Ramon Khalona said:

>One orchestra that is sorely missing from your list is Staatskapelle
>Dresden ...

I would agree that the Staatskapelle is a great orchestra, just shy of
being one of the top ten.  The Leningrad/St.  Petersburg Orchestra was
great under Mravinsky, but suffered from blatty brass.  The Cleveland was
awesome so far as precision is concerned, but Szell's precision came at
the price of emotion.  I heard a live concert with Stokowski conducting the
orchestra and realized they were much better than the recordings I'd heard.

Peace from he who is stumpf
aka Sisyphus