Search - Ferruccio Busoni, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Spoken Word :: Busoni Recalled - The 1941 New York Commemorative Concert / Mitropoulos, New York PO

This CD preserves a 1941 concert with three great artists closely associated with Busoni in historically valuable performances that may never be equaled. Mitropoulos is masterful in the romanticized Mozart arrangement and the Sarabande and Cortege. Petri's irresistible Indian Fantasy for Piano and Orchestra, based on American Indian themes, tingles with life; he and Mitropoulos are incomparable in the atmospheric slow movement and the finale's rhythmic swing. Szigeti is as masterful in the 1897 Violin Concerto, superior to his 1954 Columbia studio recording, made when his technique no longer allowed him the tonal purity and command of line we hear in this performance. Classic in form, Romantic in feeling, the work has the characteristic Busonian mix of Germanic complexity with Italianate lightness. An indispensable disc, but the sound, while listenable, has patches of distortion and extraneous noise. --Dan Davis