There's nothing like this anywhere, is there? I flipping love it and I count for probably 100 of these hits. I love the entire 4th and am always wanting for more at the end when it comes. Not here; packed with angst, this satisfies!
I've been listening to classical music all my life, I have mostly loved it. THIS is one of those rare few minutes that I admit to be thunderstruck. God speaks! An Afrikaans poet once said that Bach's Toccata and Fugue is the voice of God speaking through Bach. Let me say that this is true for a divine moment in time in London 1948, when all attention ought to have been riveted to this performance of Furtwängler and his orchestra transcending by far the human condition.
Furwängler - the greatest conductor of all times! He creates music during the concert. Every concert is like the birth and creation of the music. His body is showing the musical ideas and not the beat.
He is an incredible conductor, just like my band teacher said. I mean, the emotion in this song goes from extreme sadness to complete joy. It's just amazing.
The vastness of his conception, his vision of entire work as a single entity, and his ability to bring it forth, while letting the details shine through.....
Despite the less than ideal sound, this is a powerful performance. It demonstrates what a great conductor Furtwangler was. He brought great drama to his concerts, as this clip shows, and won the praise of no less than Toscanini. He has, of course, been under a shadow because he remained in Nazi Germany, but he was actually a patriot and a hero, who helped some Jewish musicians to escape the Nazis. He was, without question, a great conductor and there are few like him today.
@Concertanti my friend on an orchestra told me that some of the best performances do occur during rehearsals. Nevertheless, this one is insurmountable by any standard.
I'm not a fan of Furtwangler but this is absolutely scintillating. I've never heard something as angry and passionate as this. I haven't been able to stop listening to this for the past week. It sounds like he's using his baton to fire cannons and I hear smoke. Simply extraordinary!
one of the most incredible and important pieces of classical music histroy. What a recording, what a speed, what a moment, insanity of Brahms truefully painted by Furtwangler. Can't stop looking at it.
watching this video I realize that the precision of this movements and his absolute control - unlike what most people think- is what made his conducting so great. watch as his left hand follows every note of a phrase, dictating exactly the phrasing and the dynamics, being as minimal as klemperer or celibidache while at the same time being as dynamic as toscanini or as richly expressive as stokowski. his conducting
@amfortas1978 He'd been conducting the BPO for 25 years, so, they had a lot of experience with Brahms. He knew what he could get from the orchestra and they knew what he was after.
Einfach einmalig.Von 1948 ! Am ende dieses Filmes, hinter dem Flutisten, erkenne ich meinen Vater ( geboren 1914 ), der nach dem Kriege eine der bedeutensten Fagottisten war. Er war dreieinhalb Jahre in Gefangenschaft, bis 1948 , wo man 1,8 Millionen Deutsche verhungern liss. Er war gerade nach Berlin zuruckgekommen.
Einmalig. Was fuer ein grosser Dirigent. Mein Vater spielte das erste Fagott ! Er war, von den fuenfzigern an einer der bedeutensten Fagottisten in Deutschland und spielte auf einem Heckel Fagott fuer 60 Jahre ! Viele Schallplattenaufnahmen mit beruehmten Saengern und Musikern folgten und Konzerte mit Karl Richter auf der ganzen Welt. Bin sehr stolz auf Dich ! Ich vermisse Dich !
I really think catholic church should canonize two people: St. Anton (Bruckner) and St. Whilhem(Furt), because through them the God really speak to the world. well, Furt is a lutherian....
Not the sharpest playing by slick modern standards but somehow much stronger than anything you'd hear today, raw and even a bit violent. Three years after the war -- did that have anything to do with it, I wonder?
25 years ago I saw this video in someones home in Paris. Since then I was looking for it!!!
Thanks to you I could heard it again!!! and I'm glad to say myself I was not wrong: for me is the best Brahms 4th Symp I ever heard. Now I'm going to show it to my daughters.
yes. this is just so great. and imagine how it must have felt to come from a defeated germany and play it like this. in a way "an allied orchestra couldn´t match..."
As I've posted before, Furtwängler was not hard to follow for true musicians. It is his entire body language that musicians responded to--not just the movement of his right hand.
When I first viewed this performance in "The Art of Conducting" video, I thought it was the finest performance of the finale of Brahms' 4th ever. But now, I hear some passages which sound jumbled, although others are still the finest.
I suppose that the reason for this is obvious. Can you follow his beat? He appears to be a marionette dangling his arms about.
Still, go to the video of F. rehearsing Schubert's "Unfinished," and you'll see what a perfectionist he was.
i would "recommend" to berdjum that "demonstration of pathos" is a ridiculously superficial, cliched, immature way to chracterize wf's formal art. as far as attention to the inner structural tensions, wf would quote schenker, that even in a waltz for piano, brahms would hold the music together with "bands of iron". indeed schenker was in general very influential on wf, particularly so in his relationship to brahms' music. google "brahms and the crisis of our times".
...As if this music came down from the cosmos, and these notes would never be played this way again......this may have woke up Brahms in his grave.....I usually think this only aboput Toscanini, but Furtwangler does it too.......
I would recommand to some rare "free persons" who accept that it is not because Furtwangler has been considered as ZZZeee most important conductor of the 20th century ...that he is so good with Brahms, to read about Brahms's ideas and to read about his "interior or internal" energy and not about his outside demonstration of pathos. Brahms has not been educated by Wagner. Brahms was even against these news approaches. Stop to fetichized Furtwangler !
