Mercury Living Presence

Mozartiana, performed by the Festival Chamber Orchestra under the baton of Antal Doráti and released as part of the acclaimed Mercury Living Presence series, is a captivating homage to Mozart's timeless genius.

Mercury, Philips and Decca recordings of orchestral pops conducted by the supremely versatile Sir Charles Mackerras, including a pair of Strauss overtures new to CD.Few conductors, if any, have demonstrated the sheer versatility of Charles Mackerras. He could turn his sharp ear and his unfussy baton technique to every corner of classical repertoire, and early in his career, he conducted many recordings of popular ballet and symphonic repertoire for a range of record labels. The present collection revives the first-ever album he made for Decca in May 1958, of works by Grieg and Sibelius which were originally issued under RCA’s ‘Living Stereo’ livery.

In this one superlative disk you can hear why Dorati was considered one of Strauss's greatest interpreters. Throughout his career, from the days of the Ballet Russe in the '30s and '40s to the Detroit Symphony recordings of the '70s and '80s, Dorati followed Strauss scholarship closely and shared his admiration of Strauss with audiences in stunning and communicative performances.
These are from his Minneapolis years (only the mono Heldenleben is left out) and the performances are knockouts. The maestro plays fair by the composer, but there's an almost operatic type of scene organization that allows him to build drama and lead us through the ebbs and tides of Straussian psychology.
Unlike so many readings of this composer, no lumpiness is allowed, no frowzy attacks, no sitting around. In all instances the music is youthful, alive, spritely, fresh, clear, balanced, and captivating. Dorati gets his best performance of his own assemblage of Rosenkavalier excerpts, hypnotic and rythmic with a good measure of Viennese elegance thrown in. Those of us who have suffered thourgh snoring, routine performances at the Staatsoper would have liked to have had the Minneapolis contingent in the pit. The ensemble played and breathed like an opera orchestra while under Dorati, living and "singing" the drama and life of its repertoire. This comes through strongly on this disk.
Striking here is the Transfiguration, which does, indeed, do that as the conductor brings up a vertical crescendo and breaks apart the sound into transluscent color that scatters across your speakers' spectrum to startling effect.
Wilma Cozart, genius that she is, probably thought rehabbing this one from her own original tapes was a coffee-and-Danish break. My side-by-side comparisons with first-edition Mercury vinyl indicates little, if anything, was needed to bring this outstanding reissue to us.

This is one of the best recordings I've heard of Gershwin's two big piano works. Eugene List is just phenomenal. He plays with a big, steely sound, but has plenty of feeling for the jazzy accents of both works. I can't praise Howard Hanson's contribution enough. The orchestra simply speaks Gershwin, in a manner that only a great conductor who absorbed this music and the influences on it in his youth could bring off. Hearing Hanson conduct Gershwin is like hearing Serafin conduct Verdi, so complete is the identification with the composer. The sound engineering is some of the best Mercury produced in Rochester, wide ranging with plenty of detail. I do question what Stars and Stripes is doing here, although it is a good performance with a student orchestra. Nevertheless, this is essential listening for the Gershwinaholic, as iconic in its way as Oscar Levant's performances.

"Henryk Szeryng's robust and resonant violin tone at times takes on a dark quality more like a viola–quite different from the bright sound of Heifetz. The result is a certain weighty seriousness to Szeryng's playing, even in the dancing finales of both works. Of the two performances, the Khachaturian is the more memorable, as Szeryng revels in the music's ethnic coloring and exotic sensuality–sounding very much the folk fiddler in the first-movement cadenza, and displaying stunning rhythmic and tonal acuity throughout.