Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #87863 in Music
• Released on: 2003-11-10
• Number of discs: 8
• Formats: Box set, Collector's Edition
• Dimensions: .58 pounds
• Running time: 548 minutes

Customer Reviews

Berg
Fascinating compilation of some very interesting works by Berg - with EXCELLENT artists and orchestras.

The day the world ended
Alban Berg (1885-1935) Discover this world of beauty and love , horror , death and defiance .

I first heard and then studied this man's music in my early twenties , and I fell in love.

I bought this CD edition from the U.S (at a crazy inflated price) and have revisited the man and his music anew and I have to say that - unlike many other returns - this is no nostalgic re-living ; I find it afresh, and his light undimmed and far brighter . The orchestral writing , and playing , is an inspiration. Here is colour and texture that you simply won't find anywhere else .Buy it immediately . Indulge that early 21st century longing for Real Life with ...

I can't put my finger on the reason for this , but Alban atomises all my usual reservations and the tragedy that is The Second Viennese School. His fluidity of line is such that rhythm transcends its' usual confines and appears to sustain everything,and does so - to my ears - quite anonymously. I never really considered this dimension of his music before, because every facet is somehow presented seamlessly, but now this rhythmic element is remarkable, and this could also be said of a harmonic/melodic sense and delineation of structure as concentrated and pure and beautiful as J.S.Bach's. This is music conceived, written down, performed and recorded of the highest order.

Detractors will find an easy path to critique and deliberate marginalisation through Hollywood's appropriation of that style(e.g.Op.6)But Hollywood this ain't.

You will inhale new-mown Viennese grass , see the people , taste their delights and their food and the smell of their acrid tobacco and almost touch a world.

Now, hearing it again in 2007,it seems unbearably sad that this world is gone and that we chose an easier, lesser path; but that is what he was saying all along.