Leopold Stokowski, London Symphony Orchestra - Tchaikovsky Serenade for Strings Op. 48, Francesca da Rimini Op. 32 (2006) [SACD]

“This is Leopold Stokowski’s third, and last, recording of Tchaikovsky’s tone poem on Dante’s doomed lovers and his first complete recording of the “Serenade,” both made in 1974 when he was age 92….Pentatone’s remastering of the Philips tapes has resulted in conventional stereo reproduction of great sweetness as well as clarity, and those with SACD players can finally hear the vivid four-channel versions for the first time. Stokowski often was ahead of everyone else in sound reproduction–and here again is exciting proof, discovered 30 years later.”
–Alan G. Artner, Chicago Tribune
“The present performances were not served well by the long-playing record, as they were taped quadraphonically but issued only in cloudy two-channel sound. Pentatone’s remastering of the Philips tapes has resulted in conventional stereo reproduction of great sweetness as well as clarity, and those with SACD players can finally hear the vivid four-channel versions for the first time. Stokowski often was ahead of everyone else in sound reproduction–and here again is exciting proof, discovered 30 years later.”
–Alan G. Artner, Chicago Tribune
“If we collect the electricity that flows from Stowkowski and the LSO in this pair of recordings, there would be no energy crisis! This is simply extraordainary playing which is matched to a very well balanced recording which has been bought back to life by Pentatone – thank you!… I cannot recommend this recording strongly enough – I sincerely hope there are more RQR releases like this to follow.”
–John Broggio, SA-CD.net
“What a pleasure it is to have Leopold Stokowski’s 1974 Tchaikovsky recordings on SACD!…. This is Stokowski’s only complete recording of Serenade for Strings (in 1949 he recorded the Waltz with the NYP for Columbia, also reissued on Cala). Francesca and Serenade were recorded in October 1974 in London’s Wembly, Brent Town Hall with producer Eric Smith and balance engineer Hans Lauterslager. There is a fine sense of space—what we hear is the original four-track recording, and there’s no question the SACD process lets us hear more detail than on previous issues.”
–Robert Benson, classicalcdreview.com
“It´s a small miracle that a person who is 92 years old can produce music of this calibre. There is no doubt whatsoever that Stokowki was a man full of vitality during these session because this music doesn´t play itself….The recorded sound is very good with a wide dynamic range and a good front to back perspective. It sounds like in the old analogue days when you could actually tell where records were recorded, where you recognized the hall ambience.”
–Thomas Roth, SA-CD.net
“I have to say that the remastering on this disc is simply outstanding – one would never guess that these recordings will celebrate their 21st annivesary in mid 2006! The recordings, as in the other releases in the RQR series so far derive from the quadrophonic archive of Philips Classics, are superbly balanced; both those made in Bad Homburg (all except the Vivaldi) and La Chaud de Fonds (Vivaldi) are wonderful – spacious and just ever-so-slightly overly resonant….For fans of light Romantic music and any oboe fan – this is self-recommending; the performances are unlikely to be significantly bettered in the foreseeable future.”