# Dorati's Minneapolis Mercury Nutcracker & Sleeping Beauty



## blondheim (Jul 6, 2020)

I continue to be troubled that these MLP recordings have never been remastered and released to disc. I couldn't believe they weren't in any of the three big box sets. I had the Opus Kura release of The Nutcracker at one time, but I believe that is just an LP transfer. It was nice to hear, the interpretation is everything I wanted and more, but it can't hold a candle to Wilma Cozart Fine's handling of the Mercury Swan Lake that _is released.

That Swan Lake recording is the example I give to people when I want them to know what I want from an orchestra and a recording. Dirty brass, chuckling woodwinds, strings that don't sound too unison or awash and just a little ragged. I mean, this recording makes the instruments practically sound like birds. Easily the best performance of the final scene, imo. Hands-down, no competition. I would never say I have heard them all but I have certainly heard a great many of them who do not come close. The Bergen set is really the only other one I pull out. I hear great love for Ansermet, Bonynge, and Previn, but I find all to be inferior to Dorati, though I understand the love for Ansermet. I have been spoiled and ruined by the Minneapolis oboes.

We have Dorati's Concertgebouw of Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty, which are great, don't get me wrong, but Dorati in the 50s and 60s was just on fire. Is there a release of these I don't know about? Are others clamoring for them as well?_


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Dorati's LP of Nutcracker (excerpts) from Minneapolis was actually reissued on CD. Here's a link:
http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/o/opk07070a.php

His Nutcracker in stereo on Mercury with the London Symphony remains for my taste the finest reading ever put on record. Not only does he play it as written, but does so with an understanding that his years of experience in the ballet pit gave him. And it still sounds absolutely first-rate.

The Concertgebouw is also terrific, more "elegant" than London as someone put it, but I like the rawer, less blended LSO sound.

The Dorati Sleeping Beauty is good, but there are others I vastly prefer. And a misreading by the cello section in one section, an error neither the conductor or producer heard or bothered with, is extremely annoying. (There's a missing tenor clef symbol - makes quite a difference!). So I got rid of my copy. Bonynge, Previn and Rozsdestvensky are great.


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## blondheim (Jul 6, 2020)

[]Dorati's LP of Nutcracker (excerpts) from Minneapolis was actually reissued on CD. Here's a link:[]

That is actually the Opus Kura release I mentioned. It is an LP transfer. Not remastered so far as I know. Definitely not to the degree of Swan Lake.

The London stereo remake of his Minneapolis mono Nutracker is very good and the LSO was very raw in that period, I agree. I remember when people were coming down on Gergiev for his tempi. I personally prefer the warmth of his Concertgebouw remake. Very christmas morning, lots of feeling, it practically smells of clove and nutmeg. I think the slightly more relaxed tempos allow the Amsterdam players to give it lots of emotions and textures. The Trepak in Amsterdam is less frenzied but somehow no less exciting than London.

As for me, I don't believe one error is enough to throw away a recording. If anything, it makes it more real to me and at the very least gives it a unique identity. Obviously major errors aside, I don't want perfection, as is evident by my description of the orchestras I like above. A little imperfection is sometimes what elevates.

Off the top of my head I can think of a moment in the 10th anniversary of Les Miz at Royal Albert Hall where a stand falls over and cracks right in the middle of Castle on a Cloud and the little girl to her credit barely flinches. It is a memorable moment discussed among musical theatre fans. Or in the new Williams in Vienna recording where there are a few minor flubs but the sense of discovery is heavy and palpable. A classical example would be the Bernstein Mahler 9th with its missing trombones.

I find the Previn Swan Lake to be rather default and generic, despite the lovely LSO. Bonynge has more character in his recording, but not more than Dorati's Minneapolis, not by a mile. The Ansermet is the best of the three with a real sense of balletic movement. Maybe even more so than Dorati at times. I don't begrudge anyone liking any of these. But I would listen to the Neeme Jarvi and Ansermet if I couldn't have the Dorati.

I really wish we could get recordings of the Minneapolis Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty without settling for the LP transfers. Though I will end up buying them again if they don't get released soon.


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