This luxurious hardcover edition, designed by painter and sculptor Thomas Scheibitz, comprises 24 SACDs (CD compatible) containing all 23 surviving live recordings of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Herbert von Karajan from the period 1953-1969 in chronological order. The vast majority of the live repertoire performed is also available in studio recordings.
The accompanying lavishly produced booklet, featuring numerous photographs alongside essays by, among others, Karajan biographer Peter Uehling and music publicist James Jolly, follows the style of previous sets released by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.
With this — following the publication of Wilhelm Furtwängler's radio recordings from 1939-1945 — the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra releases its second major historical edition and an important milestone in documenting the media history of this world-renowned orchestra.
In the foreword to this edition, two orchestra members, violinist Philipp Bohnen and cellist Olaf Maninger, write that it was part of Karajan's philosophy to rehearse so thoroughly that he could make himself dispensable during the concert — 'like an observing creator'. And: 'The performances on stage were particularly impressive when he not only loosened the reins with complete confidence in his musicians, but let them go entirely. This willingness to take risks and the inherent danger of failure form the basis of the incomparable allure of a live performance, which we experience in the most literal sense — while we sometimes merely admire studio recordings that have been perfected in every detail with the latest sound technology.' Do they have a point? More on that later.
This richly appointed edition comprises all live recorded concerts, a total of 23, from the period 1953-1969. The original tapes used come from the {{NOTRANSLATE_1}}(RIAS) and the{{NOTRANSLATE_2}}(SFB) and have been specially digitized in high resolution for this purpose. Most of them have never been released before and are consistent with the concerts as they took place at the time. This also provides insight into Karajan's — albeit limited — dramaturgical development as a whole.
Karajan conducted the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra for the first time in April 1938, a debut that already caused quite a stir and mostly led to positive reviews. It's hardly surprising then that after Furtwängler's death in 1954, it was Karajan who took over the leadership of a US concert tour in 1955 that had been planned long in advance with Furtwängler. Again the success was substantial, which soon led to Karajan's appointment as chief conductor for life in 1956. Throughout his long career with the orchestra, he shaped both the artistic and media-friendly development of the orchestra like no conductor before him. Karajan left in April 1989, shortly before his death on July 16 of that year, preceded by considerable controversy surrounding clarinetist Sabine Meyer, whom Karajan believed deserved a place in the orchestra, which, however, strongly opposed her appointment. This was still in a time when a woman as an orchestra member was not welcome.
Titania-Palast, Berlin (1956)
No classical musician has made and sold more recordings than Karajan, but after his death, the musical world had little more to say about him or his musical legacy. The reasons are a matter of speculation, but it seems likely that the rise of historically informed performance practice, gradually spreading across all genres, played an important role.
Karajan's conducting style quickly fell out of favor in the nineties. Apart from historically informed performance practice, other aspects may have contributed as well, such as his authoritarian behavior, the theatrical element (conducting with closed eyes), his attraction to the jet set (including his own private jet and high-speed cars), and the cult status that derived from it.
Musically, from the seventies onward, his growing preference for 'cosmetic enhancement' of the orchestral sound became apparent, along with an increasing obsession with perfection according to his own perception, with which no one else could differ even slightly.
This striving toward the 'perfectionist model' evolved in the mid-sixties, when video, in addition to audio, became an important driving force for Karajan. He had become fascinated by the technology of image and sound and was firmly convinced that this combination could greatly contribute to the worldwide appreciation of classical music.
From that period dates his collaboration with French film director, screenwriter, and producer Henri-Georges Clouzot (1907-1977), a true heavyweight in his field with a string of highly successful films includingLe Corbeau(1943), The Wages of Fear(1953) andLes Diaboliques(1955). Films that displayed Clouzot's pessimistic view of mankind.
With Clouzot, himself a great music lover, Karajan worked on an extremely ambitious project for German television: an intended series of as many as thirteen films on the art of conducting:The Art of Conducting. Between 1965-1967, five films were ultimately completed, in which we see and hear Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic at work during rehearsals and concerts. And as was typical for Karajan: prepared down to the smallest detail.
This striving toward the 'perfectionist model' evolved in the mid-sixties, when video, in addition to audio, became an important driving force for Karajan. He had become fascinated by the technology of image and sound and was firmly convinced that this combination could greatly contribute to the worldwide appreciation of classical music.
