Evgeny Svetlanov is very revered among Russians. He was a great conductor, a great world-class artist, albeit with his own peculiarities bordering on problems. We love Evgeny Svetlanov for his bright soul, for his dedication to music and Russian culture, and for his "Anthology of Russian Music" - a feat that no one will ever repeat. I agree with Dave's opinion of Svetlanov from the outside, but I assure you: all of this pales before his strengths as a conductor. I have studied many memoirs of him from his contemporaries, many of whom spoke of him with warmth and admiration. He was also an opera conductor, and I listened to his recording of Tosca, which I enjoyed. As a composer he also deserves attention, his symphony and his concerto for piano and orchestra could easily find their audience and listeners today. And he was also a virtuoso pianist with a deep and penetrating sound and a truly Russian sense of musicality. We love Evgeny Svetlanov, he is a true asset to our culture.
Very fortunate to have witnessed Svetlanov conduct in London. Tchaikovsky First Symphony and Rachmaninov's The Bells in April 2002 - a revelation. Little did I know then that was to be his very last concert.
I ordered this Rachmaninoff set two weeks ago, after you mentioned it the first time, from an Amazon third-party vendor (in Japan). Not cheap. I paid $73 for the discs and $52 for rapid shipping, and they arrived within the week. Have just started working my way through it. Am glad you reconfirmed your approbation, so I look forward to hearing the rest. At the time, I already had two of his Tchaikovsky cycles, one set on laserdisc and the other on CD. So I ordered the other two CD sets, and they have arrived. The hardest to find was the Melodiya set from 1969, which I had to order from Australia. It does sound great, too. So at the moment I am in total Svetlanov-immersion mode.
I love the Rachmaninoff piano concerto recordings of Svetlanov and the late Japanese pianist Hiroko Nakamura. The Rach 2 is easy to find. Rach 1, 3 and Paganini Rhapsody are hard to find
I bought these recently from Tower Records in Shibuya, Tokyo they are SACDs and sound stunning! (I believe most imports are CDs). The performances are tremendous especially the first symphony which is white hot. Definitely my go to recordings of these wonderful works. They knock the pants off the likes of Previn, Jansons and even Ashkenazy in the first symphony.
As always love the history! Request for Dave - the Sony Copland box coming out (I never seem to hear of Copland anymore) and the Andres box coming out shortly 😁
tremendous set. I bought it on your first recommendation and was blown away by it. Would love to get ahold of his recording of Three Russian (choral) Songs which my memory places on a Melodiya lp coupled with Symphonic Dances. Recording seems to have totally disappeared if ever on cd.
The Russian Songs were on Disc 4 of Volume 3 of Anthology of Russian and Soviet Symphonic Music, coupled with The Bells and Spring. The 11 CD box seems elusive now, but it's all on streaming at the moment.
Exton also has a complete edition with Ashkenazy and the Sydney Symphony, but on six disks. Does one set have more music than the other? I'll look into adding the Svetlanov to the heap just because the orchestral playing has got to be better than the Australian group.
The Ashkenazy/Sydney set does include extra stuff, like the so-called "Youth" symphony, scenes from Aleko and Etudes Tableaux orchestrated by Respighi.
I used to like the "raw" sound of Russian orchestras in Soviet recordings. I thought it was a national characteristic. Now I learn it was just lousy engineering.
