Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra & Bernard Haitink

In 1956, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouworkest for the first time and together they would play more than 1,500 concerts across the globe. Besides his modesty, his humanity, his musical taste, and his honesty to the music, three words come to mind when one thinks of Haitink and his orchestra: Sound, Trust and Magic. Jörgen van Rijen, Principal trombone of the Concertgebouworkest, said at a memorial concert in February this year, “Every time with him [Haitink] the orchestra sounded warmer, deeper and richer, from the first moment he started to rehearse. How he did that is difficult to tell … he always gave us musicians the feeling he trusted you, that he was there to help, not to interfere.”

In 1956, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouworkest for the first time and together they would play more than 1,500 concerts across the globe. Besides his modesty, his humanity, his musical taste, and his honesty to the music, three words come to mind when one thinks of Haitink and his orchestra: Sound, Trust and Magic. Jörgen van Rijen, Principal trombone of the Concertgebouworkest, said at a memorial concert in February this year, “Every time with him [Haitink] the orchestra sounded warmer, deeper and richer, from the first moment he started to rehearse. How he did that is difficult to tell … he always gave us musicians the feeling he trusted you, that he was there to help, not to interfere.”

In 1956, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouworkest for the first time and together they would play more than 1,500 concerts across the globe. Besides his modesty, his humanity, his musical taste, and his honesty to the music, three words come to mind when one thinks of Haitink and his orchestra: Sound, Trust and Magic. Jörgen van Rijen, Principal trombone of the Concertgebouworkest, said at a memorial concert in February this year, “Every time with him [Haitink] the orchestra sounded warmer, deeper and richer, from the first moment he started to rehearse. How he did that is difficult to tell … he always gave us musicians the feeling he trusted you, that he was there to help, not to interfere.”

In 1956, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouworkest for the first time and together they would play more than 1,500 concerts across the globe. Besides his modesty, his humanity, his musical taste, and his honesty to the music, three words come to mind when one thinks of Haitink and his orchestra: Sound, Trust and Magic. Jörgen van Rijen, Principal trombone of the Concertgebouworkest, said at a memorial concert in February this year, “Every time with him [Haitink] the orchestra sounded warmer, deeper and richer, from the first moment he started to rehearse. How he did that is difficult to tell … he always gave us musicians the feeling he trusted you, that he was there to help, not to interfere.”

In 1956, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouworkest for the first time and together they would play more than 1,500 concerts across the globe. Besides his modesty, his humanity, his musical taste, and his honesty to the music, three words come to mind when one thinks of Haitink and his orchestra: Sound, Trust and Magic. Jörgen van Rijen, Principal trombone of the Concertgebouworkest, said at a memorial concert in February this year, “Every time with him [Haitink] the orchestra sounded warmer, deeper and richer, from the first moment he started to rehearse. How he did that is difficult to tell … he always gave us musicians the feeling he trusted you, that he was there to help, not to interfere.”

Bernard Haitink - Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra - Live - The Radio Recordings (1999) {14CD Box Set Q Disc 97014}
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© 1999 Q Disc | 97014
Classical / Orchestral

This huge set is "an initiative of Radio Netherlands (the Dutch World Service) and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra…" presented to Bernard Haitink on his seventieth birthday as a tribute to his consummate musicmaking." Haitink, born in Amsterdam in 1929, became joint chief Conductor of the Concertebouw in 1961, along with Eugen Jochum, and was its chief conductor from 1963 to 1988. Like his predecessor, Eduard van Beinum, Haitink also was principal conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, from 1967 to 1979, and in 1978 became musical Director of the Glyndebourne Opera. Ten years later he became musical director of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. Haitink guest conducted most of the major orchestras of the world and has received numerous awards for his services to music. In January 1999 Haitink was named "Honorary Conductor of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra."

Brahms - Complete Symphonies and Concertos (2010) {Arrau, Szeryng, Starker, RCO, Haitink} (7CD Decca 478 2365 rec 1969-1980)
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© 1969-80, 2010 Decca Music / Universal | 478 2365
Classical / Romantic / Orchestral / Concerto / Symphony

Bernard Haitink conducts the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Brahms’s great orchestral works, including the complete symphonies. The concertos feature three great soloists: pianist Claudio Arrau, violinist Henryk Szeryng, and cellist Janos Starker. "No one, I trust, will deny that Arrau has lived with, wrestled with, and in a truly terribly way ’known’ the D minor Concerto for more years than most of us can consciously recall. Where contemporary pianists have often tended to refine or domesticate the concerto, withdrawing it from the world of heroic endeavour, Arrau has always done the reverse. No pianist, apart possibly from Serkin in his several recordings, has communicated so formidably the work’s scope: its seriousness and its anxious, tragic mood. Often Arrau makes free with the text. But the vision is huge, the technique astonishing. Haitink is a worthy accompanist."

RCO - Anthology of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Vol 3, 1960-1970 (2005) {14CD Box Set RCO 05001, Limited Edition}
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© 1960-70, 2005 Radio Netherlands Music / RCO LIve | RCO 05001
Classical / Orchestral

Despite rumors some months ago that the RCOA series might be discontinued (fortunately unfounded), here we have Volume III, a 14-CD set that contains much of interest, but surely—for this collector—doesn't live up to its potential. For me, ideally that would concist of some of the outstanding performances of great symphonic music played by this magnificent orchestra, recorded in the extraordinary acoustics of the Concertgebouw with the usual Radio Nederland sonic expertise. During the decade represented in this set (1960-1970) the Concertgebouw Orchestra's programming often emphasized contemporary music and that surely is reflected in this album. We have well over five hours of music by Martin, Varèse, Berg, Webern, Henze, Lutoslawski, Nono and Dallapiccola as well as Dutch composers Ketting, Escher, and Vermeulen, and Polish composer Grazyna Bacewicz's Music for Strings, Trumpets and Percussion, an 18-minute three-movement work of imagination and vivid scoring.

RCO - Anthology of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Volume 5, 1980-1990 (2008) {14CD Box Set, RCO 06005} (Complete Artwork)
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© 1980-90, 2008 Radio Netherlands Music / RCO LIve | RCO 06005
Classical / Orchestral

The Anthology of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra is a transcription in sound of the concert-giving history of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, based upon radio recordings from the archives of Dutch Radio and Radio Netherlands World Service. Six decades of the 20th century are put under the spotlight in six boxes, each containing 14 CDs. We have chosen not only legendary performances under chief conductors of the KCO but also concerts led by countless guest conductors of both greater and lesser renown.