Williamson Also Sprach Zarathustra

Following critical acclaim for their world premiere recording of Stravinsky’s Funeral Song, the Lucerne Festival Orchestra and Riccardo Chailly return with a new collaboration featuring some of the greatest works in the orchestral repertoire by Richard Strauss, including Also sprach Zarathustra and Till Eulenspiegel, recorded live at the opening concert of the Lucerne Festival, 2017.

Celebrating one of the most revered conductors of the 20th century, this series was originally released to commemorate Herbert von Karajan’s 100th birthday in 2008. Using innovate technology to recreate the original concert acoustics, the audio for these DVDs has been re-recorded at the Philharmonic Hall in Berlin and the Musikverein in Vienna, Karajan’s two favourite concert venues, to create re-mastered surround-sound versions of these classic performances. With each DVD featuring von Karajan conducting either the Berlin Philharmonic or Vienna Philharmonic orchestras, two of the highest regarded orchestras in the world, this series really does marry the greatest music, the highest calibre performers, and the best possible audio-visual presentation.

Steinberg's tenure at the helm of the Boston Symphony was cut short by illness, but his relatively slim catalogue of recordings with the orchestra produced several important examples of his art, boasting truly fine interpretations and spectacular playing. These orchestral showpieces by Strauss and Holst were long overdue for reissue. Steinberg's fast tempos make the Strauss work zip by; it's as if he takes it in one big gulp, creating as exciting a performance as you're likely to hear.

It’s interesting that Georg Solti’s recordings of Strauss tone poems seem never to have gotten the attention that they deserve. True, he did not program them with the same frequency and comprehensiveness that he did Strauss’ contemporary Mahler, but Solti’s credentials as an exciting and idiomatic conductor of the operas have never been questioned. He knew and worked with the composer personally from his days at the helm of the Munich opera after the Second World War, and more to the point, he plays this music with just the kind of directness and virtuosity that it demands.

This Blu-ray disc features rising star conductor Andris Nelsons leading the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in a program of popular Richard Strauss orchestral works: Till Eulenspiegel, Macbeth and Also Sprach Zarathustra. Andris Nelsons is one of todays most sought-after young conductors, having worked with the worlds most important orchestras including the Berlin, Vienna, New York, Royal Concertgebouw and Philharmonia Orchestras. He is a regular guest at Covent Garden, the MET, Wiener and Deutsche Staatsoper and at Bayreuth.

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Fritz Reiner, delivers a transcendent rendition of Richard Strauss’s masterpieces, “Also sprach Zarathustra” and “Don Juan.” This recording captures the grandeur and profound depth of Strauss’s compositions, with the orchestra’s performance exuding both technical precision and emotive power.

Järvi’s version of Zarathustra strikes me as one of the finest ever, a recording to stand alongside those of Reiner, Karajan and Previn. The performance of the opening ‘Sunrise’ makes such an impact that I initially wondered whether the rest of the piece might sound anticlimactic in comparison, but Järvi sustains the intensity through to the end…. The eloquence of the orchestra’s strings also makes a strong impression in Metamorphosen…