I don't believe in The Greatest Orchestra, nor do I believe in The
Greatest Mozart (or whomever) Orchestra.  At a certain level, it's a
question with as much merit as whether Superman could beat up Captain
Marvel.  What's the greatest flavor?  How do we award points and how
many points do we award?

An orchestral performance is a collaboration among composer, orchestra,
conductor, and even the audience.  Leopold Stokowski gave some splendid
performances with inferior orchestras, as did Jascha Horenstein, but
Horenstein and Stokowski didn't give the same kind of splendid performance.
Szell did incredibly well in the German and central European repertoire
of the 18th and 19th centuries, but I'd be hard pressed to say that he
did better with Beethoven symphonies than Furtwaengler or either Kleiber
or better Dvorak than Rowicki or Talich.  The Berlin Philharmonic has
some great players, but lately they haven't had a great music director,
and I haven't forgotten Karajan, who got lazier and more self-absorbed
as he aged.

I never am interested in the absolute best, because I don't know how I'd
go about deciding.  I am indeed interested in why a performance works
or fails to work on me the way that it does.

All that nonsense aside, it's definitely the Cleveland Orchestra.  But
it may be because I'm from Cleveland.

What specifically do you want recommendations for?

Steve Schwartz