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
Much as I love Furtwängler and this orchestra, I always hated this rendering (and its sound quality). Consider f.ex. the tutti at the end. Sorry, but it almost sounds like... a bombardement, really.
This comment has received too many negative votesshow
Furtwangler demonstrates here how to interprete a great german mid 19th symphony with the mentality + values of a german conductor of the mid 20th century who was more obsessed by late 1çth c. compositors than by Brahms ...
I am sorry to say .. I do not like Furtwangler .. and if the orchestra is "possessed" this is a mistake of the conductor because Brahms is not than kind of musician and his grace is somewhere else ...
Slow??? Furtwangler's tempo is easily one of the fastest for this movement on record. He brings the movement in at ~9>30. Typically it's at least 10 minutes. If you want slow, see Bernstein's VPO performance. He drags it out to more than 11 minutes.
Fortunately enough you don't have to decide who deserves to listen to YTube and who doesn't. Besides, you are mixing things up: Brahms was not a baroque composer, so he doesn't require any baroque approach.
AAAA.020952Z SEP 2008 I agree with Vladipiano sounds very similar to Wagner...But on this recording made after the war sounds as I said some months ago Good, I like the last 5 minutes..But the wartime recording of this last 5 minutes sounds different...Could be wartime caused this I do not know...And another point I have Brahm`s second piano concerto two [2] different pianists sounds almost like two different recordings ! Same orchestra and conductor but two different pianists.......AR.
Vlad, what lolmanerik is saying is that YOU like polite "baroque" Brahms as opposed to "Wagnerian" Brahms.
It is true that Furtwangler conducts Brahms in heavy style no longer in fashion, but this same style was carried out by Hans Von Bulow, a disciple of Wagner who later on became Brahms most important conductor during his lifetime.
In Brahms day his orchestral music would have sounded "Wagnerian" in performance.
If you have time and would like to hear some of my work I have a version of the Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana posted that I conducted, as well as a number of my own compositions.
My question is: is Brahms a Romantic using Classical structures, or a Classicist using Romantic vocabulary? Therin lies one of the major differences in Brahms performances. Also, didn't the advocates of Brahms rebel against Wagner? No matter here, because this performance transcends earthly bounds; that orchestra is playing as if possessed! This is one of the most fabulous videos on all of YouTube.
You are right. I think Furtwangler made the musicians to play "in state of Grace". He himself was probably in extasis most of the time on stage, I guess...
AAAA.242242Z AUG 2008 A little while I commented on Furtwanler`s rehearsal London 1948.And that I had A.Bolts version and it looks like I shall have to buy Furtwangler`s because this was good.Guess what HMV sold me Furtwangler`s 4th [12./15.12.1942].6 min & 53seconds someone perhaps Furtwangler says something in this last movement And it has not the same sound as this rehearsal of 1948 !Adrian Bolt is better for Brahms Sorry..Thank you for posting this it is better than his 1942 version.....AR.
Furtwängler conducted Brahms' 4th with unrivalled passion. The Passacaglia (shown in this video) is simply devastating. As Brahms wrote: "Allegro energico e passionato". The Berliners soar to the heavens. The players' commitment can be seen physically (the string section is a marvel to watch). No wonder that when Karajan for the first time heard Furtwängler conduct the Berliners he promised to himself that one day he would have that orchestra. Best thanks for this video.
I award this 5 CLARAS as this somehow conjures up the total loneliness of the primordial Teutonic scream looking for itself in eternity.Something else is going on here...and it exceeds anything music is capable of...THIS GOES ON MY BRAHMS AS A KALEIDOSCOPIC CENTRIFUGE FOR FLEETING SENSIBILTY playlist.if he had been in charge of Operation Barbarossa it would be a very different world today.
I don't know if people can imagine this, it's hard, but imagine this in glorious High Definition with Super Audio sound! Then we would truly hear what this would have sounded like. But....just LISTEN TO THAT!!!
Furtwängler did a great job with Brahms. VERY slow first part but insanely good. Kleiber is also great. But my favorite Brahms conductor is Leonard Bernstein with Wiener Philharmoniker.
I am not musical at all, but my Karajan Brahms CD leaves me cold. THIS is more like it! Please tell me if there is a conductor of present time who worships the pure intensity and extacy of the music like this?
This one is unsurpassable even by Furtwangler. I got three 4th brahms by him with BPO and WPO and no one sound like this one (I'm talking about musical intensity)(and about the finale). But if you are looking for a good interpretation try to find this one: Carl Schuricht-
Orchestre symphonique de la radio bavaroise- Published by Ades.
This is my favourite disc of brahms 4th, with a superb interpretation of the tragic overture
Yuri Temirkanov is very gifted; check out some of his YouTube videos. Today nobody can approach Furtwangler's depth and greatness; I don't know what's happened exactly, but perhaps the invasion of pop culture into classical music has something to do with the loss of depth in today's musicians.
i am 22 i live in texas and i went to school and teased his great grandson kyle furtwangler(not to mention had some good spins on his last name), he looked JUST like wilhelm, i cant believe it!
smoothpianist, for of us who endeavor to contribute "a verse" to this play of life, you are right. Love has been lost among the ruins of Sodom. It is in the purity of music that we find the true essence of love. Even if it is conditional from a conductors and orchestras perspective, it is unconditional in the love one gives and receives.
perhaps it is not an interesting comment, but I am quite sure this video is taken from the rehearsal of 2 ( or 3 ) November 1948 - Earls Court, Empress Hall, London with the Berliner Philarmoniker.
