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Editorial Reviews

There are several reasons why the popularity of Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra has declined so steeply since their glory days in the '50s and '60s. For one thing, Ormandy hung on to his post in Philadelphia a tad too long, and recordings from the later '70s and '80s are for the most part marked by audible fatigue. For another, Columbia and RCA, now Song/BMG, have been reluctant to reissue Ormandy's classic recordings on CD and nearly as reluctant to keep them in print after the first few press runs. But what hurt Ormandy most of all was a change in fashion. What was once hailed as "The Fabulous Philadelphia" sound was later disparaged as the flabby Philadelphia sound in the face of sharper, edgier performances, and Ormandy and his orchestra had almost disappeared from sight when this 10-disc Sony/BMG The Original Jacket set was released in 2008.

For anyone with ears to hear, the performances here are magnificent. In these recordings, the Philadelphia under Ormandy truly sounds fabulous. Building on Stokowski's foundation, Ormandy raised an orchestra built for the gods of music. As amply demonstrated in these performances recorded when the Ormandy/Philadelphia partnership was at its peak, there was no better conductor/orchestra relationship at the time. Listen to the plush strings in Barber's "Adagio" and Vaughan Williams' "Fantasie on a Theme by Thomas Tallis," the piquant woodwinds in Bartók's "Concerto for Orchestra" and the Scherzo from Tchaikovsky's "Fifth," the brazen brass in Bach's "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" and the "Great Gates of Kiev" from Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition," or the brilliant ensemble in Respighi's tone poems and Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade." But the best thing is that Ormandy and the Philadelphia do not use their astounding virtuosity to show off their technique; they use it to show off the music. Even in obvious virtuoso pieces like the Bach transcriptions, Ormandy and the Philadelphia play the music with polish and precision, but they do not overwhelm it with panache and passion. Superbly remastered, this 10-disc set will be mandatory for fans of the Fabulous Philadelphia, and likely fascinating for those who do not already know its work. James Leonard, All Music Guide

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