I bought the recording with Toscanini and the NBC Orq.(1939) and also, in an other CD symph. nr 3 and 5. I bought them believing I would like a lot, once so many friends and listeners praised them. Surprisingly - for me - I didn't like them. I felt some arrogance or pretension on the way he conduced; some kind of "inflation of potency"; an Italian that wanted to be German - horrible to say that, but its what I felt most part of time listening these three symphonies with him. On many passages, he seemed just noisy, on others just furious. Many times the metals "scream" so loud that breaks equilibrium of the sound, looking like a car beeping on the street. On the 9th 4th mov, it is all disconnected! It looks like a mosaic of recordings, changed at each twenty compasses. And 5th 1st mov fast and furious, but meaning less. Had Toscanini any relationship with nazists or facists? That is vary surprising for me, because I like very much Toscanini's Magic Flute - Life recording (1937- Salzburg Festival, I think) A really great performance and one of the best Mozart's I ever heard. A very sensible performance, full of colors an shadows, with a perfect sense of tragedy humor. One could never imagine it was the same Maestro of those Beethoven Cycle. Cause of that performance I decided to purchase the Beethoven's Sym. with him. Now I don't know if I will continue buying the cycle with him, if I try his second cycle or if I will stop and swap to Furtwangler's, or if I swap to other Mozart's operas and symphonies with him. Regards Renato Vinicius Diniz de Carvalho [log in to unmask]