CLAUDIO ABBADO—The Complete Recordings on DG & Decca

You can always bet on classical record companies to release anniversary box sets to coincide with births, deaths, etc. Without expensive remastering, these box sets even with reasonable pricing can be big winners for record companies. After umpteen re-releases, almost pure profit.

This massive, limited edition 257-CD + 8-DVD box set from DG of the great Italian conductor Claudio Abbado contains every release he produced on both DG and Decca. A lifetime’s work. And this monster box costs a whopping €764.99. After shipping and exchange, you won’t get any change out of a grand in Canadian dollars. And because it’s a limited edition (2650 sets) I guarantee it’ll sell out and then be on Amazon or Discogs for twice the price. New from DG, it works out to €2.97/disc.

Still, that’s a lot of dosh for what many consider a defunct format.

I did not buy the set. And there were very few press copies available.

So, this is my view of what the box may mean for you. I have many of Claudio’s recordings; since they have not been remastered, they’ll be the same ones found in the box.

I’m a huge Abbado fan. I saw him conduct many times. Always a special experience. Mahler 4 with Berlin, umpteen concerts with the LSO when I studied there and with Vienna in Toronto doing Bruckner 4, still the greatest concert I have attended.

For those who will buy, the release date is on: 02/17/2023.

Among “modern” baby boomer conductors only Seiji Ozawa can match Abbado for stick technique, swagger, and style with such broad musicianship and musical taste. Few conductors can match Abbado’s recorded output, from his first as a harpsichord soloist in 1958 up to the Lucerne and Orchestra Mozart recordings of his final years. Abbado (1933-2014) died after a fifteen-year battle with stomach cancer in 2014 aged 80.

Even though this box set is vast, it is not the complete picture. There are bootlegs around and a solid discography on Sony Classical and EMI. A 39-disc box set, The RCA and Sony Collection: Claudio Abbado is available with a search (originally released in 2014). And there are a plethora of boxes from DG highlighting Abbado’s time with the LSO, and others including “Symphonies”, “Mendelssohn”, “Brahms Symphonies”, “Mahler”, “Schubert”, “Beethoven”, “Abbado and Argerich: The Complete Concerto Recordings”, etc. However, there is no doubt that the bulk of his amazing discography is on DG and less so on Decca (many of his earliest Vienna and LSO recordings are on Decca).

Here, we have Abbado’s major collaborations. At the top of the heap, he got to work with only the best. Music directorships with the LSO, Berlin Phil and Vienna State Opera were the bulk with very close and fruitful relationships with Chicago, Boston, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Vienna Phil. Only Amsterdam, Philly and Cleveland lost out. Take your pick of any of these recordings and you’ll get a winner. A trifecta of performance, sound (he generally received excellent engineering) and interpretation.

A young Abbado conducting in Vienna (he studied in Milan and Vienna). As conducting students, we were all envious of his fabulous style and prodigious stick technique. I remember at the Royal Festival Hall, sitting behind the LSO so we could watch the great man conducting Petrushka, his upbeat to the Russian Dance was so crisp and fleet, the baton swished and we heard the sound from 50 feet away. We all gasped. Never heard that before or since.

And let’s not forget his work with youth. He founded the still-going-strong European Community Youth Orchestra in 1976 and the premier youth orchestra today, the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra in 1986. Then there are his passion projects, the Lucerne Festival Orchestra (a mix of his favoured players, the Hagen String Quartet as leads, soloists, teachers, and the bulk of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra with sundry Concertgebouw and Berlin Phil players), a fantastic orchestra, and the smaller orchestra, Orchestra Mozart.

Lastly, his fame as an opera conductor equalled that of his orchestral career. All his great opera recordings can be found within this box set. And like all the great Italian conductors, he had to do his stint at La Scala as MD.

Let’s get started. Without recourse to the booklet or the internet, I’ll give you my favourite recordings that I own on CD or vinyl. The great news with streaming getting better and better, the bulk of these recordings may be found in your collection or streamed on Apple Music, Qobuz and Tidal. With those provisos, and if your streaming setup is top-notch, maybe the new box set is not top of your needs list. Or, if you are a collector, completist or simply a Claudio fanboy like me, maybe it is. I will tell you if the price was less, I’d have pressed “buy” the day it was available for preorder.

Back to the favourites in my collection. His best include performances from all his great collaborations. The following may be considered definitive recordings or, at least, among the top few choices for the work.

