The best transfer of Caruso I can lay my hand on so far. There is no surface noise and the beauty of his voice is not at all compromised, it sounds as though it is recorded in the 50s !

Caruso eclipses the great tenors of all other ages with ease. However be reminded that to some audience, his singing is dated at least so in term of taste. Others may wish to add more songs or arias to show the best of his voice etc.

The fact is, this CD runs 69.31 minutes which is more than sufficicinet to give the audience a good profile of the greatest voice of the century.

Quite a lively account of Queen Victoria as a person since her husband passed away. There isn't too much drama or suspense. There is instead a lot of attention todetailssuch court life and etiquette costume etc. But it is neither as boring as one would expect from such movies.

People may know little about this orchestra (even though it has made a number of records with top performer like Geza Anda), this is the town where Mozart was borned and his musical talents were brought up. The orchestra can compare with the world's first rate orchestras with a lot of pride.

Other than Horowitz or Gulda, I have seen 4 other contemporary pianists performing Mozart concerto on video namely, Barebboim, Pollini, Maria Joao Pires and Justus Franz. They are all very good. Maria's performance is somewhere between Pollini and Justus Franz... With this video, we have a bonus of a most beautiful voice: Cludia Kallisch singing Figaro etc.Total running time is 87 minutes.

Both the sound and vision and above all the music of this video is of high quality that well deserve a place in any library. Recommended.

To listen to Heifetz is such an intense pleasure: the intensity of his sense of beauty is unheard of in the entire recorded musicology except Dohnanyi at the piano, (Moriz Rosenthal, Rachmaninov, Cortot or Sofronitsky are very close). We don't simply call this music making for right at the same time, it's also poetry and drama in the highest form. It's the beauty of life at it's apex. Having heard Heifetz, one has no doubt that music has taken over the function of religion: it's such a consolation to one's heart and soul.

There could be no grumble or whatesoever about his Tsaichovsky, save and except the point that he adopts the Auer's revision. To say Heifetz is cold or that he played with virtuosity for vituosity's sake is the gravest mistake ( albeit that occasionally there is some justification for this when he was young), for he was so impassioned here that he could bring you to tears, along with the utmost awe, even with a single phrase and at times almost with a single strike of his bow...

Having said that, I'm not sure if Heifetz had done too great a job as what had Lizst had done in his own recital: at first it seems common or even casual, and then slowly it turns with the beauty of the second movement which keeps flashing back giving deeper meaning to the earlier part that starts to draw the audience in...

Come and listen for the beauty of it, or else you don't know what a whole world you have missed.

The sound Gilel coaxed from the piano created quite a sensation, even more so than Nelson Freire. For those who don't find the studio recording of his Beetheven Sonatas delightful, this concerto should be able to win back their heart. The command of the rhythm and the nuances of these pieces are absent from either Kissin's or even Weisenberg's rendition on DVD: he was so close to Richter. His Prokofiev is way better than his nearly completed cycle of Beethoven.

However, the recorded sound leaves much to be desired. And the B/W photography is only of average quality, and it's mostly taken from a four o'clock position just a little above the level of his hands -- often we aren't able to see the whole of his left hand. The French orchestra is however of high quality. For those who enjoy Picture at an Exhibition, or Ravel etc, they've got themselves a bonus.

The recorded sound is excellent, so is the sound she coaxed from the piano and her interpretation: they are so full of life, singing beautifully all the way with lively rhythms, from both hands and all the voices.

In many ways she is even more convincing than Glenn Gould: obviously she had digested Gould's interpretation. A very good reference especially to advanced piano students of this lovely piece: even more preferable than Weissenberg's version. And for comparison, check out Gould's two versions and for sheer enjoyment, I would also recommend the audience to check out Kempff as well.

A record that badly needs to be remastered.

Otherwise, it's a disgrace both to the pianist and these sonatas. The recording, as it stands, sounds categorically worse than most records in the 50's, far worse than Oistrakh's Beethoven Violin Sonatas (with Lev Oberin), way worse than those recordings done in Moscow in the same period. Nowadays, we have a lot of transfers from the 78s which sound much better than this one.

