Hans Knappertsbusch - Wiener Festwochen 1962 - Beethoven & Wagner with Nilsson & BackhausDVD5 - NTSC - 4:3 - All Regions - PCM Mono, Dolby Digital Mono - 81min.
Subtitles: English, French, Spanish, Italian
Tdk 2006
Beethoven: Leonora Overture No. 3, Op. 72a
Beethoveen: Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 4 in G major, Op. 58
Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Vorspiel, Isoldes Liebestod ("Mild und leise")
Hans Knappertsbusch, Birgit Nilsson, Wilhelm Backhaus
Vienna Philharmonic
Knappertsbusch was undoubtedly one of the last of a generation of great German conductors, a ‘Director of Music’ in the best sense of the word. Knappertsbusch hated superficiality and showmanship on the rostrum; he generally conducted from the score and used gestures sparingly. He used to say, "I can after all read music," and he was perfectly able to defend highly unconventional interpretations convincingly. The orchestra loved him, his quirky manner, his dislike of too many rehearsals. His unsentimental straightforwardness and even his sarcastic humour, however, did not always win him friends. This is an unmistakable Knappertsbusch document, which, in the truest sense of the word, will convey a picture of the great conductor to later generations. The excerpts from Wagner’s Tristan, with whose interpretation Knappertsbusch had so often set the standard in Vienna, Munich and Bayreuth, show clearly just what distinguishes this conductor above all others: concentration on the essential, suspense from within and a depth of feeling which does not need to resort to sentimentality and superficiality. --Comment Amazon
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