In no particular order:

Tchaikovsky—Symphony No. 4/Vienna

Bartók—The Miraculous Mandarin/LSO

Berg—Wozzeck with Grundheber, Behrens, Zednik, Haugland, Langridge, Raffeiner,/Vienna

Ravel—Piano Concerto in G Major with Martha Argerich/LSO

Brahms—Symphonies/Vienna

Debussy/Ravel—Nocturnes; Daphnis & Chloé, Suite no. 2; Pavane pour une Infante/Boston

Mahler—Symphony No. 7/Chicago

Mendelssohn—Italian Symphony/LSO

Verdi—Overtures/Berlin

Stravinsky—Pulcinella/LSO

Rossini—Il barbiere di Siviglia with Berganza, Alva, Prey, Dara, Montarsolo/LSO

Prokofiev—Ala und Lolly; Skythische Suite; Lieutenant Kijé/Chicago

Prokofiev—Alexandr Nevskij with Obraztsova,/LSO

Prokofiev—Klavierkonzert Nr.3 with Martha Argerich/Berlin

Debussy—Pelléas et Mélisande with Ewing, Le Roux, van Dam, Courtis, Ludwig, Pace, Mazzola/Vienna

Bizet—Carmen with Berganza, Domingo, Cotrubas, Milnes/LSO

Berg—Lulu Suite; Altenberg Lieder op.4; Drei Orchesterstücke op.6 with Margaret Price/LSO

Bartók—Klavierkonzert Nr.1, Klavierkonzert Nr. 2 with Maurizio Pollini/Chicago

Beethoven—Die 5 Klavierkonzerte with Maurizio Pollini/Berlin

Brahms—Klavierkonzert Nr.1 & Klavierkonzert Nr.2 with Maurizio Pollini/Berlin

Brahms—Serenade Nr.2; Akademische Festouvertüre/Berlin

Brahms—21 Ungarische Tänze/Vienna

Okay, that’s 25 or so discs out of a total of 257. Well, that’s the great thing about Abbado—all his performances are with great ensembles and singers and are beautifully prepared. You’ll rarely if ever get a dud. So, you can dip into any disc and have a superb musical experience with playing and singing at the very highest levels. That’s what makes this particular set so valuable. €764.99 valuable? That’ll be your choice.

That said, and not appearing in my “must-have” list above, but super valuable and probably on many other must-have lists, you’ll be buying seminal performances of Verdi and Rossini operas, Mozart Piano Concertos with Serkin, and many others of your favourite works.

Not much Bruckner, Mahler, Schumann or Schubert, on the must-have list you say. All his recordings are serviceable, are very well played and will suit many tastes. Sadly, his last Beethoven Symphonies set with Berlin sold so poorly, it was the beginning of the end of CDs and the way the classical music recording industry works.

In addition to the CDs and DVDs, the DG PR says: The edition is accompanied by a 112-page coffee-table book featuring former musicians and his longtime producers. In 12 essays, various important stages of his career, such as his time with the Berlin Philharmonic, are highlighted. Numerous rare photos, recording logs and a greeting from his four children round out this great limited edition.

So, are you buying? Would love to know your thoughts, yay or nay in the Comments below.

Release Date: 17th Feb 2023

Catalogue No: 4862510

Purchase here. No financial affiliation.

CDs 1–4

J.S. Bach | Bartók

CDs 5–56

Beethoven | Berg | Berlioz | Bizet | Brahms

CDs 57–63

Bruckner I

CDs 64–80

Bruckner II | Chopin | Debussy | Dvořák | Haydn
Hindemith | Janáček | Kurtág

CDs 81–135

Mahler | Mendelssohn | Mozart I

CDs 136–190

Mozart II | Mussorgsky | Pergolesi | Prokofiev
Rachmaninoff | Ravel | Rossini | Schoenberg | Schubert I

CDs 191–257

Schubert II | Schumann | R. Strauss | Stravinsky
Tchaikovsky | Verdi | Vivaldi | Wagner
Berlin Galas | Jonas Kaufmann | Anna Netrebko
New Year’s Concerts | Schoenberg & Webern
Wien Modern I–III | From the House of the Dead (Janáček)

DVDs 1–8

A Russian Night – Lucerne Festival Orchestra, Hélène Grimaud

Claudio Abbado in Concert – Wiener Philharmoniker, Maurizio Pollini (2 DVDs)

New Year’s Concert 1991 – Wiener Philharmoniker

Peter and the Wolf – Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Roberto Benigni

La Cenerentola – Orchestra e Coro del Teatro alla Scala

Il barbiere di Siviglia – Orchestra e Coro del Teatro alla Scala

From the House of the Dead – Wiener Philharmoniker