Lovro von Matačić: Beethoven Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 36 (NHK SO, 1984)
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- 4 movements: 0:32 / 12:12 / 23:56 / 28:10
Beethoven: Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 36
Conductor: Lovro von Matačić
NHK Symphony Orchestra
March 14, 1984
NHK Hall
Great performance. Maestro Matacic is best of the best.
My goodness...the best Beethoven I have ever heard...Triple Bravo
“Matačić can show music emerging from the overall Human nature, vast and deep, warm and limitless, and the impression is so strong that it makes the entire body and soul vibrate to the very roots.” (Philharmonic, 1967)
Lovro von Matačić (February 14, 1899 - January 4, 1985) used a single word to describe his versatile artistic personality - musician. In the turbulent, and occasionally unfavorable circumstances of the period encompassing almost the entire 20th century, his talent was proven on countless occasions as a value that will always find room for excellent achievements.
He was born in Sušak (a part of the city of Rijeka) in Croatia, to a family that was granted a noble title in the early 17th century. Growing up, he was always surrounded by music and art: his father had a career as an opera singer, and his mother as an actress. After his parents’ divorce, the family moved to Vienna where Lovro joined the Vienna Boys Choir of the Royal Court Chapel at the age of eight. The Choir’s repertoire must have influenced his later affinities, but most of all through the music of Anton Bruckner. In the Piarists’ Gymnasium in Vienna he received training in piano, organ and music theory. His music education continued under distinguished teachers at the Vienna Conservatory which he never attended formally nor obtained any degrees. He proved his talent in practice when in 1916 he started volunteering as an accompanist at the Cologne Opera. When the war broke out, however, he volunteered for the army and also became an active revolutionary: in 1918 he joined the circle of left-oriented intellectuals in Vienna who recognized his artistic talent. He already had several works ready; he recited the poem “Vigilia” to his colleagues, and he was sixteen when the Tonkünstlerorchester of the Vienna Musikverein conducted by Bernhard Paumgartner premiered his “Fantasy for the Orchestra.” Not many of Matačić’s compositions have been completely preserved, although he did include some of them in his programs after becoming a distinguished conductor - such as the “Confrontation Symphony” or the “Konjuh planina” Cantata. After the war, he made a living mostly by playing in cafés, writing reviews, and by short-term conducting engagements in Osijek, Zagreb and Novi Sad where he served the required military service as a military musician. Even then, his performances were marked with opera pieces and a vocal repertoire, but he did not find a permanent position until 1922 when he was employed by the Ljubljana Opera. In the meantime, he married a Czech singer Karla Dubska who introduced him to the golden portion of Czech music. His first success in Ljubljana was the performance of Leoš Janáček’s opera “Jenůfa”, which would subsequently become one of the most often performed operas of Matačić’s repertoire.
After Ljubljana, his engagements and successes lined up: with the Belgrade Opera and the Obilić Academic Choir, his first appearance in front of the Zagreb Philharmonics in Zagreb (1927) and the Vienna Symphonic Orchestra at the Konzerthaus (1928), the Letonic State Opera in Riga, and the more permanent move to Zagreb in 1932 where he spread his activities to opera, symphony, and choir repertoire. His strivings of the time, however, reached a peak in 1936 when he conducted the Berlin Philharmonic and became the orchestra’s regular guest. In 1938 he left the position of the permanent conductor at the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb to become the director of the Belgrade Opera and the chief conductor of the Belgrade Philharmonic. But his path lead further to Europe, too. During World War II, he spent most of the time in Zagreb as an army officer, but also continued conducting: he appeared in Zagreb with all major local orchestras, as well as in Vienna and Berlin. He was the Inspector of Croatian Army’s music ensembles and was in charge of the entire corpus of military music in Croatia. His last concert before he was arrested was two weeks prior to the capitulation of Germany - on April 23, 1945 he appeared with the State Radio Orchestra. Maestro never wanted to comment in detail on his status during and after the war. In more than a year spent in prison, he was once again given a chance to work in music - he lead the prison orchestra and choir. After his second wife Elizabeta Lilly Levenson, whom he married in 1933, managed to obtain a pardon for him, he was relocated to Skopje in 1948. Until 1954, when he managed to get an approval from Josip Broz Tito to be issued a passport, his activities in the former country were limited (to Rijeka and Ljubljana), but soon his career gained full international momentum. The recoding of Richard Strauss’s “Arabelle” in London for the Columbia label marked a new beginning in the conductor’s life. He replaced Herbert von Karajan for that recording and afterwards signed a five-year contract with the record company.
