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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
48 of 52 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
I started investigating and listening to classical music in late 2000 and into 2001. This Barenboim Beethoven cycle was recorded in 1999 and first released in 2000, so I must have just missed hearing about it and the acclaim it received. Fortunately I have now discovered it, and this 2004 reissue, which was lost in Amazon's cloud due to faulty labelling. This is a true Brilliant-style box, no jewel cases, six discs in cardboard sleeves and an excellent 108-page booklet.
With the emergence of the HIP (historically informed performance) movement, some Beethoven listeners have come to prefer the sleeker, faster style that was apparently the way the works were originally performed, which can be heard in the cycles led by Gardiner, Harnoncourt, Mackerras, Norrington and Zinman. Some conductors, like Claudio Abbado, have embraced the movement and recorded new cycles in the stripped-down style. But Daniel Barenboim is not part of that movement. His inspiration as a conductor is the great Wilhelm Furtwangler, and he consciously extends the German tradition that was developed across the 20th century, well-known to most classical music listeners. This is a fantastic Beethoven cycle on every level, with that understanding. The Staatskapelle Berlin has a deep, rich, burnished sound, and Barenboim's readings are masterful. Everyone who has heard these great works is likely to find places where they question a particular passage where the conductor takes a tempo or attack differently than in their favorite recording. But there is no question of Barenboim's vision and control, with some of Furtwangler's elan if not the seat-of-the-pants daring and stretching of tempos.
Having been listening to Beethoven and classical music for several years now, I have arrived at a point where I am increasingly likely to seek out a recording based on the orchestra. The Staatskapelle Berlin is not as well-known as the Berlin Philharmoniker, but it is one of Berlin's and Germany's finest symphony orchestras, with a long tradition. According to the liner notes, all of Beethoven's symphonies were heard in Berlin during the composer's lifetime, and the Berlin premieres were all by the Royal Prussian Court Orchestra, which is now the Staatskapelle Berlin. After World War II the SB was a leading East German (DDR) orchestra, and was led by Otmar Suitner through most of the DDR period. Today the SB shares the magnificent Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin, on the Unter den Linden on Museum Island, a World Heritage site. (It is currently closed for reconstruction, and performances have been moved to the Schiller Theater until 2013.) Daniel Barenboim (b. 1942) was voted Music Director for life by the musicians in 2000, and is still at the helm today. I have come to realize that beyond the Berlin Philharmoniker there are many fine German orchestras, including the Staatskapelle Dresden and the Staatskapelle Berlin which maintained the highest standards of music through the DDR years into the post-reunification period.
This Beethoven cycle is widely regarded as one of the finest recent state-of-the-art recordings. I can't recommend it more highly.
With the emergence of the HIP (historically informed performance) movement, some Beethoven listeners have come to prefer the sleeker, faster style that was apparently the way the works were originally performed, which can be heard in the cycles led by Gardiner, Harnoncourt, Mackerras, Norrington and Zinman. Some conductors, like Claudio Abbado, have embraced the movement and recorded new cycles in the stripped-down style. But Daniel Barenboim is not part of that movement. His inspiration as a conductor is the great Wilhelm Furtwangler, and he consciously extends the German tradition that was developed across the 20th century, well-known to most classical music listeners. This is a fantastic Beethoven cycle on every level, with that understanding. The Staatskapelle Berlin has a deep, rich, burnished sound, and Barenboim's readings are masterful. Everyone who has heard these great works is likely to find places where they question a particular passage where the conductor takes a tempo or attack differently than in their favorite recording. But there is no question of Barenboim's vision and control, with some of Furtwangler's elan if not the seat-of-the-pants daring and stretching of tempos.
Having been listening to Beethoven and classical music for several years now, I have arrived at a point where I am increasingly likely to seek out a recording based on the orchestra. The Staatskapelle Berlin is not as well-known as the Berlin Philharmoniker, but it is one of Berlin's and Germany's finest symphony orchestras, with a long tradition. According to the liner notes, all of Beethoven's symphonies were heard in Berlin during the composer's lifetime, and the Berlin premieres were all by the Royal Prussian Court Orchestra, which is now the Staatskapelle Berlin. After World War II the SB was a leading East German (DDR) orchestra, and was led by Otmar Suitner through most of the DDR period. Today the SB shares the magnificent Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin, on the Unter den Linden on Museum Island, a World Heritage site. (It is currently closed for reconstruction, and performances have been moved to the Schiller Theater until 2013.) Daniel Barenboim (b. 1942) was voted Music Director for life by the musicians in 2000, and is still at the helm today. I have come to realize that beyond the Berlin Philharmoniker there are many fine German orchestras, including the Staatskapelle Dresden and the Staatskapelle Berlin which maintained the highest standards of music through the DDR years into the post-reunification period.