Moreover, it's not only the Berlin Philharmonic (who played concerts up until April 12th 1945, with the Russians already in the streets of Berlin). It is a reconciliation concert, the Berliners being invited by the British, if I recall correctly. The same happend to the "tainted" Richard Strauss, who had his own Strauss-festival in London in 1947 . (I write this by heart, forgive me any small mistakes in numbers)
There is something wrong with our world when love becomes arctic allowing ice to pump through our veins that we can't sing or compose the way we used too. Maybe love is going through a severe famine? Even in the pop world it's all about sex and image love has died the poet's ink arid in bitterness. The mellow mood of life's tone has become dead and music has died with it the composer performs before dead people who no longer feel but hate see my videos profiles
AAAA.242043Z DEC 2007 I have Boults LSO recording....But this is good no doubt about that; Looks like a visit to HMV here in London after the break,nice to see so many Furtwangler fans. No need for the vulgar talk it is either yea or nay...Thank you for posting this.....AR.
Sorry for being a voice of dissent, but I think it is almost vulgar. Tempi are really organic, but contrasts are overdone and it lacks the kind of introspection that is essential to Brahms. Give me Giulini any time.
I really like and respect Giulini. It was a sad day in LA when he left the Phil and we got stuck first with Previn then even worse
Essa Pecker (God, talk about imposters!)
I however must disagree. I find this to be well within the sprit of Brahms. It is bold, dramatic, contrasted. Blended? no, but it isn't Puccini! It should be contrasted, delineated, not a wall of sound but a flood of contrasting counterpoint!
lovelymess, of course there are countless preferences and tastes in music. But in this case, please cut Furtwangler a little slack due to the hideous recording. In spite of this primitive audio, the performance he evokes from this orchestra is tremendously moving. I feel elevated just having heard his snippet of a rehearsal!
Yes, a Furtwangler performance was nearly always a spiritual experience; barlines disappeared, and we float on clouds of ecstasy. There are people who prefer drum beaters and downward accenters; I am not among them.
for what I am talking, let's just listen this creation a great composer and some one who tuly understood, ok Furtwaengler is not the only who conducted that but he is unique
This sympohony was written when Clara Schumann (widow of Robert Schumann), whom Brahms loved all of his life, died in 1896. She was 14 years older than Brahms, he met her first time in 1853 when Brahms (then 20 year old) first met Robert Schumann.
May I add that all who listen and comment on these magnificent performances are all listening to the music and NOT the perfection of sound recording. We hear the greatness--the lack of technical audio perfection is a moot point. It's all about the music making. Bless you all.
This is my first time watching Furtwanger clip with sound. I don't know how they follow him, but doesn't matter.. So intense!!! Even his cut-off was amazing, like some thunderous abdominal thrust! Really, he's like a undead ghoul possessed by the composer's spirit!!!
Carlos Kleiber with the Vienna Philharmonic. That will blow you away. Furtwangler's tempos are sometimes a little outta control, and the melody can't really be heard right before the chacone.
Kleiber did a fabulous recording of Beethoven symphonies 5&7.Although his tempos are somewhat disjointed-the excitement level is tremendous.His Beethoven 9Th.reigns supreme.
This clip alone proves that Furtwangler was one of the greatest musicians and conductors of all time. The orchestra plays as if possessed, and no other performance sounds so spontaneous, electric, and disciplined all at once. Thank you for sharing this treasure.
Didn't seem like a rehearsal.
Not one comment from Maestro during the movement.
Seemed more like a finished performance.
PacRimJim 1 week ago
The best version of the 4th symphony.
carlosmighty 2 weeks ago
Gott in himmell!!!!!1
Cocoheadedcannibal 2 months ago
Beautiful... absolutely gorgeous!
mobruelle 2 months ago
There's nothing like this anywhere, is there? I flipping love it and I count for probably 100 of these hits. I love the entire 4th and am always wanting for more at the end when it comes. Not here; packed with angst, this satisfies!
curtisunit 3 months ago 2
Magic the conducting of Furtwangler !
Thanks a lot
123must 5 months ago
Thank you for sharing with the world! Bravo!
GeoJDr 5 months ago
Incredibly passionate! Love it!
tabitheriel 6 months ago
I've been listening to classical music all my life, I have mostly loved it. THIS is one of those rare few minutes that I admit to be thunderstruck. God speaks! An Afrikaans poet once said that Bach's Toccata and Fugue is the voice of God speaking through Bach. Let me say that this is true for a divine moment in time in London 1948, when all attention ought to have been riveted to this performance of Furtwängler and his orchestra transcending by far the human condition.
westbeach1963 6 months ago
Furwängler - the greatest conductor of all times! He creates music during the concert. Every concert is like the birth and creation of the music. His body is showing the musical ideas and not the beat.
Modernmanx 8 months ago
Agreed this is some wild performance - for the exact opposite, check Mavrinsky's concert performance of this same movement - utter control
davidc5191 10 months ago
lol @ 0:02
ppgppgppgppg 10 months ago
何と言う集中、熱狂。リハーサルってことが信じられない。
凄い！
tristan0823 11 months ago
The beginning of the film, the music reminds me of Wagner's Tannhauser Overture.
yenhoho 11 months ago
outstanding performance!!! thank's for upload this gem!!!
barakfer 11 months ago
What a great performance!
