Search - Johann II [Junior] Strauss, Ondrej Lenard, Vienna Johann Strauss Orchestra :: Strauss Jr: Most Famous Waltzes The Blue Danube

Enjoyable Performances of Delightful Music

Gontroppo | Bathurst, NSW Australia | 10/16/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This bargain-priced CD is a perfectly acceptable recording of Strauss Waltzes, and contains some of the most well-known ones. If you wanted one recording of Strauss Waltzes, this would be an ideal choice.



Confidently recommended"

Spacious recording, Viennese charm, grand selection

Leslie Richford | Selsingen, Lower Saxony | 11/05/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Although this disc can in no way compete with the musicianship and the atmospherics on Willi Boskovsky's New Year concerts with the Vienna Philharmonic, it is nonetheless praiseworthy and recommendable. Ondrej Lenard has proved often enough on disc that he is a fine conductor, and whenever one sees 'Festival Orchestra' on a CD label, one knows that the recording was (probably) made using musicians specially selected for this occasion. The thin Naxos booklet gives no details whatsoever, so it is anyone's guess who is really playing here. Nevertheless, the result is good: The recording is a good deal more direct and spacious than on many other early Naxos discs (this one was recorded in January 1988), and the playing (Strauss is taken at a comfortable speed) is rather attractive with a good deal of Viennese charm about it, despite being recorded in Bratislava in Slovakia. And the Waltz selection is grand: here are all those tunes that many of us grew up with and have always loved"