MIDEM in Cannes

The visit of German Culture Minister Bernd Neumann to the PROFIL stand is now almost a tradition, and this time was no exception. Head of the record label, Günter Hänssler, and Minister Neumann had a lively discussion about the current PROFIL programme.



The last release in the EDITION STAATSKAPELLE DRESDEN series has been met with particular interest. Volume 21 presents Gustav Mahler's 4th Symphony recorded live under the baton of Giuseppe Sinopoli, who died much too young in 2001 (PH 07047). The 40 page booklet, which includes many pictures, provides a wealth of information about the Staatskapelle Dresden, the conductor Giuseppe Sinopoli and the music itself. In addition, the CD includes a particularly special "extra"; the listener can hear extracts from Giuseppe Sinopoli's personal introduction to the work, with live examples from the music. This is an exceptional opportunity to hear the maestro in person, at first hand. This unique talk, a transcript of which is provided in English in the booklet, demonstrates just how perceptive and sensitive a master of the baton the music world lost forever in 2001.

Volume 21: Edition Staatskapelle Dresden

The historical highlight of the EDITION STAATSKAPELLE DRESDEN: FRITZ BUSCH AND DRESDEN The unpublished musical legacy, complete for the first time on 3 CDs, 1 DVD and a 190 page booklet

He was the music director of the Staatskapelle Dresden orchestra for ten years, succeeding the legendary Ernst von Schuch. For ten years he was also the director of the Dresden Opera House, or the "Semperoper" as it is now called. During that time he worked his fingers to the bone and went home only to sleep, something even his political opponents acknowledged. In the decade in which he worked in Dresden, Fritz Busch's achievements were incredible. He virtually "remoulded" the opera company, which was beginning to show its age, he directed important premières, such as the German première of Puccini's last opera Turandot, Hindemith's Cardillac and The Egyptian Helen by Richard Strauss, and he initiated the German and European Verdi renaissance from Dresden. Busch was successful. After the defeat of the First World War, his leadership brought international recognition for the Staatskapelle and the Opera House. But despite all his successes, Busch's "exit" from Dresden came on March 7, 1933, as he himself noted laconically in his diary. He was driven out of the Opera House and stripped of his office before a performance of Rigoletto, in a plot engineered not only by his political opponents but also by the orchestra and the opera company, for whom Busch's radical and uncompromising approach to restructuring the opera company had long been a thorn in the side. The justification given was simple: Busch associated with Jews, had prohibited swastikas from being hung from the Opera House's façade, and was more than critical of the new regime.

Fritz Busch was one of the first well-known artists of international standing to be forced to emigrate because of their political views just a few weeks after the National Socialists came to power.

Today – 75 years after the scandalous events in Dresden – this dark time has finally been reviewed with historical accuracy as part of the EDITION STAATSKAPELLE DRESDEN.

This series, comprising 2 CDs of all the recordings made between 1923 and 1926 and the legendary live broadcast of a Staatskapelle concert from the Berlin Philharmonic Hall in 1931, and one DVD of extensive documentation, many as yet unknown pictures and an early sound film, the overture to Richard Wagner's Tannhäuser, recorded in the old Dresden Opera House in 1932, represents the most comprehensive acoustic documentation of Fritz Busch's achievements in Dresden available anywhere in the world. The sound recordings, which are extremely rare today, have been compiled from around the world, from Germany, to England, to the USA, to Singapore. The accompanying booklet comprises 190 pages and is a sensational bilingual documentation in German and English of the artistic achievements of Fritz Busch in Dresden and the events which led to his dismissal on March 7, 1933. This is an exciting piece of contemporary and music history; a chapter of history which was not spoken about for decades and which has now finally been opened up for everyone. Release is planned for May / June 2008.

Günter Wand: The Munich Recordings

This is the title of a new box set which brings together the best recordings from this legendary conductor of the Munich Radio Orchestra. The set comprises Bruckner's Symphonies nos. 4, 5, 6, 8 and 9, along with Franz Schubert's Symphonies no. 8 and no. 9 and the first two symphonies by Johannes Brahms and Ludwig van Beethoven (PH 06013).

Wolfgang Seifert, executor of Wand's musical legacy, writes of Günter Wand, "As the archetypal anti-star all his life, whose significance was not truly recognised for many years, this conductor was only acknowledged internationally as a classical artist in a class of his own late in his life. The majority of these multi-award-winning recordings, which are rated as benchmark recordings, were therefore made in his latter years.

This makes Wand's numerous previously unreleased radio recordings from his earlier years all the more important. He worked for almost all the member organisations of the ARD association of German broadcasters, for the BBC and for NHK in Tokyo, leaving a rich musical footprint with them all. The aim of the posthumous Wand Edition is to use the resonant legacy of these radio productions and concert broadcasts to highlight aspects of his musical accomplishments which were not demonstrated in the records released during his lifetime. With the best recordings from the various broadcasting archives, produced using top of the range digital technology, the listener is introduced to the extraordinary spectrum of this great conductor's repertoire."

Head of the record label, Günter Hänssler, explained the philosophy behind this series in an interview with FonoForum magazine. "You have to think very carefully about whether or not to release Bruckner's 6th Symphony with Günter Wand, when it is already available with the NDR Symphony Orchestra. If there is no particular reason to make it a new release, it is better to just let it be. There should be respect for the great names in music, and that includes not abusing them." This is a philosophy which has paid off; the Günter Wand Edition has already won several awards. You can read the full interview with Günter Hänssler in FonoForum here.

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