PineClassics,com has related albums.
atozholic 11 months ago
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atozholic 11 months ago
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atozholic 11 months ago
A rehearsal to end all rehearsals.TY for posting this treasure.
paulostroff99 11 months ago
He is an incredible conductor, just like my band teacher said. I mean, the emotion in this song goes from extreme sadness to complete joy. It's just amazing.
StarXGamerEX 1 year ago
@StarXGamerEX Joy? You think so? The finale of the Brahms 4th is one of the darkest symphony endings. It ends pretty tragically, to my ears.
BorisGodunov 11 months ago
@BorisGodunov It expresses ALL emotions and joy is an emotion, but it only matters what it sounds like to you.
StarXGamerEX 11 months ago
@BorisGodunov I agree. Its a an austerely beautiful symphony--like the last autumn leaves before they get blasted off by November's icy winds.
windstorm1000 8 months ago
...seems like the firmament of the cosmos trembled when these notes were player by Furtwangler......
j72050 1 year ago
WHERE ON EARTH DID YOU GET THESE WONDERFUL FURTWANGLER VIDEOS? I WANT TO BUY THE WHOLE SET!!!
CLASSICALFAN100 1 year ago
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Vote thumbs up if "Furtwangler" makes you think "Fart Wrangler" or "Fart Knocker".
dieselheart001 1 year ago
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At 0:02 he shakes the hand like a FAG
videocrazier 1 year ago
A melhor interpretação de todos os tempos!
natto31 1 year ago
The vastness of his conception, his vision of entire work as a single entity, and his ability to bring it forth, while letting the details shine through.....
RobSilverMania 1 year ago
Despite the less than ideal sound, this is a powerful performance. It demonstrates what a great conductor Furtwangler was. He brought great drama to his concerts, as this clip shows, and won the praise of no less than Toscanini. He has, of course, been under a shadow because he remained in Nazi Germany, but he was actually a patriot and a hero, who helped some Jewish musicians to escape the Nazis. He was, without question, a great conductor and there are few like him today.
sallyrob101 1 year ago 2
And to think, this is a rehearsal!
Concertanti 1 year ago 3
@Concertanti my friend on an orchestra told me that some of the best performances do occur during rehearsals. Nevertheless, this one is insurmountable by any standard.
wxsty 1 year ago
Absolutely incandescent. A brilliant shining spirit.
emtube 1 year ago
I'm not a fan of Furtwangler but this is absolutely scintillating. I've never heard something as angry and passionate as this. I haven't been able to stop listening to this for the past week. It sounds like he's using his baton to fire cannons and I hear smoke. Simply extraordinary!
auerod 1 year ago
one of the most incredible and important pieces of classical music histroy. What a recording, what a speed, what a moment, insanity of Brahms truefully painted by Furtwangler. Can't stop looking at it.
mmarky26 1 year ago
is so ideal. he also gives the illusion of minimal control, leaving the orchestra to play uninhibited.
jin12345678 1 year ago 2
watching this video I realize that the precision of this movements and his absolute control - unlike what most people think- is what made his conducting so great. watch as his left hand follows every note of a phrase, dictating exactly the phrasing and the dynamics, being as minimal as klemperer or celibidache while at the same time being as dynamic as toscanini or as richly expressive as stokowski. his conducting
jin12345678 1 year ago
how can the whole orchestra follow him like this?
amfortas1978 1 year ago 2
@amfortas1978 He'd been conducting the BPO for 25 years, so, they had a lot of experience with Brahms. He knew what he could get from the orchestra and they knew what he was after.
TheStockwell 11 months ago
Comment removed
curtisunit 1 year ago
Einfach einmalig.Von 1948 ! Am ende dieses Filmes, hinter dem Flutisten, erkenne ich meinen Vater ( geboren 1914 ), der nach dem Kriege eine der bedeutensten Fagottisten war. Er war dreieinhalb Jahre in Gefangenschaft, bis 1948 , wo man 1,8 Millionen Deutsche verhungern liss. Er war gerade nach Berlin zuruckgekommen.
henkerfastwalker 1 year ago 5
Einmalig. Was fuer ein grosser Dirigent. Mein Vater spielte das erste Fagott ! Er war, von den fuenfzigern an einer der bedeutensten Fagottisten in Deutschland und spielte auf einem Heckel Fagott fuer 60 Jahre ! Viele Schallplattenaufnahmen mit beruehmten Saengern und Musikern folgten und Konzerte mit Karl Richter auf der ganzen Welt. Bin sehr stolz auf Dich ! Ich vermisse Dich !
henkerfastwalker 1 year ago 4
nothing comparable with Furtwaengler's "eurythmia".
gaiu76 1 year ago
This is Brahms even Brahms didn't hear of.
FilmRomMusDrawingWar 1 year ago 2
This is godly.
iplongnin 1 year ago
they look like POW, Anyway incredible post-war document. Thx4it
legoland70 1 year ago
No one has the balls to take it at this speed today. This is a piece Furtwangler and the BPO owned.
hophmi 1 year ago 2
I really think catholic church should canonize two people: St. Anton (Bruckner) and St. Whilhem(Furt), because through them the God really speak to the world. well, Furt is a lutherian....
mingweicello 2 years ago
Not the sharpest playing by slick modern standards but somehow much stronger than anything you'd hear today, raw and even a bit violent. Three years after the war -- did that have anything to do with it, I wonder?
bchucup 2 years ago 3
wow! what a marvel. don't care what his persuasions were. he is for the ages. arts stands for all. inspires all.