This Beethoven cycle is widely regarded as one of the finest recent state-of-the-art recordings. I can't recommend it more highly.
21 of 24 people found the following review helpful
Format:MP3 Download
I am not a musician or a musicologist, but I know what I like. I couldn't tell a crochet from a quaver. Ludwig Van would have written his music to entertain folks like me, who would buy a ticket to see and hear his works performed. I love Beethoven's music, and have committed so much of his compositions to memory that I can hum along with most of it. What could be termed as my default Beethoven symphonies are a collection from Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Symphony Orchestra that I bought and got to know way back in the 80's. That interpretation is workman-like, and competent - but rather pedestrian to my ears. In fact, most of Karajan's interpretations are like this to me. The Beethoven symphonies are so well known, and so frequently performed that they can become rather over-familiar and somewhat stale. I thought the time was right out of boredom to try a different interpretation. Barenboim's collection looked splendid value. Having a collection of his piano works I thought that here is a musician of the first rate who could be trusted. Besides, I have been a fan of Daniel Barenboim's for over forty years now. Got to be careful with my pocket money so whatever I buy will be with me for years to come! So I did the deed and bought this collection. Now that I have heard the albums all the way through I've got to say that what I have heard is so fresh, and vigorous, and dare I say it - thrilling to listen to that I would thoroughly recommend this collection of Beethoven's finest works to Beethoven-lovers everywhere. Shivers down the spine stuff to be sure. Go on, buy it. You will not regret it.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a striking bargain: a very well played Beethoven cycle by a leading conductor in very good sound, currently for less that £13 (or £10 is you download as I did). It has taken me a while to decide definitively what I actually think of these performances. Many parts of most symphonies are strikingly effective. But there is something missing. Again and again you are thinking "oh, this is really good!" only to be let down further along by a slackening of tension or momentum, an undesirable lingering, so that the overall impression is that each of these accounts lacks the coherence that you would expect in the very best Beethoven. This is not about slowness. Barenboim's approach is unfashionably slow but a desire for an old fashioned slow Beethoven set was behind my buying this set. Klemperer is slow (slower), Bohm's great 5th is slow, Guilini's great Eroica is slow ... but those performances never lost their tension and always retained a clear and coherent vision. Barenboim doesn't quite manage that in these accounts.
That said, there are good performances, filled with marvellous detail and imagination. Anyone who wants a traditionally slow Beethoven set could do a lot worse (and spend a lot more money) than buying this set.
That said, there are good performances, filled with marvellous detail and imagination. Anyone who wants a traditionally slow Beethoven set could do a lot worse (and spend a lot more money) than buying this set.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Great performance but buyer beware download formatting.
The one star is for the fact that this download will not play properly on my Sony Walkman NWZ A845 via iplayer. Read more
Published 1 day ago by S. J. Williams
Beethoven would have loved it!
Already possessing the von Karajan and Bernstein sets for different, full orchestra sound and the Norrington set for the "authentic", smaller sound with original instruments, i.e. Read more
Published 7 months ago by RR Waller
Barenboim's Big Band Beethoven
This won't appeal to the authenticists. No Hogwood or Norrington orchestral minimalism here - not a natural trumpet, horn or a sackbutt to be heard. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Tan Ser Leat
Clear and powerful
Having read other reviews I was unsure how good this box set would be. Again it is always a matter of taste, but I can say that the clarity of recording is excellent. Read more
Published 21 months ago by Steve Moon
powerfull
i have heard most versions of the nine but this is just the one for me. i can not beleave there is no review in certain reference guides to praise this box set go and here it for... Read more
Published on 6 Feb 2010 by Maebh Collins
Reincarnation
My first serious encounter with classical music was hearing the piano works of Beethoven, played by Barenboim. Never had heard of the man before. Read more
Published on 1 Dec 2009 by J. A. Van Hemert
Superb sound
I also have the Beethoven set played by the Tonhalle orchestra under David Zinman, which I find generally to lack sparkle and enthusism. Read more
Published on 12 Sep 2009 by Stephen Bullen
Superb!
One of the most satisfying integrals of Beethoven symphonies I've heard so far. While there is a plethora of interpretations on "ancient instruments", this one is played on modern... Read more
Published on 17 April 2009 by Jean-yves Boucher
Brilliant Barenboim
Recorded in 1999 this Barenboim Beethoven cycle will attract critics and admirers alike for various reasons, but as a mid-priced 6 CD set which also includes the Fidelio and three... Read more
Published on 27 April 2007 by Mart Music
excellent value
there are no shortages of beethoven symphony cycles to choose from infact i think its fair to say there are too many!! Read more
Published on 6 Dec 2005
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