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Side Two
Janos Starker ('cello) Philharmonia Orchestra Walter Susskind Recorded in stereo on 11, 12, 16 & 17 July 1956, Kingsway Hall, London. Produced by the legendary Walter Legge and engineered by Robert Gooch & Michael Grafton-Green. Cut at Abbey Road Studios from the original stereo analogue master tapes with the Neumann VMS82 lathe fed an analogue pre-cut signal from a specially adapted Studer A80 tape deck with additional 'advance' playback head, making the cut a totally analogue process. |
| By the mid 1950s, the Hungarian cellist Janos Starker (1924-2013) was already a legend and principal cellist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Reiner. EMI producer Walter Legge arranged for Starker to record all the essential works in his repertoire and this stereo recording of the Dvořák concerto, made at London's Kingsway Hall in 1956, has become a highly collectable LP.
As the Telegraph obituary put it: 'Starker possessed a phenomenal technique. His bow attacked the strings with both a ravishing intensity and a deep, biting edge. He was equally startling to watch, his piercing black eyes glaring out from beneath deep black eyebrows.' But he wasn't all scary – many a recital programme involved him performing in short sleeves, puffing on a cigarette (he smoked 60 a day) and sipping scotch, interspersed with sharing his low opinions on conductors. |