Review: Who Needs The Walton Collection?
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- čas přidán 17. 12. 2021
- No one needs it, to be honest. EMI (now Warner) threw together this 12-disc set from a combination of poor choices and no choices. There are better versions of virtually all of this music elsewhere, and the good stuff has long been available separately . Enough said, other than please check out the full written review, with sound samples, at ClassicsToday.com here if you're an Insider subscriber: www.classicstoday.com/review/...
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www.classicstoday.com/classic... - Hudba
Walton is important to me, and yet, I discovered through your review, there is still Walton I haven’t discovered yet! I’ll get on it. The review was also wonderful in telling me the perfect choice to listen to for so many of the major works. That boxed set is still available for purchase…but at a pricey price. As usual I laughed: “The Walton Desperation Edition.” Hilarious.
Submitting a request for a video on Belshazzar’s Feast!
One performance of the VC I remember is when Aaron Rosand did it with the Rochester Philharmonic in 1973. It was flawless, absolutely phenomenal. Unfortunately he did an encore which was a very strange arrangement of the Paganini Caprice #24, and it became obvious why he didn't achieve major success in the US. People just didn't want to hear that old fashioned style of violin playing dating back to Kreisler.
Boult plays the original version of Crown Imperial, which is fully 3 or 4 minutes longer than the one Groves uses. Walton made the cuts in the late 1950s, before the score was published in the. 1960s.
I love Previn’s Walton #1 so much, it’s hard for me to imagine liking Haitink’s or anyone else’s better. As with so many of these compilation by label boxes, it seems like the curatorial choices are somewhat odd. I typically think it the better part of valor to collect by conductor if one opts for big boxes.
A great Walton series comes form Naxos, the Northern English Sinfonia albums with Paul Daniel conducting. Other great ones for the concertos are the cello concerto with Piatigorsky, and the Violin and Viola concertos with Menuhin, and the composer conducting.
I don't have many box sets but I do have another EMI collector's edition (Schubert) which I got a lot from. I wonder what other ones to get?
The Walton S1/Previn/LSO really bowled me over, especially in the slow movement. Making the back of my hair curl!
The reason they made such selection because (I think) in the same year (2012) they release another Walton 5CD box, "the British Composer". The selection is different and some of which you prefer to be in the bigger box.
Wasn't No 1 symphony with Previn on RCA /BMG anyway? If so, Warner couldn't have included it.
@@chrishorner7679 The No1 is the Sargent
Tortelier and Harrell are among my favorite cellists. I just did a side-by-side comparison, and I do prefer Harrell! Of course, the reference is Piatigorsky who the piece was written for…
Laughing out loud at "all you have to do is get out there and suffer nobly."
I should hasten to add what the listening public truly needs: William Walton - The Complete Tinnitus Classics Recordings. Just 27 blank CDs cascading onto the purchaser’s toes immediately upon opening the box.
Hi David, thanks for this video, very informative and fun as always.
Wondering what you think of Walton’s Symphony #1 conducted by Boult? I picked up a used copy a few years ago on vinyl, on the Everest label
What do you think of it?
@@DavesClassicalGuide , I quite enjoy it. The recording is from 1958 with the London Phil, and I feel it holds up well, sound wise. I enjoy the tempo that Boult sets as well.
I’m no professional however, and I was curious if this particular recording is looked on favourably by critics such as yourself.
@@andrewkennedy8502 It doesn't compare to more recent versions, on the whole. It's not so much a question of tempo, as of sharpness of rhythm and accent, and Boult's orchestra at that time was pretty seedy sounding.
I owned this box set once but was so disappointed by it that I rapidly sold it.
I'm a little surprised that they didn't pick Rattle's Symphony No. 1, which, while I don't admire it, is better than Haitink's. A pity that EMI has abandoned Vernon Handley's Symphony No. 1. It's taut and very exciting, really one of the finest things Handley ever did for EMI (it's the same album as the Hindemith Variations). EMI also has Richard Hickox's Belshazzar's Feast (same original disc as In Honour of the City), which as one might expect has some of the best choral singing imaginable, and far, far superior to Rattle's. Frémaux's coronation marches are also more excitingly done than Sir Adrian's. In short, the selection myopia that went into this box is even worse than you let on. They had three choices for some of these works and picked the worst in each case!