Charismatic Italian conductor Riccardo Muti was music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra from 1980 to 1992, which he led on numerous international tours and made many acclaimed recordings, including the first Beethoven cycle for CD. In 1992, he was appointed conductor laureate. Muti was very much an EMI artist in the 1980s and EMI found a new recording venue in the Old Metropolitan Opera House in Philadelphia with its generous acoustic enabling this great orchestra to be heard to best advantage
Side One
Mussorgsky (orch. Ravel): Pictures From An Exhibition
Promenade – The Gnome – Promenade – The Old Castle – Promenade – In The Tuileries – Bydlo – Promenade – Ballet of the Chicks in their Shells – Two Old Jews (Goldenberg and Schmuyle) – The Market Place at Limoges – The Catacombs
Cum mortuis in lingua mortua
Side Two
Mussorgsky (orch. Ravel): Pictures From An Exhibition(cont.)
The Hut on Fowls' Legs (Baba Yaga) – The Great Gate of Kiev
Stravinsky: Firebird Suite (1919 version)
Introduction – Dance of the Firebird – Round Dance of the Princesses – Infernal Dance of King Kastchei – Berceuse – Finale
The Philadelphia Orchestra Riccardo Muti
Produced and engineered by Christopher Bishop and Michael Gray resp.
