Beethoven: (orch. Mitropoulos/Bernstein). String Quartets in C sharp minor, Op. 131; and in F major, Op. 135,
Wiener Philharmoniker; Leonard Bernstein conductor
Classical | 1 CD | EAC Rip | 347 Mb | FLAC+LOG+M3U+Cue | Full scans | 4 RS links
Publisher: Deutsche Grammophon
DG 435 779-2GH (77 minutes: ADD/DDD).
Item marked a recorded at performances in the Konzerthaus, Vienna during September 1977, from 2531 077 (1/80);
Grosser Saal of the Musikverein, Vienna during September 1989.
When the young Leonard Bernstein was a student at Harvard University he went to Dmitri Mitropoulos's first concert with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1936, which included his own arrangement for string orchestra of Beethoven's longest, most complex and—in the composer's own opinion—finest string quartet: Op. 131 in C sharp minor, whose seven movements are meant to be played consecutively, without pauses in between. "I went out of my mind and have been ever since," Bernstein later recalled. "It's not a version but exactly the quartet. One buys the four parts in multiple and distributes them to the orchestra, just marking where the basses double with the celli." Bernstein borrowed Mitropoulos's copy of the Eulenburg miniature score, made his own adjustments to the latter's editing, and performed the work several times with his first orchestra, the New York City Symphony, and once, later, with the New York Philharmonic.
DG's recording, first issued on LP in 1980 and now most happily reissued on CD, was, it seems, an amalgamation of takes from several live performances with the strings of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra ("the perfect people to do this", Bernstein said) both at the Salzburg Festival and in Vienna, with no 'touch-up' session in the studio afterwards. I still think that some passages in the gigantic variation-form central slow movement and in the recitative-like Allegro moderato which precedes it would have benefited from the use of solo strings, but the virtuosity and unanimity of the VP0 strings command the highest respect. The grave opening fugue, the brilliant scherzo and the impassioned finale sound terrific; right or wrong, this is a performance that takes you by the throat.
The CD has the enormous advantage of prefacing Op. 131 with Beethoven's last Quartet, Op. 135 in F, recorded in what were presumably comparable circumstances in the Musikverein in Vienna in September 1989, less than a year before Bernstein's death. Although Toscanini recorded the second and third movements of Op. 135 with the strings of the NBC Symphony in 1938 it could be argued that this in many ways more intimate music responds less well to performance by an orchestral string section; but listen to the VPO playing the scherzo and the Lento which follows it and see if you are not persuaded otherwise. This is a fabulous disc.
R.G. Gramophone, November 1992
Exact Audio Copy V0.99 prebeta 4 from 23. January 2008
EAC extraction logfile from 30. August 2009, 14:48
Ludwig van Beethoven / String Quartets Op 131 & 135 - Bernstein, Vienna PO
Used drive : HL-DT-STDVDRAM GSA-4167B Adapter: 3 ID: 0
Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : No
Make use of C2 pointers : Yes
Read offset correction : 667
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : No
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 768 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files\Exact Audio Copy\FLAC\FLAC.EXE
Additional command line options : -6 -V -T "ARTIST=%a" -T "TITLE=%t" -T "ALBUM=%g" -T "DATE=%y" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%n" -T "GENRE=%m" -T "COMMENT=%e" %s -o %d
TOC of the extracted CD
Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.33 | 7:16.00 | 33 | 32732
2 | 7:16.33 | 3:29.00 | 32733 | 48407
3 | 10:45.33 | 10:01.00 | 48408 | 93482
4 | 20:46.33 | 10:47.00 | 93483 | 142007
5 | 31:33.33 | 8:45.32 | 142008 | 181414
6 | 40:18.65 | 3:14.43 | 181415 | 196007
7 | 43:33.33 | 0:54.00 | 196008 | 200057
8 | 44:27.33 | 17:15.00 | 200058 | 277682
9 | 61:42.33 | 6:03.00 | 277683 | 304907
10 | 67:45.33 | 2:44.57 | 304908 | 317264
11 | 70:30.15 | 6:58.18 | 317265 | 348632
Range status and errors
Selected range
Filename I:\My Documents\My Music\Beethoven\String Quartets\Bernstein\Ludwig van Beethoven - String Quartets Op 131 & 135 - Bernstein, Vienna PO.wav
Peak level 96.5 %
Range quality 100.0 %
Copy CRC 7781390E
Copy OK
No errors occurred
AccurateRip summary
Track 1 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [60AC453A]
Track 2 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [EAD3C269]
Track 3 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [AAFD43A5]
Track 4 accurately ripped (confidence 7) [1DDA7089]
Track 5 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [EBA7D575]
Track 6 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [6A149267]
Track 7 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [3719C1D1]
Track 8 accurately ripped (confidence 8) [34FCBF0D]
Track 9 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [BC9ED1E3]
Track 10 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [E4BC42AF]
Track 11 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [6F01D16C]
All tracks accurately ripped
End of status report
EAC extraction logfile from 30. August 2009, 14:48
Ludwig van Beethoven / String Quartets Op 131 & 135 - Bernstein, Vienna PO
Used drive : HL-DT-STDVDRAM GSA-4167B Adapter: 3 ID: 0
Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : No
Make use of C2 pointers : Yes
Read offset correction : 667
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : No
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 768 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files\Exact Audio Copy\FLAC\FLAC.EXE
Additional command line options : -6 -V -T "ARTIST=%a" -T "TITLE=%t" -T "ALBUM=%g" -T "DATE=%y" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%n" -T "GENRE=%m" -T "COMMENT=%e" %s -o %d
TOC of the extracted CD
Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.33 | 7:16.00 | 33 | 32732
2 | 7:16.33 | 3:29.00 | 32733 | 48407
3 | 10:45.33 | 10:01.00 | 48408 | 93482
4 | 20:46.33 | 10:47.00 | 93483 | 142007
5 | 31:33.33 | 8:45.32 | 142008 | 181414
6 | 40:18.65 | 3:14.43 | 181415 | 196007
7 | 43:33.33 | 0:54.00 | 196008 | 200057
8 | 44:27.33 | 17:15.00 | 200058 | 277682
9 | 61:42.33 | 6:03.00 | 277683 | 304907
10 | 67:45.33 | 2:44.57 | 304908 | 317264
11 | 70:30.15 | 6:58.18 | 317265 | 348632
Range status and errors
Selected range
Filename I:\My Documents\My Music\Beethoven\String Quartets\Bernstein\Ludwig van Beethoven - String Quartets Op 131 & 135 - Bernstein, Vienna PO.wav
Peak level 96.5 %
Range quality 100.0 %
Copy CRC 7781390E
Copy OK
No errors occurred
AccurateRip summary
Track 1 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [60AC453A]
Track 2 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [EAD3C269]
Track 3 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [AAFD43A5]
Track 4 accurately ripped (confidence 7) [1DDA7089]
Track 5 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [EBA7D575]
Track 6 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [6A149267]
Track 7 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [3719C1D1]
Track 8 accurately ripped (confidence 8) [34FCBF0D]
Track 9 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [BC9ED1E3]
Track 10 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [E4BC42AF]
Track 11 accurately ripped (confidence 9) [6F01D16C]
All tracks accurately ripped
End of status report