Berliner Philharmoniker Great Recordings

The Berlin Philharmonic is consistently ranked as one of the greatest orchestras in the world. As is fitting such an eminent orchestra, they consistently work with the world's most renowned conductors and soloists, and this collection shows these great musicians coming together in eight classic recordings.

2013 marked the 100th anniversary of recording between the Berliner Philharmoniker and Deutsche Grammophon, two giants in music. DG celebrated by releasing a hugely successful limited edition 50 CD Centenary Edition, with content chosen by public vote. New for 2014 is a more bite-size box 8 CDs honouring the same iconic relationship between label and orchestra, at a fantastic price. The featured maestros at the helm of the orchestra include Karajan, Abbado, Rattle, Böhm, Giulini, Kubelik and Furtwängler.

Perhaps no other conductor has done more for Sibelius or has championed him more consistently on record than Herbert von Karajan. Celebrating Karajan’s great affinity to Sibelius, we present the reissue of his complete recordings of the composer’s works on the Yellow Label, across 5 CDs + 1 Blu-ray. The analogue recordings are newly remastered and presented on Blu-ray Audio disc in DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0, 5.1 Surround Sound and Dolby Atmos.

Liszt’s Dante Symphony is a work of astonishing imagination. His evocation of the ‘Inferno’, the shade of Francesca da Rimini and her sad remembered love is marked by strokes of genius which, with bewildering frequency, pre-empt the mature Wagner (who was, incidentally, the dedicatee of the work). If the second and third movements – the ‘Paradiso’ was wisely commuted to a setting of part of the Magnificat plus a brief Hosanna – don’t quite match the sweep and control of the first, they have their own particular magic. Even so, the work has not acquired the popularity of the Faust Symphony. Barenboim’s new recording with the Berlin Philharmonic is thus particularly welcome. Not only does it augment the number of available recordings to four, it is also the most polished. Even performing ‘live’, the Berlin Philharmonic turns in a performance of near-perfection – the solo lines are a particular joy.

Between 1961 and 1986, Herbert von Karajan made three recordings of the Mozart Requiem for Deutsche Grammophon, with little change in his conception of the piece over the years. This recording, from 1975, is, on balance, the best of them. The approach is Romantic, broad, and sustained, marked by a thoroughly homogenized blend of chorus and orchestra, a remarkable richness of tone, striking power, and an almost marmoreal polish. Karajan viewed the Requiem as idealized church music rather than a confessional statement awash in operatic expressiveness. In this account, the orchestra is paramount, followed in importance by the chorus, then the soloists. Not surprisingly, the singing of the solo quartet sounds somewhat reined-in, especially considering these singers' pedigrees. By contrast, the Vienna Singverein, always Karajan's favorite chorus, sings with a huge dynamic range and great intensity, though with an emotional detachment nonetheless. Perfection, if not passion or poignancy, is the watchword. The Berlin orchestra plays majestically, and the sound is pleasingly vivid.

In light of the "chill-out" trend of the 1990s, major labels released many albums of slow, meditative pieces to appeal to listeners who wanted relaxing or reflective background music. Deutsche Grammophon's vaults are full of exceptional recordings of classical orchestral music, and the performances by Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic are prominent in the label's catalog. The slow selections on Karajan: Adagio are in most cases drawn from larger compositions, though these movements are frequently anthologized as if they were free-standing works. Indeed, many have come to think of the Adagietto from Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 5 as a separate piece in its own right, largely because of its evocative use in the film Death in Venice. Furthermore, the famous Canon by Johann Pachelbel is seldom played with its original companion piece, the Gigue in D major, let alone in its original version for three violins and continuo; it most often appears in an arrangement for strings.

In 1955 and at the peak of his postwar powers, Karl Böhm recorded Beethoven's Missa Solemnis with the Berlin Philharmonic with an all-star cast of soloists. It is a great and powerful performance: tightly argued, superbly played, fabulously sung, and very dramatic. Deutsche Grammophon's original mono recording was clear but a little distant, and the digital remastering keeps the clarity and brings the performers a little closer to the listener. In every way that matters, this is a great Missa Solemnis. The thing is, how many recordings of the Missa Solemnis does anyone want or need? There's Böhm's later 1974 with the Vienna Philharmonic, a deeper and more transcendent performance.

The world’s great conductors are not the only important artistic companions of the Berliner Philharmoniker. It is also always exceptional soloists who perform regularly with the orchestra, providing individual inspiration in their collaboration and opening up stimulating perspectives on the music. The Berliner Philharmoniker enjoy a productive partnership with many of these esteemed companions – with some, even a friendship.

Sol Gabetta’s first recording of the Elgar Cello Concerto, with the Danish National Symphony, was much admired when it appeared six years ago. This one, taken from a concert in the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus in 2014, is a far glossier affair orchestrally. Simon Rattle’s tendency to overmould the phrasing is sometimes too obvious, but Gabetta’s playing is intense and searching, less introspective than some performances in the Adagio, perhaps, but epic in scale in the outer movements, and always keenly responsive. Those who possess her earlier disc might not think they need to invest in this one, but would then miss Gabetta’s vivid, pulsating account of the Martinů concerto, which went through a quarter of a century of revisions before the definitive 1955 version she plays here, with Krysztof Urbański conducting. She finds real depth and intensity in it, both in the slow movement and in the introspective episode that interrupts the finale’s headlong rush.