Syms Comp/Ovts [Box set]

I wanted to quickly mention that Mr Fung's so-called review below is ludicrous. Anytime you have someone make a statement of how absolutely horrible, zero/1 stars, etc. something is and have no factual comments to back it up, means they don't know what the heck they're talking about. Fact. The Eroica 1st movemement is in fact the most exciting, visceral performance I have ever heard. The lyrical "desolation" theme (Leornard Bernstein's word) perhaps loses some of it's tragedy (is this implicit in the music, or is this what the Romantic era has breathed into it?) when played with lighter period instruments and at the faster tempi... but not much. Listen near the end when the main theme is repeated a last time and the hard stick/period timpani strikes like a bolt of lightning. This must be one of the most exciting moments recorded in any Eroica performance.
I am not convinced by Norrington's "swell" at the end of the famous 4 notes in the 5th, however his perf of the 3rd variation of the slow movement is played superbly, with the woodwind coming across like you've never before heard.
The 9th is good but the tenor soloist section is too slow, here Norrington taking the face metronome marking at face value, today, we know that the marking was most likely misprinted at a whole note instead of half, making it twice as fast. Traditional performances take it somewhere in between.
Summary= at this bargain price, the price of a single sushi sitting (haaha), you can gain a completely new angle/view of these great masterpieces. Wheter you agree or disagree, again, for the price you should buy this, and experience a new light that has been cast onto these musical masterpieces.

I have had these recordings since their initial release in the late eighties, and still enjoy them. Norrington not only took on the contraversial metronome marks head-on, but internalized them and the aesthetic world that they suggest: brash, impassioned, uncompromising. (Mostly uncompromising; Norrington said that he took the outer movements of the Eighth at a slightly slower tempo than indicated because he could not get the players to produce the performance that he could hear in his head.) And much to my liking in that.
That said, I must admit that these performances have lost a bit of the bloom off the rose. For one thing, they no longer stand alone: Gardiner, Zinman, and MacKerras have gone down the same path. And since then Norrington has had to compete with Norrington. Over the years I have heard the man perform many times in Los Angeles, and I also have a number of live performances. In each case Norrington live surpassed Norrington recorded. (With one exception. His recording of Beethoven's Second was every bit the match of his live performance with LA Phil.) Before a live audience there was flow, a songfulness, that he could not muster in these recordings, where he working very hard to document his ideas about the pieces. He was at his most careful and cautious in the Seventh and Ninth (that is to say, the pieces with the most complex rhythms); at his best in the Second, Third, and Fifth. I remeber one oddity about his conducting: he would alternate between using a baton and not. He would take up the stick in movements with a strong rhythmic push and put it down in movement with a strong lyrical flow. I found myself wishing that he had left that he had left the baton on the stand when he made his recordings.
I would recommend these recordings on balance, conscious of the fact that they do not reflect Norrington as his best. I do hope that someday Norrington re-records this music, or allows some live performances to find the light of day.

I only bought this set's #1/#3; thank goodness. Despite a few tries, I fell asleep listening to the CD each time. Sounded like an orchestra playing instruments, but I wasn't sure Norrington was conducting Beethoven's symphonies. '1 star' is generous; I would've given it '0 star' if available. Crazy tempos, listless playing, it isn't about Beethoven, rather it's Norrington having some kind of an ax to grind.