From that period dates his collaboration with French film director, screenwriter, and producer Henri-Georges Clouzot (1907-1977), a true heavyweight in his field with a string of highly successful films includingLe Corbeau(1943), The Wages of Fear(1953) andLes Diaboliques(1955). Films that displayed Clouzot's pessimistic view of mankind.
With Clouzot, himself a great music lover, Karajan worked on an extremely ambitious project for German television: an intended series of as many as thirteen films on the art of conducting:The Art of Conducting. Between 1965-1967, five films were ultimately completed, in which we see and hear Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic at work during rehearsals and concerts. And as was typical for Karajan: prepared down to the smallest detail.
With Henri-Georges Clouzot (1969) (photo Siegfried Lautenwasser)
The collaboration began with a documentary in which Karajan was filmed by Clouzot during rehearsals and a performance of Schumann's Fourth Symphony with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. The two clicked, and they admired each other's work.
Soon after Clouzot's death, Telemondial came into play, the production company founded and financed by Karajan himself, which was established to continue Clouzot's work unabridged, but subsequently expanded further by making the productions (concerts, opera) suitable for specific digital platforms as well. In this respect, too, Karajan was a pioneer. It led to a large number of projects, most of which are now available onStage+, the streaming platform operated by Deutsche Grammophon.
The 'perfectionist model': for Karajan, absolutely nothing was left to chance. Everything and everyone was meticulously choreographed. While it was indeed about the music, the visual presentation of it had to be created with a clear vision—his, of course. For the orchestra members, this involved matters such as uniformity, with as little movement as possible, which moreover had to be strictly coordinated, no exaggerated physical expression, clothing tailored to the occasion, and so on. Karajan's own role in both the direction and editing determined to a large and often decisive extent the final result.
Because this entire process had to be meticulously prepared and executed, it left little to no room for taking risks. A straitjacket, then, from which no one could—let alone wanted to—escape. Not only was Karajan the absolute master of this process, but there were also substantial financial interests involved, including those of the orchestra members.
Audio tape of the concert on April 25, 1957 at the Hochschule für Musik with Beethoven's Ninth Symphony on the program
From his studio recordings with the Philharmonia Orchestra in London, founded by the renowned producer Walter Legge in the late 1940s and early 1950s, it is crystal clear that Karajan was primarily focused on rhythmic vitality at that time, not, as in his Berlin years, on a more voluptuous sound, with absolute control as the counterbalance to spirituality, liveliness, and emotion. It cut both ways, with sterile beauty and stylistic uniformity (the contrast between different stylistic periods is partly or completely smoothed over or even eliminated). The theatrical and sensuously bombastic is no worthwhile substitute.
Both on the concert podium and in the studio, Karajan the perfectionist dominated, tireless, consistent, and tenacious. The better the orchestra, the more it comes to the fore. This is also evident from these live recordings, particularly those from the mid-sixties onward. Earlier recordings show a more expressive, spontaneous range of action, although the differences are still relatively minor. Karajan's recordings with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra of that period also attest to this.
Karajan the 'control freak': the influential producer Walter Legge, already mentioned, noticed it early on: the exceptional precision, the unparalleled control for that time, the refinement of sound. Just as there was that shared goal: to harness the great artistic potential of studio recordings and, in this context, to maintain a very high quality standard. It has produced many groundbreaking recordings.
Legge (who played an essential role in Karajan's postwar career) once said: "Over the years his (Karajan's, AvdW) interpretations have varied little in tempo, texture, and form, probably because he did not play a work until he had convinced himself how it should sound."
'How it should sound' also applied to, for example, Arnold Schoenberg's Orchestral Variations op. 31. During the recordings in the early seventies, Karajan experimented with various orchestra seating arrangements with a view to achieving the acoustic balance he desired, but also to allow the complex textures to come into their own as much as possible. Each variation brought a different positioning: instrumental groups were relocated or sometimes just a single instrument was moved based on the idea that what was possible in the studio was impractical in the concert hall (Schoenberg's op. 31 is part of CD 23, the concert at the Philharmonie on February 3, 1969, oddly enough in mono). Of course, criticism came later: that there was 'technical manipulation,' but the conductor countered by pointing to the necessity he felt to convey the composer's intentions as faithfully as possible.
