CD review: Wilhelm Furtwängler - Live Recordings

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You could not get a more vivid picture of the genius of Wilhelm Furtwängler than in this wide-ranging collection of radio recordings dating from the last 10 years of his life. Where in his studio recordings his characteristic tempo fluctuations too often sound contrived or even forced, here the idiosyncrasies are made to emerge naturally thanks to the high-voltage electricity conveyed.

So the two Beethoven items which open the first of the six discs, the Leonore III Overture and the Seventh Symphony, have the sort of intensity that one associates with the very different live performances of Furtwängler's arch-rival, Toscanini. Consistently in almost every item, notably in Schubert's Unfinished, Brahms's Second or Bruckner's Eighth Symphonies, there is an incandescent glow that has one magnetised. Though these are mono recordings with limited range the sound is remarkably full and true, even in those made just at the end of the war, when Russian tanks were already threatening Berlin and Vienna.