Richard Strauss Karajan

Karajan - Richard Strauss: An Alpine Symphony - DVD 10/24 - His Legacy For Home Video
Classical | DVD | with scans | 3,73 Gb (DVD5) | DVD´s FULL No compression
All Videos of this collection (except one) are DVD5, yet complete, without taking anything from the original.
Release: November 11, 2003 | Publisher: Sony Classical

This is the best recording of Richard Strauss' Alpine Symphony.
It is a stunning piece of music–an auditory journey up an alpine mountain, complete with sunrise and sunset, and even an impressive, powerful mountain storm.

Richard Strauss - Orchestral Works
Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich / David Zinman
7xCD | EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 1,98 GB | Artwork: 142 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Arte Nova # 74321 98495 2 | Country/Year: Germany 2003
Genre: Classical | Style: Romantic, Early 20th Century

"…Seven CDs is undoubtedly a major collection. There will inevitably be some frustrations that the enterprise was not more thorough in terms of repertoire, and as discussed, there are some howling omissions. Having made the point, let me conclude by acknowledging the high standards of performance and recording that lie at the heart of this set. While there may be a few regrets that it is not as comprehensive as it might (as it ought to?) have been, what we do have is undoubtedly well worth having." ~musicweb-international

Christoph von Dohnanyi is one of those conductors, like Wolfgang Sawallisch, Rafael Kubelik and Josef Keilberth, who were relatively ignored by the journalist school of music critics and later, usually after they are dead, lauded to the skies as undiscovered geniuses of the podium. Well, Maestro Dohnanyi is alive and well and with us and still conducting, mostly at the Zurich opera, and it is a good thing that his performances are being filmed, if not recorded, for posterity because he is a giant of the operatic podium, especially in the operas of Richard Strauss and Richard Wagner.

The Grosses Festpielhaus in Salzburg has been the scene of countless memorable musical events - operas, concerts and recitals - for 50 years. Here is a unique chance to celebrate the glories of this distinguished era. In an exceptional collaboration with the Salzburg Festival, we have prepared a 25-CD box set - 5 complete operas, 10 concerts and 2 recitals - featuring many of the world's greatest artists, in recordings with classical status and others that are appearing on CD for the first time.

I think Karl Böhm's live performances of Strauss operas represent some of his best work; this is a companion piece to his live Daphne which has yet to be bettered despite being another elderly, live recording, albeit in narrow stereo. It is in comparatively restricted mono but one soon forgets that, given the quality of the performance.

Richard Strauss: Also sprach Zarathustra; Don Juan; Till Eulenspiegel - Wiener Philharmoniker; Herbert von Karajan; Label: DECCA
Classical | Exact Audio Copy v.099 prebeta 3 Rip | 366 MB | Full scans | FLAC +LOG+M3U | No CUE | 4shared links

Karajan was a great Straussian, and this collection, produced by John Culshaw in 1959-60, with the VPO (especially the strings) in superb form, shows him at his most charismatic. Also sprach Zarathustra was a famous early Decca stereo demonstration record, and remains as spectacular as ever. The many-faceted portrait of Till is delectably witty, Don Juan is exciting, racy, and full of sensuality, which is voluptuously shared by the dramatic and sinuous 'Salome's dance'. The transfers undoubtedly recreate the sonic excitement of the originals.
Ivan March, Gramophone