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Beethoven: Piano Concertos Nos 1 & 3 / Fleisher, Szell


Release Date: 01/03/1992 
Label:  Sony Classical Essential Classics Catalog #: 47658   Spars Code: ADD 
Composer:  Ludwig van Beethoven
Performer:  Leon Fleisher
Conductor:  George Szell
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Cleveland Orchestra
Number of Discs: 1 
Recorded in: Stereo 
Length: 1 Hours 11 Mins. 

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This CD is reissued by ArkivMusic.

Notes and Editorial Reviews

...I have always admired Fleischer's playing and renewing my acquaintance with these readings have found little reason to modify my enthusiasm for what seems to me eminently intelligent and clean playing from him and no less thoughtful a response from Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra. Turning back to the original reviews I see that EG as long ago as 1965 found No. 1 "among the most attractive and enjoyable versions available"... [N]o one investing in these fresh and alert readings is likely to be disappointed.

-- Gramophone [1/1975, reviewing the LP box set of the complete Beethoven piano concertos]

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...This is vibrant and virile music making Read more full of passionate sweep, arresting clarity, and genuine, chamber-like give and take between soloist and orchestra.

Like his teacher and mentor Artur Schnabel, Fleisher underlines Beethoven's harmonic tension by either distending or slightly speeding up certain runs and arpeggiated sequences, yet rarely at the expense of accuracy...although he's not one to slave over making every long trill perfectly even and tapered. Under George Szell's eagle-eye, the Cleveland Orchestra members achieve staggering unanimity in regard to articulation and marcato phrasing, but with more heart and singing impulse than in Szell's relatively stiffer Beethoven accompaniments for Emil Gilels eight years later...

-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com [reviewing the Third Concerto, Sony 78767]
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Works on This Recording

1.
Concerto for Piano no 1 in C major, Op. 15 by Ludwig van Beethoven
Performer:  Leon Fleisher (Piano)
Conductor:  George Szell
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Cleveland Orchestra
Period: Classical 
Written: 1795; Vienna, Austria 
2.
Concerto for Piano no 3 in C minor, Op. 37 by Ludwig van Beethoven
Performer:  Leon Fleisher (Piano)
Conductor:  George Szell
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Cleveland Orchestra
Period: Classical 
Written: 1800; Vienna, Austria 

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