Repertoire: The BEST Beethoven Seventh Symphony 

Same here, Szell's Beethoven Symphonies was the first box set I ever purchased, and I loved listening to it back in the day, but personally, I think there are better performances of the 7th. I'm listening to Fritz Reiner's recording right now on another tab, and I just think it's better than Szell's, in every regard really.

My pleasure! But always smell before tasting.

Walter skipped all the repeats!

I imprinted on this recording as a child in the early 1970s. Walter is still my dad’s favorite interpreter of LvB symphonies above all others, for the warmth. Thanks for mentioning this one since Dave didn’t. Certainly some of the tempos are slower than ideal, but not so slow as to ruin the musical content.

But think of the poor orchestra musicians forever getting war post traumatic anxiety every time they were listening to this joyous symphony

There's a video on Ormandy that you can check out!

Loved his 7th and 3rd! I'm amazed on the recent DG remastering how they softened the sound of those fairly shrill Command originals. Recommended!

@@brtherjohn Great to find another admirer of that oft-overlooked bargain set. Wonderful playing, including the clarinet squawk in the repeat of the expo in 4/i. Yes, very highly recommended!

The Steinberg Beethoven 7th was my Favorite LP when I was a kid.

I think Beethoven had something else in mind in the first movement repeat other than just (or only) sticking closely to form. See my main thread comment from one day ago.

David loves the Leibowitz! Great minds think alike, I guess!

The Kubelik Vienna Phil 7th is terrific. Love that one.

I once dated a girl in college whose major was pre- and post-tonal music. I asked her, "Why are you ignoring the only stuff everyone cares about?" Happy listening!

I gave my opinion of Kleiber in the talk. And yes, of course I've heard the others!

@@DavesClassicalGuide Oops, I stopped listening just before your Szell entry, agreeing with you about that one and thinking you had no more to say. Lesson learned: listen to everything you have to say!

When you do rehear the Szell,I would certainly like to hear your opinion.

I agree with you; Klemperer is magnificent!

​@@frankgyure3154 Gave a listen to the Szell finally. Sound is really wonderful in the big box...not as close in as I remembered it, but allows plenty of detail, which is the strongpoint of the performance, imho. I think Szell's handling of transitions belie the standard dictum that he was an unyielding taskmaster. Actually some of his Brahms strikes me as wandering around TOO much, but here it works wonderfully (things like the last big crescendo at the end of the 1st mvt.). However, I find, in the end a certain lack of characterization keeps it from my absolute top echelon. I wish he had coupled the incisiveness with a LITTLE bit of grunt and grime....Casals has that, of course, but with certainly a less "professional" sheen. Each has it's virtues. Szell is nowhere near a Karajan kind of sheen, but I was surprised to find it there even this much. I pulled out the Konwitschny Gewandhaus version, and wow, did that impress this time around! Is it Kapellmeister-ish? If so, it's a whole gamut of shades of grey, like a B&W etching with a ton of detail. Here was the characterization I craved from Szell..And the balances are nearly ideal. There's enough gruffness to satisfy me, and damn, the finale kicks out the exit with a great zing. There's a remaster of the set from 2017 that's much better than the old No-noised BC cds. Blomstedt/Dresden is delicious too.... I've got that on now. Btw, does ANY orchestra tune higher than Staatskapelle Dresden in that period? Wow, is that A 450 or something? Same with the Kempe R. Strauss recordings. Anyone have any insight into that? They can't have gotten the pitch wrong on every issue, right?

@@nealkurz6503 wow. Thank you for getting back to me. Really liked and surprised by your in-depth reply.

There is no shortage of electric 7ths--as well as quite a few diesel driven, steam powered, nuclear, and spring-loaded!

I like Davis very much. Masur, not, Konwitschny, OK, but really not competitive.

