Loke ShiukTung wrote:

>Furthermore, how do list member rate Toscanini, the conductor? It seems
>like lately he is getting a lot of bad remarks.

Are you thinking of using that as input in your decision-making process?
It depends on what your objectives are.  If your aim is to learn how a
number of famous conductors approach works from the standard repertoire,
then to ignore Toscanini would not be a good thing.  If your aim is to find
the one or two conductors whose performances resonate with the way you like
the music to go, then you are the one to decide whether these performances
are for you, not us.  Are you of an open frame of mind, ready to try to get
into an unfamiliar conductor's head-space and see if you gain new insights
into the music? If your goal is any or all of those, you can't lose, as I
see it.  The only way you could lose is if you are so strongly prejudiced
toward a particular interpretative point of view that it's just not
possible for you to accept another, or demand a certain standard of sound
quality.

IMO Toscanini had strengths and weaknesses as a conductor, and because
of his fame and the power of his personality those strengths and
weaknesses were highlighted.  I see his energy, intensity and rhythmic
drive as strengths.  He had a great sense of climax, for example (but in
a totally different way from Furtwaengler).  For me one of his weaknesses
is that he could be awfully abrupt or perfunctory when I wished for more
expansiveness.  However, a number of people seem to have pointed out that
his NBC studio recordings are often more that way than his live air checks,
for all their imperfections.

I cut my classical eye teeth on his recordings of the Beethoven and Brahms
symphonies, so his take on them is in my blood.  I don't doubt that he was
a great conductor.  But I also don't think I have to have everything he
ever recorded.

Chris Bonds