Otto Klemperer - The Vox Recordings (2002) [6CD Box Set]

Embarking for Europe after a decade in America, Klemperer returned to the recording studio for the first time in 15 years. A year earlier George Mendelssohn-Bartholdy had started Vox as an independent label that initially licensed European masters for US release but sought to expand into original productions, just as Klemperer needed a vehicle to rebuild his career. In part to save costs, for their first project an ad hoc "Pro Musica Orchestra" was assembled in Paris to record all six Bach Brandenburg Concertos and the Mozart Eine Kleine Nachtmusik during a single highly productive week in July 1946. Each concerto was issued in a separate album of two or three 12" 78s (with short Bach fillers for the final sides of #s 1 and 3) but apparently had weak distribution (on Polydor in France and Vox in the US) and disappointing sales, and so the arrangement lapsed until early 1950, even though Klemperer's contract had anticipated four sessions per year. (Although either party was able to terminate upon notice, it was an exclusive contract, which perhaps explains why Klemperer made no recordings in the interim.) In February 1950 a further Paris session with the Pro Musica yielded the Mozart Symphonies 25 and 36 ("Linz"), followed in November with the Schubert Symphony # 4 credited to the Lamoureux Orchestra (leading to speculation that the Pro Musica had been drawn from it). By then LP sales had taken off and the Klemperer/Vox collaboration shifted into high hear with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra (an outfit reconstituted after WWII and not to be confused with the venerable Vienna Philharmonic). The Beethoven Missa Solemnis and "Pastoral" Symphony and Bruckner Symphony # 4 all were dispatched in five days and by June four more symphonies, three piano concertos and Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde followed and received wide distribution throughout Europe and even Australia and Japan. The arrangement ruptured for good when Klemperer had time to record only the first two movements of Mendelssohn's Symphony # 3 ("Scottish") before embarking on a concert tour; it was completed by the obscure Herbert Haefner and then released under Klemperer's name without his consent.


Tracks:

CD 1 :

Mozart: Symphony No. 25 in G minor K.183
Mozart: Symphony No. 36 in C major "Linz" K.425
Pro Musica Orchestra

Schubert : Symphony No. 4 in C minor "Tragedy" D417
Orchestre Lamoureux

CD 2 :

Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 3 in A minor Op.56
Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 in A Op.90
Vienna Symphony Orchestra

CD 3 :

Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 in C minor Op.67
Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 in F major Op.68
Vienna Symphony Orchestra

CD 4 :

Beethoven: Missa Solemnis in D major, Op. 123
Ilona Steingruber (soprano), Else Schürhoff (alto), Erich Majkut (tenor), Otto Wiener (bass)
Wiener Akademiechor, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Otto Klemperer

CD 5-6 :

Bach, J S: Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 1-6 BWV1046-1051
Pro Musica Orchestra

Mozart: Serenade No. 13 in G major, K525 'Eine kleine Nachtmusik'
Vienna expert Orchestra