Search - Beethoven, Kubelik, Philharmonia :: Gieseking Plays Beethoven Concertos for Piano

Historic early stereo from 1945!

Timothy L. Smith | Fontana, CA United States | 06/30/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a piece of musical history. The "Emperor" concerto happens to be the only surviving complete work in true stereo of the experimental recordings done by Telefunken toward the end of World War II. As a sound experiment it is amazing, but as a front row seat to the complex and conflicted world of Germany at that time, it is downright chilling. First, the sound is quite good, with a tiny bit of tape hiss and occasionally congested louder portions due to the limitations of the experimental first-generation stereo tape equipment. Second, the Grosses Funkorchester of Berlin had lost a good many of its best musicians to the camps by this time, and that fact rattles around the back of your mind as you listen. Third, during a soft passage in the adagio, antiaircraft guns can clearly be heard in the distance, instantly bringing us back to where and when this was recorded. Fourth, from a philosopical standpoint, it is chilling to listen to such glorious, good music performed without any apparent irony by a society that was not yet done with its reign of terror -- what contradictions the human species is capable of!"