Perseus12345678 2 years ago 6
Merci jacquesurlus!!
UrbanMk 2 years ago
25 years ago I saw this video in someones home in Paris. Since then I was looking for it!!!
Thanks to you I could heard it again!!! and I'm glad to say myself I was not wrong: for me is the best Brahms 4th Symp I ever heard. Now I'm going to show it to my daughters.
25 years later...
Thank you very, very much...
leonengard 2 years ago 12
@leonengard
What about Kleibers version?
bowedmyhead 2 months ago
Brahms 4th Symphony - last 5 minutes of the 4th movement
sylvio1980 2 years ago
what mouvment is it? wich part?
UrbanMk 2 years ago
Fin du 4 ième mouvement.
jacquesurlus 2 years ago
これだけ指揮者に身を委ねたオーケストラの団員の姿は今ではほとんど見られませんね。鬼気迫る、しかし感動的な演奏だと思います。
oosawashuuji 2 years ago
Wow. Now THAT has a sense of real 'scale' and majesty to it that isn't matched or allowed for by todays standards.
aardvaark069 2 years ago
the video and sound might suck (1948, after all), but the energy and passion is through the roof! Amazing!
loppyjev 2 years ago
Fürtwangler, Brahms, yeah.
morningayo 2 years ago
This is incredible you'll never hear anything like this again from these journey man conductors we have now
pedrovski10 2 years ago 41
yes. this is just so great. and imagine how it must have felt to come from a defeated germany and play it like this. in a way "an allied orchestra couldn´t match..."
QuintusVIIV 2 years ago
@pedrovski10 You bet mate. It blew my socks off. Incredible THIS IS CONDUCTING....x
gezbo66 1 year ago
@pedrovski10 rubbish! Journeying makes fresh!
thetheatreofmadness 1 month ago
3:03 - gettin' jiggy with it
karlhschro 2 years ago 2
As I've posted before, Furtwängler was not hard to follow for true musicians. It is his entire body language that musicians responded to--not just the movement of his right hand.
ipmoic 2 years ago 3
When I first viewed this performance in "The Art of Conducting" video, I thought it was the finest performance of the finale of Brahms' 4th ever. But now, I hear some passages which sound jumbled, although others are still the finest.
I suppose that the reason for this is obvious. Can you follow his beat? He appears to be a marionette dangling his arms about.
Still, go to the video of F. rehearsing Schubert's "Unfinished," and you'll see what a perfectionist he was.
ybravura 2 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Karajan is better
Liebromeistal 2 years ago
i would "recommend" to berdjum that "demonstration of pathos" is a ridiculously superficial, cliched, immature way to chracterize wf's formal art. as far as attention to the inner structural tensions, wf would quote schenker, that even in a waltz for piano, brahms would hold the music together with "bands of iron". indeed schenker was in general very influential on wf, particularly so in his relationship to brahms' music. google "brahms and the crisis of our times".
ijrupahsinosub 2 years ago
...As if this music came down from the cosmos, and these notes would never be played this way again......this may have woke up Brahms in his grave.....I usually think this only aboput Toscanini, but Furtwangler does it too.......
j72050 2 years ago 2
the greatest conductor ever.
changjiang001 2 years ago 3
I would recommand to some rare "free persons" who accept that it is not because Furtwangler has been considered as ZZZeee most important conductor of the 20th century ...that he is so good with Brahms, to read about Brahms's ideas and to read about his "interior or internal" energy and not about his outside demonstration of pathos. Brahms has not been educated by Wagner. Brahms was even against these news approaches. Stop to fetichized Furtwangler !
Berdjum 2 years ago
Can we have this in English, please?
BorisGodunov 2 years ago
This is just fantastic!
MahlerBruckner 2 years ago 3
This comment has received too many negative votes show
Much as I love Furtwängler and this orchestra, I always hated this rendering (and its sound quality). Consider f.ex. the tutti at the end. Sorry, but it almost sounds like... a bombardement, really.
CaptainBluebear08 2 years ago
Comment removed
gaugin1903 2 years ago
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Furtwangler demonstrates here how to interprete a great german mid 19th symphony with the mentality + values of a german conductor of the mid 20th century who was more obsessed by late 1çth c. compositors than by Brahms ...
I am sorry to say .. I do not like Furtwangler .. and if the orchestra is "possessed" this is a mistake of the conductor because Brahms is not than kind of musician and his grace is somewhere else ...
Berdjum 2 years ago
What gorgeous tone wafting from the horns--no doubt a Brain family member(s).
Just remarkable essence and life-affirming energy from Furtwangler--to me, the greatest natural conducting talent of any century.
ipmoic 2 years ago 4
this is a very powerful performance, the furtwangler sound - heavy, spiritual, the tutti at 4:19 my goodness, watching the bows at 4:58
i'm so thankful this exists
fuels me for conducting my high school orchestra and band
es freut mich sehr!
squelchtheory 2 years ago
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good but slow
billythekid20 2 years ago
you have never listened to it conducted by Lorin Maazel :)
FavEl79 2 years ago 3
Slow??? Furtwangler's tempo is easily one of the fastest for this movement on record. He brings the movement in at ~9>30. Typically it's at least 10 minutes. If you want slow, see Bernstein's VPO performance. He drags it out to more than 11 minutes.