We hear this reflected in the live performances (which also served as preparation for the eventual studio recording), though with the caveat that these are typically radio recordings (some also in mono) and therefore less 'polished' than the studio recordings made in the sixties by Deutsche Grammophon in the Jesus-Christus-Kirche in Dahlem, a suburb of Berlin, with its exceptional acoustics for recording, and from October 1963 onwards in the newly inaugurated Berlin Philharmonie.
Even in those radio recordings, I detected little evidence of Karajan's willingness to take real risks, to make music spontaneously in the heat of the moment. There are differences between live and studio, but they generally limited themselves to details in voice-leading and balance (insofar as the recording quality doesn't get in the way of judgment). And when something occasionally went wrong, that's the logical consequence of 'live' performance.
Risk and spontaneity go hand in hand. Violist Philipp Bohnen and cellist Olaf Maninger believed—as mentioned earlier—that this was the case under Karajan's direction, but the surviving radio recordings don't bear this out: the canvas is consistent, only the fine-meshed 'wiring' occasionally lights up just slightly differently. It seems more like suggested spontaneity emerging from meticulously prepared details (anyone familiar with Karajan's rehearsals knows exactly what I mean).
The shift to stereo in the sixties meant more (also suggested) spatial quality and detail, but the technology itself had also advanced. Karajan, always deeply interested in that technology, seized every new opportunity or development with both hands. He involved himself intensively and often forcefully in the work of 'sound engineers' like Hans Weber, Hans Hirsch, Otto Gerdes, and Günther Hermanns (which they didn't always appreciate), but he had little or no influence over the radio recordings. Added to which, stereo was already in widespread use when broadcasting was still limited to mono: it wasn't until 1967 that the first stereo recording appeared, a live concert from the Philharmonie on October 22 (CD 16). While there's nothing wrong with those mono recordings, provided they're not listened to on headphones or through two speakers.
As Karajan's collaboration with the Berliner Philharmoniker intensified, the sound also took on a more homogeneous character. The sound became 'smoother,' more polished and streamlined, which aroused much admiration at the time, both from the public and from critics.
The distinction between the sound of the fifties and that from the sixties onward is better expressed in the Beethoven cycles on EMI (Philharmonia Orchestra) and DG (Berliner Philharmoniker) than anywhere else. How important recording and playback technology was to Karajan in this respect is evident from the fact that whenever new technical developments arose, some of the repertoire already recorded earlier had to be re-recorded; but often with, from an artistic standpoint, inferior results (examples include Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony, Debussy's Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune and La Mer, and the Beethoven symphonies from the seventies and eighties; aside from the audiovisual cycle on LaserDisc released by Telemondial in the late eighties).
What all those different studio recordings do convey is Karajan's obsession with sound, with one of the most striking examples being the Ring of the Nibelungs recorded in connection with the Easter Festival in Salzburg that he founded, created in the period 1967-1970, and also a textbook example of Karajan's absolute control over everything and everyone (including stage direction).
A great deal has been written about Karajan and numerous documentaries have been devoted to him. Regarding his influence and his extravagances, the most (un)palatable anecdotes have been scattered about, but for the music lover today, the only thing that remains relevant is the musical content of the message and not so much the messenger.
The recently released 24 SACDs represent a snapshot in time that, while now firmly in the past, is certainly of great value and significance as a sound document in the context of our musical history. Not only because Karajan managed to elevate the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra to world-class status (his successor Claudio Abbado was extremely grateful to him for this), but also because his musical legacy still influences how we experience classical music. Although the stylistic characteristics of his conducting have come under criticism over the course of the nineties, through his charisma and the many initiatives he set in motion, he profoundly transformed the world of classical music. Some will be grateful to him for that, others perhaps not, but the fact itself cannot be denied.
Finally, a word about the SACD process as it relates to 'older' recordings. The digitization is carried out in high resolution (DXC, Digital eXtreme Definition or alternatively PCM, Pulse Code Modulation, 24 bit, 192 kHz). Next comes the conversion to DSD (Direct Digital Stream) 64 (1 bit, 2.8 MHz) or even higher, DSD 128. During remastering, the original is further optimized using noise reduction, equalization, and dynamic bandwidth processing. The DSD files thus mastered are prepared for SACD layering, after which the glass master is made to press the SACD discs. The result of all these efforts is (hopefully) an overall improvement in sound quality that is at least partially perceptible even on 'ordinary' CD players.