I find Krips' Beethoven to be very ordinary, but it just goes to show how personal this is. In general, I'm not sentimental about versions of works that I imprinted on or that gave me a thrill long ago. Even here, although I recommend Szell, an older version, I never heard his Beethoven cycle complete until it was issued on CD. My first Beethoven cycle was Cluytens, mixed with Steinberg, although I had the Toscanini 7th too.

Thank you for chiming in!

Since you brought what to avoid. I would add two. Pletnev/Pentatone (I think DH mentioned this as an avoid)and Thielemann/VPO/Sony. Both are cases of pushing and pulling and it’s unbelievably obvious

That is fine. I would only note that your "clinical" is my "audible." I appreciate your taking another crack as Szell. I just want to note that those performances are strikingly limited in what you can actually hear, and I can't believe that you have heard nothing since (never mind my preferences) that does not do far better justice to the music while being equally "unclinical."

I'll second the Monteux/LSO recording.

Indeed I love the Monteux too.

None of these are in order of "best." Szell is my favorite, but all of them are worthy in their way. I was not ranking them.

I have not been impressed by their overpriced recordings, and until something astonishing comes along I believe they are trading on their reputation(s).

I like the new petrenko/Berlin recording better than the the other relatively recent high profile 7ths from sets like Nelsons and Chailly. He gets playing out of them that reminds you that it’s the Berlin Phil unlike Chailly who makes the gewandhaus sound like an underplaying itty bitty chamber orchestra trying to do a period approach.

I've very seldom seen the Szell called a reference version. In fact, when I was coming up in the business in the early 80s the talk was all about Bernstein, Kleiber, Karajan and Solti. Szell was yesterday's news already.

See my reviews of the Mackerras Beethoven cycles on ClassicsToday.com.

I agree with everything you say

Don't worry. If it looks like it's going to be too painful I'll just delete the posting!

I'm not.

@@DavesClassicalGuide I kind of suspected that.....

Mackerras with the Liverpool's is amazing, indeed. And I have a fascination for Szell too. And I do not know why but I like very much Abendroth and Mengelberg, if I take abstraction of the so so sound. And I coukd have name all the seventh of the catalogue, because I like Beethoven so much. And here in Quebec, Yannick Nezet Seguin gave us a wonderfull seventh in concert that I will surely buy the recording when I will find it.

Mackerras' cycle in Hyperion is one of my very favourite. So agree with you.

@@josecarmona9168 Same here.

Totally agreed. Reiner is my favorite. The tension in the last movement is incredible. Plus there's a video. And Janos Starker is principal cello. Supposedly, Reiner was responsible for bringing Starker to the US.

Interesting theory, and quite possible. It is a terrific 7th whatever the reason.

The Allegretto is the second movement.

Thanks for letting me know!

I think his Rome cycle was the best Beethoven he did. It's not a favorite, but it deserves respect.

And thank God one major critic rates The Consecretation of the House! Every time I put it on I pray that Beethoven will keep it going for another couple of minutes.

If you know what the meaning of the word "apotheosis" is, then it makes perfect sense. The real issue is whether you agree with Wagner's statement or not. At the end of the day, it's just a cute quote.

I was to say exactly the same!!!!

I've always thought Wagner's observation was a reasonable one. Three of the four movements contain the most rustic and danceable rhythms of any Beethoven symphony and would, I imagine, be very exhilarating to dance to, and watch, if it were well coreographed. Whether or not it's the "apotheosis of the dance" is debatable but I get why he said it.

One of Wagner's biographers said that he wrote to figure out what he thought, by continuing to express opinions until he had tried them all. Probably he said somewhere else that the 7th was the apotheosis of sculpture. His unconscious mind was a genius; too bad about his conscious one!

Schuller was a panic. He and I had a screaming fight about that book at the MIDEM convention in France--it was great fun.

@@DavesClassicalGuide Go on; more details about the substance of your argument / disagreement, please, and do tell what provoked tensions to rise to a shouting match...!^^

@@colinwrubleski7627 It was just a good, clean, vigorous debate about his insane theory of dynamics (that no orchestral instrument should be louder in a tutti than the volume produced by the weakest member of the ensemble).