BorisGodunov 2 years ago 5
Allegro energico e passionato.
Is it the Philharmonia (with Dennis Brain as first Horn)?I wonder why the timpani player isn't using hard sticks.
Is it the Royal Albert Hall (an elliptical building with enormous echo before the installation of ceiling "flying saucers" in the 1970s)?
The bows of the strings are wonderfully disciplined (this is no longer the case with late Karajan Berlin Philharmonic recordings!)
The tempo is too fast to do tremolando in sextuplets as marked.
1401JSC 2 years ago
Nope. It´s the BPO.
blechmusik 2 years ago
Yeah...the doublebass bowing is underarm (continental) not as in England.
It was however the position of this section that worried me, I thought that in the 40s, the Basses of the BPO were set behind the 1st violins.
Does Fürt really need to rehearse Brahms with this orchestra???
1401JSC 2 years ago
is this the lso?
nbaum0 3 years ago
It's the post war Berlin Philharmonic
sebafak 3 years ago
Comment removed
MahlerBruckner 2 years ago
This is incredible.
Bravo! Maestro.
toyodafamily2008 3 years ago
this is beautiful!
earthatic 3 years ago
Fortunately enough you don't have to decide who deserves to listen to YTube and who doesn't. Besides, you are mixing things up: Brahms was not a baroque composer, so he doesn't require any baroque approach.
Vladipiano 3 years ago
Greatest ever. Berlin + Furtwängler. So epic. So big. So warm. So human.
lolmanerik 3 years ago 32
@lolmanerik it's not Berlin - it's London.
ewetubeviewer 1 year ago
@ewetubeviewer ...Berlin Phil. not Londony Symph
lolmanerik 1 year ago
@lolmanerik
so human? No.
So German
TheDeusmechs 11 months ago 2
@TheDeusmechs lol i thought the same....and im not german!
divine604 10 months ago
At 0.03 he's not so kind to the concert master...
olga2809 3 years ago 4
yep he can be so grumpy sometimes
iambananananananana 3 years ago
Furtwängler conducts Brahms as it would be Wagner...
Vladipiano 3 years ago
AAAA.020952Z SEP 2008 I agree with Vladipiano sounds very similar to Wagner...But on this recording made after the war sounds as I said some months ago Good, I like the last 5 minutes..But the wartime recording of this last 5 minutes sounds different...Could be wartime caused this I do not know...And another point I have Brahm`s second piano concerto two [2] different pianists sounds almost like two different recordings ! Same orchestra and conductor but two different pianists.......AR.
fourwayscottage 3 years ago
u don´t understand anything. go play baroque brahms and never come back. people like you don´t deserve to listen to this greatness.
lolmanerik 3 years ago
I think you guys ar having a confused argument.
Vlad, what lolmanerik is saying is that YOU like polite "baroque" Brahms as opposed to "Wagnerian" Brahms.
It is true that Furtwangler conducts Brahms in heavy style no longer in fashion, but this same style was carried out by Hans Von Bulow, a disciple of Wagner who later on became Brahms most important conductor during his lifetime.
In Brahms day his orchestral music would have sounded "Wagnerian" in performance.
lovelymess 3 years ago 5
wow. you have some knowledge! nice to meet you. Are you a musician yourself?
all ther best
lolmanerik 3 years ago
Thank you,
Yes I am a musician.
If you have time and would like to hear some of my work I have a version of the Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana posted that I conducted, as well as a number of my own compositions.
All the best as well
LM
lovelymess 3 years ago
My question is: is Brahms a Romantic using Classical structures, or a Classicist using Romantic vocabulary? Therin lies one of the major differences in Brahms performances. Also, didn't the advocates of Brahms rebel against Wagner? No matter here, because this performance transcends earthly bounds; that orchestra is playing as if possessed! This is one of the most fabulous videos on all of YouTube.
billyguns2 2 years ago
You are right. I think Furtwangler made the musicians to play "in state of Grace". He himself was probably in extasis most of the time on stage, I guess...
maxlorenz24 2 years ago
AAAA.242242Z AUG 2008 A little while I commented on Furtwanler`s rehearsal London 1948.And that I had A.Bolts version and it looks like I shall have to buy Furtwangler`s because this was good.Guess what HMV sold me Furtwangler`s 4th [12./15.12.1942].6 min & 53seconds someone perhaps Furtwangler says something in this last movement And it has not the same sound as this rehearsal of 1948 !Adrian Bolt is better for Brahms Sorry..Thank you for posting this it is better than his 1942 version.....AR.
fourwayscottage 3 years ago
wretched sound but the passion and momentum of the performance-as if it were in a single breath-sweeps you along.
japanesesweet 3 years ago
the more modern pure and clear orchestra sound is musicaly empty, this is the only possible sound, MUSIC.
ilbacioditosca 3 years ago 8
this is the greatest version i ever heard. i'm addict to it, viva la furtwangler
gunmenow 3 years ago 3
Thanks franciszhou ¡¡¡¡ : )
dermann76 3 years ago
Yes, Furtwängler the master.
dermann76 3 years ago
太牛了，这段结尾甚至要强悍过卡洛斯克莱伯的
vocabulary927 3 years ago 3
Furtwängler conducted Brahms' 4th with unrivalled passion. The Passacaglia (shown in this video) is simply devastating. As Brahms wrote: "Allegro energico e passionato". The Berliners soar to the heavens. The players' commitment can be seen physically (the string section is a marvel to watch). No wonder that when Karajan for the first time heard Furtwängler conduct the Berliners he promised to himself that one day he would have that orchestra. Best thanks for this video.
