A remarkable 30-CD collection brings together 30 world-class conductors representing the cream of crop - including Herbert von Karajan, Arturo Toscanini, Otto Klemperer, Pierre Monteux, Eugene Ormandy, Bruno Walter, Sir Thomas Beecham, Leonard Bernstein, Leopold Stokowski, Sir Georg Solti and George Szell.
In classical music, the 20th century was the era of the conductor. Before then enthusiastically received soloists dominated the scene and only after World War II stage directors began commanding attention, too, at least in the world of opera. Still, charismatic conductors stood at the helm of orchestras, which they themselves had moulded into ensembles of international renown. Furtwängler in Berlin, Ormandy in Philadelphia, Reiner in Chicago, Mitropoulos in New York, Mravinsky in Leningrad, Münch in Boston, Ansermet in Geneva, Barbirolli in Manchester, and Toscanini with his NBC Symphony Orchestra are a few of the famous partnerships in this very Special Edition.
The Vienna Philharmonic can be heard under Clemens Krauss, Rafael Kubelik, Erich Kleiber, Erich Leinsdorf, Lorin Maazel, Wolfgang Sawallisch, and Wilhelm Furtwängler, and the latter is also one of three conductors - the others are Karl Böhm and Rudolf Kempe - in charge of the Berlin Philharmonic. The diverse repertoire also paints a vivid picture of the concert life in Europe and the US during this period - covering mostly the 1950s and 60s - that has never been available in such a collection before.
