Beethoven: Missa Solemnis in D major, Op. 123

[Solti's] command, both of the work and of the forces he has at his disposal here, makes for a vivid account of the Mass. The Edinburgh Festival Chorus...is in particularly fine fettle. For so... — Gramophone Magazine, September 2014 More…

Release Date: 2nd Jun 2014
Catalogue No: LPO0077
Label: LPO
Length: 79 minutes

Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days

Work length1:19:56

Helen Donath (soprano), Doris Soffel (mezzo-soprano), Siegfried Jerusalem (tenor), Hans Sotin (bass)
Edinburgh Festival Chorus, London Philharmonic Orchestra
Sir Georg Solti
Recorded: 10 September 1982
Recording Venue: Royal Albert Hall, London, UK

Kyrie: Assai sostenuto (Mit Andacht)

Track length10:01

Gloria: Allegro vivace

Track length17:53

Credo: Allegro ma non troppo

Track length20:03

Sanctus: Adagio (Mit Andacht)

Track length15:25

Agnus Dei: Adagio

Track length16:34

About
Reviews
Explore

About

The Missa Solemnis is one of Beethoven’s great works from the height of his composing career: nothing he composed surpasses it for scale, sincerity or sheer vision.

Recorded live at the BBC Proms in 1982, this concert was one of the highlights of Solti’s final season as LPO Principal Conductor: a memorable performance described by mezzo soprano Doris Soffel upon hearing the master as the conductor’s ‘love-declaration to Beethoven’.

Solti, an exclusive Decca artist, was one of the most influential and most recorded conductors of the 20th century. It was with his recordings of Beethoven with the LPO in the early 1950s that his career first gathered momentum.

Solti had a great affinity with the Missa Solemnis on the concert stage and in recordings. He recorded it twice, once with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (1978) and later a live recording with the Berlin Philharmonic (1994), both only currently available digitally or as part of a 25CD (Berlin) or 54CD (Chicago) box set.

In this live Proms recording Solti demonstrates his mastery of the large-scale choral genre, and of making the most of the occasion; this performance is full of calming reverence.

The recording features an outstanding array of soloists representing some of the finest voices of the late 20th century: Helen Donath, Doris Soffel, Siegfried Jerusalem and Hans Sotin, as well as the Edinburgh Festival Chorus.

Reviews

September 2014

[Solti's] command, both of the work and of the forces he has at his disposal here, makes for a vivid account of the Mass. The Edinburgh Festival Chorus...is in particularly fine fettle. For so large a chorus, the word-pointing is superb...The contributions of the young Siegfried Jerusalem are particularly noteworthy.

3rd June 2014

Solti’s is an intense, big-boned reading which seems to me to be firmly operatic in conception...The operatic dimension is very much in evidence in the contributions of the four soloists...However, the real heroes and heroines of this performance are to be found in the chorus...Solti, who gets the LPO to play very well indeed, is on fine form.

26th July 2014

It's not without problems: the recording is murky and has too much reverb...But it's a wonderfully coherent interpretation – humane, humble and, at one point during the anti-military Agnus Dei, disturbingly angry – that proves utterly enthralling.

Beethoven: Missa Solemnis in D major, Op. 123

CD

Contents

Download queue