> This from DG Classics site at:
>
> http://www.dgclassics.com/news/i9812pc.htm
>
> New contracts announced at the press conference include a new exclusive
> agreement with the Celibidache family which will make Deutsche
> Grammophon the Celibidaches' sole authorized partner worldwide for release
> and exploitation of Sergiu Celibidache's legacy of unreleased recordings. In
> the course of the next five years Deutsche Grammophon plans to issue The
> Celibidache Edition, a comprehensive edition of Celibidache's work from all
> major periods of his career. The Edition is to comprise a total of 60 CDs
> - 12
> per year over the next five years - to be released in boxed sets and later
> individually. The first sets are scheduled to appear in 1999, thanks to an
> agreement with Suddeutsche Rundfunk, and will document the conductor's
> work with the SWR Stuttgart Radio-Symphony Orchestra from 1972 to 1983.
> The first 3-CD set, to be released in February 1999, is devoted to the
> complete Brahms Symphonies and includes a fourth, bonus CD featuring a
> remarkable rehearsal of the first movement of the Fourth Symphony. Two
> more sets will follow later in 1999, consisting of repertoire by Russian and
> French composers with whom Celibidache was strongly associated. As with
> the Brahms, both these sets will be accompanied by bonus CDs of
> rehearsals.
> -
> Gene Halaburt
> genehal at csi.com
I welcome the switch to DG, both for the broader scope of the projected releases
and because DG doesnÃÕ quite share EMIÃÔ passion for deleting items from its
catalogue.
Nevertheless I wonder what effect this will have on the continued availability
of volumes 1 and 2 of the EMI edition (will the Bruckner still be released in
the US?), as well as the fate volume 3, described in the Celibidache Forum as
containing performances with various unspecified soloists.
Furthermore, will EMI maintain the rights to any material not already released?
RavelÃÔ Mother Goose was listed in early promotions, and was even printed on the
cellophane spine of one disk in volume 1, but it has yet to make it to CD. Will
this and perhaps several other performances just sit in an EMI vault?
More simply, has the EMI contract been terminated, or just not extended? Can we
anticipate, at least for a time, simultaneous releases from both labels?
Just in case anyone hasnÃÕ already seen it, here is a July 1997 article by Paul
Moor, posted at the Archives of Classical Music, announcing the EMI deal.
_____________________________________
Date: Sat, 5 Jul 1997 09:23:15 -0400
From: Paul Moor <100722.1351 at compuserve.com>
Subject: Posthumous Recording Star Celibidache
[Since the following piece commissioned from me by London's daily
newspaper "The Financial Times" has appeared in today's issue (in
editorially somewhat mutilated form), I may now pass it along to Celi's
fans around the world.]
Throughout the career of Sergiu Celibidache, virtually nothing conformed
to any precedent.
In a unique Berlin Philharmonic emergency immediately after World War
II - with Wilhelm Furtwaengler drydocked in obligatory de-Nazification
proceedings, plus the accidental shooting of his temporary heir apparent
Leo Borchard - this flamboyantly gifted young Romanian comet zoomed
directly from Berlin's Musikhochschule into the conductorship of one
of the world's greatest orchestras.
Until his death last year at 84, he ridiculed recordings as "sounding
pancakes" - yet he bids fair to become 1997's top recording star.
Germany's factually reliable newsmagazine "Der Spiegel" claims that media
concerns during Celibidache's lifetime offered him a recording fee higher
than Herbert von Karajan's, and that one U.S. label even offered him a
blank check. With characteristic reticence, Celibidache continued to
dismiss recordings as "masturbation, substitute gratification".
Because of his uniquely extravagant rehearsal demands, orchestras shied
away from Celibidache (chay-lee-bee-DAH-kay), but he did have seventeen
final halcyon years as conductor of the Munich Philharmonic, which under
his affectionately exigent guidance developed into a world-class band.
Even there he refused to make recordings - but he did permit live archive
tapings of most concerts and rehearsals, which he threw open to the
public.
When he died, the Munich Philharmonic's vaults contained stillborn tapes,
mostly digital, of several hundred works, many in several performances.
Celibidache never even listened to them.
Musicians, especially orchestra players, tended to rank "Celi" as one of
his era's titans. After Furtwaengler's death, with a major U.S. tour a
mere fortnight away, Herbert von Karajan's skilful maneuvering himself
into position as Furtwaengler's successor so offended Celi that he turned
his back on his erstwhile orchestra until 1992, when Germany's President
himself personally prevailed upon him to conduct a benefit concert.
One senior *Philharmoniker* says Celi talked himself out of that choice
post. Because of his clean political record, he received an early
post-war invitation to conduct the Israel Philharmonic. The Celibidache
quoted in an Israeli interview, reprinted in Germany, made cruelly unfair
statements about the Berlin orchestra's contemporaneous Nazi assay. That
outraged even Celi's stanchest friends in the Berlin Philharmonic - where
the Nazi cohort had never approached that of its dear old Viennese
counterpart, which by 1938 had one Nazi Party member among every three
*Philharmoniker* - a proportion that increased as the post- *Anschluss*
economy improved.
Phenomenology fascinated Celibidache; at one point he talked of writing a
book on the subject in relation to musical performance. One reason for
his dislike of recording derived from that interest. In each performance
he conducted, he considered every aspect of that performance, fine-tuning
to momentary circumstances not only dynamics but also tempi. From that
perspective, he regarded each performance as unique, and refused any part
in making a performance recorded in one environment available for
listening in a completely different one.
After Celibidache's death, his son Serge, who had always considered his
father's "fanatical disapproval of recordings a tragedy", found himself
in "the greatest conflict of my life".
The conductor's will left open the question of those unreleased tapes.
Before Celibidache's death he even told his son: "Do what you like."
Unauthorized Italian releases of technically deplorable recorded
Celibidache broadcasts infuriated Serge; also, the Munich Philharmonic
wanted to exploit that hoard to sweeten its musicians' salaries. Serge
has also announced two Celibidache charitable foundations.
This September, soon after the first anniversary of Celibidache's death,
EMI will release an appetizer: Musorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" -
to whet worldwide Celibidache fans' appetites for the main course: a
10-CD box in October or November.
That promises to include Beethoven, Debussy, Haydn, Mozart, Ravel,
Schumann, Tchaikovsky, and Wagner. EMI has an option to release 20
additional CDs, possibly including one set entirely of Bruckner, a
Celibidache speciality.
For unique charisma, perhaps no conductor of Celibidache's generation
could match him. His face radiated rapture when his musicians pleased
him, but woe betide anyone who irked him. He dismissed Arturo Toscanini
as "a note factory", Karl Boehm as "a potato sack", Riccardo Muti as
"ignorant". His Male Chauvinist Piggery knew no bounds. When the
American trombonist Abbie Conant successfully auditioned for first chair
before his entire orchestra - but with Celibidache absent - she found
herself in a position so iron-clad that several appellate courts
supported her grievance over Celibidache's refusal to let her actually
play first trombone. Munich's Lord Mayor himself capitulated before
Celibidache's ultimatum; only a providential, allegedly more lucrative
German professorship for Abbie Conant resolved the crisis. Even so, at
Celibidache's first rehearsal with the Schleswig-Holstein Festival
orchestra, he swept onstage unregenerately proclaiming: "No women in
first chairs!"
Among musicians, the question of Celi's Munich successor remains the
subject of lively speculation. One favourite, Sir Simon Rattle, has
voluntarily declared himself unavailable.
Munich's Lord Mayor has confirmed pending negotiations with the
Metropolitan Opera's James Levine.
Paul Moor (Berlin)
100722.1351 at compuserve.com