- Producer's Note
- Full Track Listing
- Cover Art
A fabulous Mozart Requiem is revealed in these new XR remasters
Beecham's brilliance heard here as never before, with sterling performances throughout
This recording of Mozart's Requiem is one of
those happy instances which demonstrates the merits of
The later Schubert recording was far more successful in its original incarnation, but this, too, has been brought into even finer focus by the XR process, with additional use of phase-alignment software helping to produce a more sharply-defined stereo soundstage than before.
Together they're a superb-sounding record of Beecham at his very best.
Recorded 13-14 December 1954 and 29 May 1956, Walthamstow Assembly Hall, London
First issued on Columbia ML-5160
Transfer from Fonata CFL 1000
Elsie Morison soprano
Monica Sinclair contralto
Alexander Young tenor
Marian Nowakowski bass
BBC Chorus dir. Leslie Woodgate
Recorded 14/16 May 1958 Salle Wagram, Paris
and 18 December 1958 & 7 May 1959, Abbey Road Studio 1, London
First issued on EMI ASD345/ALP1743
Transfer from EMI SXLP 30204
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Sir Thomas Beecham conductor
Studio recordings, 1954-1959
XR remastering by
Cover artwork based on a photograph of Sir Thomas Beecham
Total duration: 77:52
Fanfare Review
The Schubert is one of those works that brought out the charm in Sir Thomas’s music-making; the Mozart shows his serious side, as well as his willingness to tinker with a score
Here are two Beecham classics from the
1950s: the mono Mozart Requiem of 1954–56 and the early stereo Schubert
Fifth from 1958–59. The Mozart is transferred from a copy of the English
Fontana LP, the Schubert from the stereo LP on HMV Concert Classics, a
budget reissue line. (Fontana, which reissue producer
Since these recordings are well known
to Beecham collectors, I will direct most of my observations to the
sound of this reissue. I compared Rose’s transfer of the Mozart with my
copy of the original Columbia LP. As
The Schubert is another matter. I was
able to do A/B comparisons with not only Concert Classics SXLP-30204 but
also the original issue on ASD-345, as well as the currently available
EMI CD.
Mine seems to be the lone dissonant voice amid Fanfare’s
chorus of praise for
Richard A. Kaplan
This article originally appeared in Issue 36:1 (Sept/Oct 2012) of Fanfare Magazine.