I happen to own another Sony record by the same artist playing Bach. Likewise, it is impossible. Do we take this as a projection of the American dislike for French pianists?

Contrary to the editorial review, this is one of the best Hammerklavier around. And I say that with Arrau or even Backhaus in mind, not to mention Gulda, Gilels or Brendel. And I regret to say that I still don't have sufficient time for Ashkenazy or the like.

His Sonata No. 30 is, moreover, much better than the one recorded in the 70's: much more energetic and more artisitically imaginative as a whole. Surprising enough, the recording in the 50 is so very nice, which is by far better than the one recorded in 70.

BUT, if you have your ears well tuned to mechanical interpretations on just some musical notes instead of music. Further more, if you are indifferent to poetry at all, then these sonatas are not for you. Otherwise, don't miss it.

One of my favourite modern conductors.

I don't mind much about the recorded sound, but the sound of the orchestra must be musical well mixed. Here we have soloists from some 60 countries, including some Indians and some Asians players whatever lumping together for I don't know how long. It's pointless to expect much from such a combination.

The photpgraphy needs much to be desired as well. Often, we see players from an angle that is not quite natural and then the players are not depicted as a section, nor as a group nor are they maninly the soloist(s). Even the seating needs to be re-arranged from a photographic point of view. So is the lighting.
Moreover, very often we have depictions of Giulini with his eyes closed for most of the time ( and when he opens his eyes he was not really looking and would close them within a second) murmuring all the time as though he was cursing! Odd enough.

One of the reasons why I don't really enjoy this performance was, I've just finished watching Eugene Jochum's performance of the same piece with Bamgerger Symphony taped in 1982 and which was way better than this one: it was just like a realist German oil painting from beginning till the last note. Too bad a juxtaposition despite the fact that this one is 4 years younger.

As one of his lyrics says, Lennon himself was someone big in the working class. But the working class was not and is still not restricted to the West, nor are the fans for John Lennon nor indeed the Beatles. He was big and exceedingly memorable in our time on this planet something that we all share.

This DVD is a very good biography of John Lennon with loads of his photos when he was a small kid: of his home, his parents etc. And with the coming of the videos, we have ample clips of him singing or else in his own words, "doing time" watching the "wheels"... Without the consent of his wife, the viewers may not be able to have sight of them all.

The video starts from his complaint (in his song) that his parents brought him into this lonely world (obviously without his consent) without giving him sufficient support: young Lennon felt he needed his parents more than they needed him! The tone was that of a rebel and was rather coarse. And then as seen from his lyrics, it was his wife who taught him "the meaning of success", something that we expect his parents or else his teachers to have done. Then in "Woman", his tone started to change. It became more and more tender and was wonderfully sublime in "Beautiful Boy". And then his attention turned to the injustice of this crazy world reaching a climax at "Happy X'mas" which was so ironic... Obviously, the focus changed from the meaning of success to the meaning of life itself.

Even as an oriental, I take no delight in watching his wife on this DVD. But without his wife, John Lennon would not be the same. Maybe he would be better off, we really don't know. But the choice was purely his, and without his wife his songs would be very different. We won't be able to see lots of things here or anywhere else to start with...

Since my love for music is not restricted to the classics, or the pop or even jazz, I feel touched by the life of Lennon even as depicted here or at least by the path that he had taken as shown here. And, other than fame and fortune, isn't his life essentially the same as ours after all: the same fluidity, the same fragility and the same stupidity, albeit at different spots on this lonely planet?

The music here is great, and so precious are the pictures and the clips albeit that occasionally things had been inserted or deleted. But so long as Lennon was there, it is good enough. Photography was superb or even a bit far fetched, well, it is only a matter of taste after all.

In any event, for those who don't have more authentic videos of John Lennon and if you are looking for a comprehensive and enjoyable overview of him, sound and sight, or even as a historical documentary, this might be the one for you.