Engineers: Gordon Parry, James Brown
Recording Location: Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 3–6 June 1956
Original Decca Release: LXT 5255–56 (mono): December 1956 (UK); CSA 2205 (stereo): November 1959 (USA)
CDs 8-9
Recording Producer: Kurt List
Balance Engineers: Adolf Enz, Raymond Fügistaler
Recording Location: Bavaria Musikstudios, Munich, Germany, January 1963
Original Westminster Release: WST 235: 1963
CD 10
Recording Producers: James Walker, John Culshaw
Balance Engineers: Kenneth Wilkinson, Roy Wallace
Recording Location: La Maison de la Mutualité, Paris, France, 7–8 May 1956
Original Decca Release: LXT 5239: October 1956
CD 11
Recordings: Berlin, Germany, September 1927 and January 1928
Matrix No.: 751–2 bm
Original Polydor Releases: 66698, 66699, 66780, 66700, 66701–02, 66705, 27185
CD 12
Recording Producers: Terence Gibbs, Victor Olof
Balance Engineers: Kenneth Wilkinson, Arthur Haddy
Recording Location: Kingsway Hall, London, UK, 31 December 1947–3 January 1948 (1, 3, 8-9), Radio Studio, Zürich, Switzerland, 18 June 1947 (2), Radio Studio B, Geneva, Switzerland, 1 July 1947 (4), Kingsway Hall, London, UK, 31 December 1947 (5-7)
CD 13
Recording Producer: Victor Olof
Balance Engineer: Cyril Windebank
Recording Locations: Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 14–15 and 24 June 1950 (Parsifal: Prelude), 23 June 1950 (Parsifal: Transformation Music), 11 September 1950 (Parsifal: Flower Maidens’ Scene), 14–15 and 24 June 1950 (Rienzi, Siegfried)
Original Decca Releases: LX 3034 (Rienzi, Siegfried): March 1951; LX 3036 (Parsifal): March 1951
CD 14
Recording Producer: Victor Olof
Balance Engineer: Cyril Windebank
Recording Location: Grosser Saal, Musikverein, Vienna, Austria, 6–7 May 1953
Original Decca Release: LXT 2822: September 1953
CD 15
Recording Producer: Dr. Kurt List
Recorded By: Peter Curiel
Mastering Engineer: Claude Rie
Recording Location: Bavaria Musikstudios, Munich, Germany, November 1962
Original Westminster Release: WST 17032: 1963
CD 16
Recording Producer: Dr. Kurt List
Recorded By: Peter Curiel
Mastering Engineer: Claude Rie
Recording Location: Bavaria Musikstudios, Munich, Germany, November 1962
Original Westminster Release: WST 17055: 1962
CD 17
Recording Producers: John Culshaw, Erik Smith
Balance Engineers: Gordon Parry, James Brown
Recording Location: Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 15–16 October 1957
Original Decca Releases: LXT 5420: June 1958, SXL 2016: October 1958
CD 18
Recording Producer: Ray Minshull
Balance Engineers: Gordon Parry, James Brown
Recording Location: Sofiensaal, Vienna, Austria, 15–17 February 1960
Original Decca Release: SXL 2239: October 1960
‘This … will please everyone who loves opulent brazen sound. As a Wagnerian, Prof. Knappertsbusch is plainly a great conductor … The Wagner of burlesque – lady wrestlers as Valkyries, heaving on Clydesdales and percherons; winds of two-miles-per-hour in the Dutchman’s hurricane … Still, the sound is splendid.’ High Fidelity, January 1954 (Wagner Preludes, VPO)
‘There is less heaviness, more flexibility and true Viennese spirit in his reading than in any of the others.’ High Fidelity, February 1956 (Bruckner, Symphony No. 4)
‘There apparently exists a wonderful rapport between the English virtuoso and the German conductor, for this performance is pervaded by a nearly tangible quality of artistic give-and-take.’ Stereo Review, April 1958 (Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5)
‘If you want a deliberate, large-scale reading of Brahms, Knappertsbusch is your man. He is as unhurried as Gibraltar.’ High Fidelity, March 1958 (Brahms: Overtures and Haydn Variations)
‘Readings of great power and eloquence – almost of a hypnotic nature. From first to last each work has an inevitability about its unfolding which is akin to the unravelling of a ball of wool.’ Stereo Review, April 1958 (Brahms: Overtures and Haydn Variations)
‘Knappertsbusch approaches these Strauss favourites in the old world manner conducting the music carefully and easily.’ Stereo Review, June 1960 (Johann Strauss: Waltzes & Polkas)
‘A wholly absorbing experience … The craggy grandeur of Bruckner’s huge Eighth Symphony is illuminated with convincing eloquence.’ Stereo Review, April 1964
‘This collection of pop-concert miniatures could not be more delightful. The Nutcracker is light and airy … full of careful attention to instrumental details overlooked in most other versions.’ High Fidelity, February 1969