The other Saturday Humphrey Burton set to comparing various versions,
on BBC R3's Building a Record Library, and I was most interested to be
reminded of the Barbirolli version because whereas the conductor came in
for much criticism, at the time of the original release, for his slow and
studied tempi Burton reminded listeners as to just what a sensational team
of soloists had been assembled for the recording

He went on to support his views with some magnificent extracts from Jon
Vickers (a tenor who stands with Callas, to be sure) and Monserrat Caballe.
The other soloists were Cossotto and Raimondi and although this isn't by
any means a top recommendation it is worth considering for the soloists
(as is Julia Varady on the recent Plasson recording).  For me though, it is
still Giulini at No.1 (EMI - certainly not DG, by the way) - I attended his
concert performances several times in the 60s in London.  they could only
have been euqalled/surpassed by Cantelli's of a few years previous.

Burton came down in favour of Bernstein as his top recommendation (full of
fire, drama and theatre) which is odd in the sense that Roy Ellefsen's
survey didn't mention him at all.

Giuliano Finessi mentioned Karajan (La Scala; Price, Cossotto, Pavarotti,
Ghiaurov) which is, indeed, widely recognised as one of the finest versions
available but surely it is only on *video* (DG) - unless the pirates got at
it?

John G. Deacon
Home page:   http://www.ctv.es/USERS/j.deacon