Tony Duggan:
>Someone whose opinion I normally value (no one on these Lists) once said
>that Szell was "not a natural Mahlerian" which is think is too harsh.
>His account(s) of the Ninth that I have heard are excellent.
I'd have agreed with that statement, once upon a time when I hadn't heard
his Ninth or his Lied. I have since, and I agree with Tony. However, I
still think a Real Mahlerian has to do the entire cycle. I can't imagine
Szell with the Seventh or the Eighth, for example - to me, the toughest
tests of a Mahler conductor. Szell also made no secret of the fact that he
thought several of the symphonies weak. On the other hand, Furtwaengler
thought Beethoven's second symphony a failure, and he's certainly a great
Beethoven conductor.
Steve Schwartz