Franciscque 3 years ago 3
the venue sounds simply amazing.
DualThunder 3 years ago
this performance has some BALLS!
theoryjoe 3 years ago 2
There are many great conductors (thank God), but Furtwaengler has his own category.
deadlift65 3 years ago
This is one of the greatest performances of anything I've ever heard.
billyguns2 3 years ago 6
this is astounding!!
rachmaninovbrahms 3 years ago
I award this 5 CLARAS as this somehow conjures up the total loneliness of the primordial Teutonic scream looking for itself in eternity.Something else is going on here...and it exceeds anything music is capable of...THIS GOES ON MY BRAHMS AS A KALEIDOSCOPIC CENTRIFUGE FOR FLEETING SENSIBILTY playlist.if he had been in charge of Operation Barbarossa it would be a very different world today.
smithsherman 3 years ago
Fabulous!!!
Thanks for posting.
hikoci64 3 years ago
again, this is simply the best ever ending of no.4.
mingweicello 3 years ago 8
legendary! Thanks for posting.
sbcpianist 3 years ago
I don't know if people can imagine this, it's hard, but imagine this in glorious High Definition with Super Audio sound! Then we would truly hear what this would have sounded like. But....just LISTEN TO THAT!!!
amigomatt 3 years ago 4
wow, so much energy and power!
olga2809 3 years ago
Furtwängler did a great job with Brahms. VERY slow first part but insanely good. Kleiber is also great. But my favorite Brahms conductor is Leonard Bernstein with Wiener Philharmoniker.
entelekhia 3 years ago 3
I am not musical at all, but my Karajan Brahms CD leaves me cold. THIS is more like it! Please tell me if there is a conductor of present time who worships the pure intensity and extacy of the music like this?
keramikk 3 years ago
This one is unsurpassable even by Furtwangler. I got three 4th brahms by him with BPO and WPO and no one sound like this one (I'm talking about musical intensity)(and about the finale). But if you are looking for a good interpretation try to find this one: Carl Schuricht-
Orchestre symphonique de la radio bavaroise- Published by Ades.
This is my favourite disc of brahms 4th, with a superb interpretation of the tragic overture
Aventao 3 years ago 2
Yuri Temirkanov is very gifted; check out some of his YouTube videos. Today nobody can approach Furtwangler's depth and greatness; I don't know what's happened exactly, but perhaps the invasion of pop culture into classical music has something to do with the loss of depth in today's musicians.
billyguns2 3 years ago 3
Greatest conductor ever.
Katyclarinet 3 years ago 3
i love brahms so much...his music...especially this movement...its jus so much emotion put into it...idk...its jus so amazing
HORNSPWN 4 years ago 2
i am 22 i live in texas and i went to school and teased his great grandson kyle furtwangler(not to mention had some good spins on his last name), he looked JUST like wilhelm, i cant believe it!
tyson33300 4 years ago
Did you really know his great grandson - in Texas? Wow! How did they ever wind up there? Very amusing.
jatriggs 2 years ago
Who is he supposed to be?
EDWL1 2 years ago
I mean that great grandson
EDWL1 2 years ago
AAAA.021536Z FEB 2008 I notice that there are 8 double bass players ! Is this normal ? .....AR.
fourwayscottage 4 years ago
smoothpianist, for of us who endeavor to contribute "a verse" to this play of life, you are right. Love has been lost among the ruins of Sodom. It is in the purity of music that we find the true essence of love. Even if it is conditional from a conductors and orchestras perspective, it is unconditional in the love one gives and receives.
DaddyofT 4 years ago
perhaps it is not an interesting comment, but I am quite sure this video is taken from the rehearsal of 2 ( or 3 ) November 1948 - Earls Court, Empress Hall, London with the Berliner Philarmoniker.
Hoping it helps
MOUNTDRASH 4 years ago
I do not know if it is the London Phil...or the Royal Phil..or the BBC.......but they really woke up this day for Furtwangler
j72050 4 years ago 3
This is the Berliner Philcharmonicker Orchester !
MaestroVNG 4 years ago
Moreover, it's not only the Berlin Philharmonic (who played concerts up until April 12th 1945, with the Russians already in the streets of Berlin). It is a reconciliation concert, the Berliners being invited by the British, if I recall correctly. The same happend to the "tainted" Richard Strauss, who had his own Strauss-festival in London in 1947 . (I write this by heart, forgive me any small mistakes in numbers)
MarkoKassenaar 4 years ago
legend
playornotplay 4 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
This is the worst Brahms I have ever heard.
hillwills 4 years ago
This the best Brahms I have ever heard...
Impressionist1 4 years ago 9
Voyez Carlos Kleiber, DVD DG 1996.
écoutez Yevgeny Mravinsky CD.