@@DavesClassicalGuide Yet he brings out other valid points about rhythm and balance that are worth attending to. In the first movement of 7, for example, he claims that many conductors fail to have their orchestras play the dotted eighth-sixteenth-eighth 6/8 rhythm correctly. Somewhere in the Books-with-Craft, Stravinsky makes a similar point that the 6/8 rhythms in one recording he heard devolve into 2/4. I'll give Schuller props too in his own recording of LvB 5 for bringing out balances not always heard (the winds in one passage of the slow movement, and the piccolo-contrabassoon-trombones in the finale).

Mark Obert-Thorn did a very good xfer for Pristine Classical recently. He strikes a very good balance between cleaning up debris and leaving the full range of the recording intact. He also included the alternate first take of the first side, since the original one was damaged at some point and a 2nd (faster) take was substituted. Does Opus Kura include that?

Neither. I just haven't mentioned them. That's all, and there's no real reason. I stand by the initial recommendations. That's part of the point--there's just too much out there, period.

Vanska's 7th is one of my current favorites.

Maybe Beethoven intended the first movement exposition repeat (or at least the repeated note at the start of it) to sound irritating -- see my main thread comment from one day ago.

Agreed, one of the best performances I have ever heard, in my opinion, better than Szell. I also like Solti's rendition of Beethoven's 7th, it has a different tone from Reiner's, meaning it doesn't have the edge that Reiner's does, it's more rounded and smooth, but it's also got a fuller sound because of that, and it's still crisp, not soft at all.

@@mydogskips2 Yes, I like both of Solti's famous recordings. Another conductor that put out tons of great stuff yet never seems too make anyone's list.

Did I say that? Fabulous! A Freudian slip for sure!

@@DavesClassicalGuide I think you started to say performance, and switched, mid-word, to version... Made me laugh.

@@JackBurttrumpetstuff You're very kind to give me the benefit of the doubt, but I like your first interpretation!

@@DavesClassicalGuide Well, you did LIKE the recording...

Wow - I really did raise an eyebrow, then I thought, no, he couldn't have said that... I guess he did really say it. Delicious.

Glad someone mentioned Steinberg!

Completely agreed--I was just going to write basically the same comment. This truly is an under-rated and under-noticed performance. And it's in EMI's superb Davis early recordings box, not to be missed.

I agree too. It tends to get overlooked. Barnstorming performance and one of Davis greatest recordings.

Oh, there are many without Szell recommendations, but in the basic German repertoire he was pretty hard to beat.

@@DavesClassicalGuide Bernstein version is magnificent! Thanks for the tip

actually it is Sael, with an s at the beginning, and with ae in the middle. it means wind in Hungarian

@@leonardodavinci5779 I will ask my sister-in-law. She is Hungarian.

I've always heard Zell, or Sell, and occasionally Tzell. Accepted if not correct.

@@jefolson6989 sell is closest. tzell is wrong, there is no t in it. z is for not pronunce it "sh" . it's the opposite of the polish

@@hmhparis1904 I thought the exact same thing!

In Hungarian, however, it is indeed Sell (ˈsɛl). But ... we don't care :-)

No, we don't.

What is there to say? The remark is incredibly stupid on its face. As to Savall, there's no reason you have to like it, and whether you do or don't it has not special claim to authority or "authenticity," whatever that is.

You know it's all relative. Kleiber is very good, but I think you can do better. That's all.

You’re not alone. The 2, 3, 5, 7 and 9 from that set are phenomenal. The 5/7 disc is absolutely stunning, Dohnanyi really has something to say musically in each symphony, and the sound is early digital Telarc perfection.

I actually love both of them. I'd probably pick Szell if I have to pick only one, but I totally agree that Dohnanyi's 7th is really great one. Especially the 4th movement!