Beethoven: Les 9 Symphonies [Box Set]

 (35 customer reviews)

For decades, I have considered this set, along with Konwitschny's, to be one of the two best ever recorded; and here is why:

Both sets wear better with each successive hearing, and both are monumental and devoid of mannerisms, or of any pretenses or straining for effects. Furthermore, unlike either of the 1950's & 1960's Karajan sets (first with the Philharmonia, and then with the Berlin Phil.), both the Cluytens and the Konwitschny sets communicate the humanity and warmth of Beethoven, and aren't at all steely cold.

Cluytens in this set introduced himself to the world as an astounding Beethoven conductor, after a career which had previously focused upon French music. This Belgian conductor had unfortunately become typecast as French because he built his career in Paris, but then in the 1950's he conducted several times at Bayreuth, and soon became recognized as a very great conductor of German music. EMI's Walter Legge had discovered him (along with Karajan and...Read more

This recording is both technically and artistically WONDERFUL. Beethovian power is pounding out in the room, and everything in your mind may be changed to just want to eternally listen to these wonderful recordings. I was stunned, and I realized why I became a dedicated fan to classical music after I first heard the Cluytens recording of the 5th and 8th symphony when I was a boy. This is THE music, THE life in the music. STRONGLY RECOMMENDED. - And the price is simply so low, you won't believe, that it is possible to get such marvelous music to that price!!!

What were the copyright holders thinking? This is a conductor and the Berlin Philharmonic at their finest. Classical Beethoven as it should be. Hidden away for so long that it never even made the guidebooks to classical music. Thankfully, the set is out of the closet and on the market. Overall quality and sound are superb. But buy it, before some short circuited executive retires it yet again.