The following year he replaced Karl Bohm at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich for a triumphal performance of Strauss’s “Ariadne on Naxos.” Appearances in Berlin, Stuttgart, Augsburg, Salzburg, Graz and elsewhere followed, where he conducted concert programs, operas, and often even directed the productions. He was invited to the Dresden State Chapel, State Opera of East Berlin, and to tours around Europe, including Ljubljana, Split, and Dubrovnik. After leaving Dresden in 1958, he strengthened his ties to Vienna, debuted at Bayreuth where he also started a long-term collaboration with opera director and Richard Wagner’s grandson - Wieland Wagner. He finally travelled to the United States, where he performed at the Chicago Opera. Matačić has won over the Italian audience, too (in 1961 at the Rome Opera he performed Wagner’s “The Ring of the Nibelung”). In 1961 in Frankfurt he became the chief conductor of the local opera and the prestigious series of Museum Concerts. As always, he continued working in multiple fields: he recorded for RAI in Turin, and simultaneously managed the Dubrovnik Summer Festival. He was named Honorary Life-Time Conductor of the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Japan, conducted orchestras such as Philharmonie, the Czech, Berlin, and Munich philharmonic orchestras. He appeared at the Bavarian State Opera, Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, the State and Volksopera of Vienna. At the Musikverein he regularly conducted the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, sat on the jury for Karajan's conducting competition and in 1974 became the chief conductor of the National Opera Orchestra of Monte Carlo - and these are only some of his after-war successes. The list goes on with his appointment as the chief conductor of the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra in 1970 with which he realized a number of ambitious plans, including support for young conductors through a special series - Presenting Young Conductors.
The musicians he collaborated with include Arthur Rubinstein, Christian Ferras and Rudolf Buchbinder, Marijana Radev, Ruža Pospiš Baldani, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Christa Ludwig, Renata Tebaldi, Birgit Nilsson, Leontyne Price, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau... He recorded for labels such as Columbia and Supraphon, covering a vast repertoire. Although Anton Bruckner was at the top of the list for his symphony and concert repertorie and Richard Wagner, along with his favorite „Orpheus“ by Ch. W. Gluck and Janáček’s “Jenůfa” at the top of his opera repertorie, Lovro von Matačić's interest covered a huge span from Palestrina, Monteverdi and Henry Purcell, through Handel, Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven to Mussorgsky, Mahlera, Janáček, Smetana, R. Strauss, Wagner, Verdi and others. He was especially dedicated to performing Croatian authors. His first appearances with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra in 1936 already included a suite from Krešimir Baranović’s ballet “Gingerbread Heart” and Jakov Gotovac’s “Symphonic Kolo”. The programs of his subsequent international and Croatian performances also included the works of Josip Hatze, Blagoje Bersa, Božidar Širola, Božidar Kunc, Boris Papandopulo, Antun Dobronić, Josip Štolcer-Slavenski, Bruno Bjelinski...
“One day, when they draw a line, it will not matter what I did for international composers, but how I contributed to Croatian music” maestro once said. His numerous efforts in that respect should definitely include his last will and testimony by which he established the Lovro & Lilly Matačić Foundation.
巨匠N響定期、最後の出演。この時のA、B、Ｃプログラム、各２日間全てNHKホールの客席で聴きました。もう、こんな巨大な指揮者は出ないだろうなぁ‼️
Matačić showing that if the work is done properly in rehearsal, there's no need for a lot of gesticulation in the concert performance.
Lepi naš majstor *
Dobar duh muzike \|!
Lovro the Great!
Nezaboravan
lovro
Gospodine podpukovniče, podnosimo Vam muzički prijavak!
Ustasko, nisi znao da je bio Titov prijatelj?