Product Review

The Austrian conductor Karl Böhm is one of the towering conductors of the 20th Century. As the embodiment of the long Austro-German musical tradition, he helped to write musical history. This 19-CD set assembles all the extant recordings he conducted for EMI (notably its German Electrola label) over the period 1935 to 1949 in Dresden, Berlin, Vienna and London includes a number of rarities and the world premiere release of a version of Mozart’s Serenata notturna recorded in Vienna in 1947. It was during these years that Böhm cemented his reputation as a major conductor of Austro-German repertoire.Collectors will also be pleased to know that this set contains all the recordings that featured in the now-iconic series of Dresden-themed LP boxes released by EMI to mark Böhm’s 85th birthday in 1979.

 Repertoire - The vast majority of the set is devoted to the mainstream Austro-German orchestral and operatic repertoire closely associated with Böhm. - It also includes shorter works (orchestral works or operatic arias) by other composers from Central Europe and from France, Italy and Russia - The 1947 Vienna recording of Mozart’s Serenata notturna has never before been released in any format. Performers - Among the soloists featured on the set are: o Pianists Walter Gieseking, Edwin Fischer, Wilhelm Backhaus o Violinists Wolfgang Schneiderhan and Willi Boskovsky o Singers Kirsten Flagstad, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Margarete Teschemacher, Christel Goltz, Elisabeth Höngen, Torsten Ralf, Set Svanholm, Paul Schöffler o The orchestras Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden; Berliner Philharmoniker; Wiener Philharmoniker; Philarmonia Orchestra Remastering - All the recordings in the set have been carefully remastered in 24BIT/96Khz from the best sources available - All the Dresden recordings have been remastered from the tapes prepared for the iconic LP boxes that EMI released to celebrate Böhm’s 85th birthday in 1979. - The digital master of the previously unreleased 1947 Vienna recording of the Serenata notturna has been created from a newly-manufactured positive metal master, taken from the original positive metal master that was found in the archive.