La quatrième de Brahms est une de mes symphonie préféré,ce sont les seuls qui peuvent soutenir la comparaison, à mon avis.
jacquesurlus 3 years ago
There is something wrong with our world when love becomes arctic allowing ice to pump through our veins that we can't sing or compose the way we used too. Maybe love is going through a severe famine? Even in the pop world it's all about sex and image love has died the poet's ink arid in bitterness. The mellow mood of life's tone has become dead and music has died with it the composer performs before dead people who no longer feel but hate see my videos profiles
smoothpianist 4 years ago
Incredibile....stupefacente.....inarrivabile....perfetto.....divino.....
dermann1 4 years ago
AAAA.242043Z DEC 2007 I have Boults LSO recording....But this is good no doubt about that; Looks like a visit to HMV here in London after the break,nice to see so many Furtwangler fans. No need for the vulgar talk it is either yea or nay...Thank you for posting this.....AR.
fourwayscottage 4 years ago
Anybody has the beginning of the first symphony of Brahms by him? They say it's the best interpretation....
zamolxis7 4 years ago
Sorry for being a voice of dissent, but I think it is almost vulgar. Tempi are really organic, but contrasts are overdone and it lacks the kind of introspection that is essential to Brahms. Give me Giulini any time.
viandante 4 years ago
introspection?
suzettegm 4 years ago
I really like and respect Giulini. It was a sad day in LA when he left the Phil and we got stuck first with Previn then even worse
Essa Pecker (God, talk about imposters!)
I however must disagree. I find this to be well within the sprit of Brahms. It is bold, dramatic, contrasted. Blended? no, but it isn't Puccini! It should be contrasted, delineated, not a wall of sound but a flood of contrasting counterpoint!
lovelymess 4 years ago
Well then we got ourselfs a new version. I hear music, do you?
VojinD 4 years ago
??! Are you talking about Dudamel going to LA? If so I am excited about him, but I am not sure what you're talking about...
lovelymess 4 years ago
lovelymess, of course there are countless preferences and tastes in music. But in this case, please cut Furtwangler a little slack due to the hideous recording. In spite of this primitive audio, the performance he evokes from this orchestra is tremendously moving. I feel elevated just having heard his snippet of a rehearsal!
emtube 4 years ago
ALL the other performances pale in the face of this one
wxsty 4 years ago
He's a mystic.
That's all there is to it.
weepingforbrunnhilde 4 years ago
He's not playing the notes, he's "channeling" spirit of the music.
emtube 4 years ago
Yup.
weepingforbrunnhilde 4 years ago
Yes, a Furtwangler performance was nearly always a spiritual experience; barlines disappeared, and we float on clouds of ecstasy. There are people who prefer drum beaters and downward accenters; I am not among them.
billyguns2 4 years ago
...Furtwangler makes 99% of modern day conductors look like imposters, rank amateurs.
j72050 4 years ago 4
Tremendously exciting playing and conducting.
paulostroff99 4 years ago
for what I am talking, let's just listen this creation a great composer and some one who tuly understood, ok Furtwaengler is not the only who conducted that but he is unique
12010830 4 years ago
The one 20th century conductor who could read between the notes. Ah, but this was a butt-kicker of a rehearsal. Thanks for getting it up.
Amiduffer 4 years ago
You wouldn't happen to have the Bruckner 8th rehearsal?
NecroSexy 4 years ago
I keep Furwangler's Brahms 4 in my car. Never get tired of listening to it.
mltube 4 years ago
This sympohony was written when Clara Schumann (widow of Robert Schumann), whom Brahms loved all of his life, died in 1896. She was 14 years older than Brahms, he met her first time in 1853 when Brahms (then 20 year old) first met Robert Schumann.
AllaHimself 4 years ago
なんだこの尋常ならざる雰囲気は？！ひどい音にも拘らず、この体が、心が震える様は、いったいなんなんだっ！この演奏の前では誰でも無力になり、ひれ伏すしか術はない。
kimikimi003 4 years ago
May I add that all who listen and comment on these magnificent performances are all listening to the music and NOT the perfection of sound recording. We hear the greatness--the lack of technical audio perfection is a moot point. It's all about the music making. Bless you all.
ipmoic 4 years ago
This is my first time watching Furtwanger clip with sound. I don't know how they follow him, but doesn't matter.. So intense!!! Even his cut-off was amazing, like some thunderous abdominal thrust! Really, he's like a undead ghoul possessed by the composer's spirit!!!
samtam12 4 years ago
Carlos Kleiber with the Vienna Philharmonic. That will blow you away. Furtwangler's tempos are sometimes a little outta control, and the melody can't really be heard right before the chacone.
jnicho19 4 years ago
Kleiber did a fabulous recording of Beethoven symphonies 5&7.Although his tempos are somewhat disjointed-the excitement level is tremendous.His Beethoven 9Th.reigns supreme.
paulostroff99 4 years ago
I've never heard Brahms with quite this much emotional power from anyone else.
shug1688 4 years ago
This clip alone proves that Furtwangler was one of the greatest musicians and conductors of all time. The orchestra plays as if possessed, and no other performance sounds so spontaneous, electric, and disciplined all at once. Thank you for sharing this treasure.
billyguns2 4 years ago 2
The best ever!!!!!!!!
lolmanerik 4 years ago
Unbelievable!
smudgepots 4 years ago
Furtwaengler is on fire here. No one else's Brahms 4 even come close.
nibelungensohn 4 years ago 2