The Earliest Recording of Gustav Mahler’s Second Symphony: As a conductor, … Read Full Bio ↴The Earliest Recording of Gustav Mahler’s Second Symphony:
As a conductor, Oskar Fried (1871 – 1941) was not a great technician; but he was highly devoted to the music of Mahler. It was at Mahler’s own suggestion that Fried conducted a performance of the Second (Resurrection) Symphony in Berlin on 8 November 1905. Mahler attended the dress rehearsal and, according to Otto Klemperer who was in charge of the off-stage band, gave Fried a last minute coaching in the tempi and style of the work between the rehearsal and the performance.
In 1923 or 1924, Fried recorded the symphony. This was an extremely adventurous undertaking for an acoustic recording. Not only was it made entirely without the benefit of microphones, but at 83 minutes it was also the longest piece of music to have been recorded up to that time. Despite the natural limitations of acoustic recording, the recording is highly successful and can only have been achieved by means of careful planning and experimentation.
Balance is generally satisfactory, with the exception of a couple of places in the first movement, such as the oboe at bar 131, and the flute and solo violin in bars 217 – 221. As is normal for acoustic recordings, the tuba can sometimes be heard helping out the bassline and the percussion instruments are the most compromised. While the timpani sound good and are well tuned, the cymbals, when audible, sound more like a slapstick. In the Scherzo, the Ruthe (a birch brush used to tap the rim of the bass drum) clearly had to be brought close to the recording horn, and the triangle was replaced by pitched tubular bells that in places are startlingly loud.
In making the first-ever recording of a Mahler symphony, Fried must surely have tried to follow the detailed advice that Mahler gave him about it nearly twenty years earlier.
----
See the full article by Dr. David Pickett with extracts from the recording. The singers were Gertrud Bindernagel and Emmi Leisner, the orchestra was the Berliner Staatskapelle.
The second work of Gustav Mahler on this Naxos CD, "Kindertotenlieder", is conducted by Jascha Horenstein and sung by Heinrich Rehkemper, same orchestra as above.
As a conductor, Oskar Fried (1871 – 1941) was not a great technician; but he was highly devoted to the music of Mahler. It was at Mahler’s own suggestion that Fried conducted a performance of the Second (Resurrection) Symphony in Berlin on 8 November 1905. Mahler attended the dress rehearsal and, according to Otto Klemperer who was in charge of the off-stage band, gave Fried a last minute coaching in the tempi and style of the work between the rehearsal and the performance.
In 1923 or 1924, Fried recorded the symphony. This was an extremely adventurous undertaking for an acoustic recording. Not only was it made entirely without the benefit of microphones, but at 83 minutes it was also the longest piece of music to have been recorded up to that time. Despite the natural limitations of acoustic recording, the recording is highly successful and can only have been achieved by means of careful planning and experimentation.
Balance is generally satisfactory, with the exception of a couple of places in the first movement, such as the oboe at bar 131, and the flute and solo violin in bars 217 – 221. As is normal for acoustic recordings, the tuba can sometimes be heard helping out the bassline and the percussion instruments are the most compromised. While the timpani sound good and are well tuned, the cymbals, when audible, sound more like a slapstick. In the Scherzo, the Ruthe (a birch brush used to tap the rim of the bass drum) clearly had to be brought close to the recording horn, and the triangle was replaced by pitched tubular bells that in places are startlingly loud.
In making the first-ever recording of a Mahler symphony, Fried must surely have tried to follow the detailed advice that Mahler gave him about it nearly twenty years earlier.
----
See the full article by Dr. David Pickett with extracts from the recording. The singers were Gertrud Bindernagel and Emmi Leisner, the orchestra was the Berliner Staatskapelle.
The second work of Gustav Mahler on this Naxos CD, "Kindertotenlieder", is conducted by Jascha Horenstein and sung by Heinrich Rehkemper, same orchestra as above.
More Genres
No Artists Found
More Artists
Load All
No Albums Found
More Albums
Load All
No Tracks Found
Genre not found
Artist not found
Album not found
Search results not found
Song not found
nsampaladorman@gmail.com
I wanted choklet wenze zuba but I can't find it