David
Senior Member
Autograph - obtained by me on 13th June 1977 at the Royal Festival Hall in London
Posts: 100
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Post by David on Feb 7, 2010 23:32:44 GMT 1
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 18, 2010 13:33:12 GMT 1
Hi David,
When you received the autograph in London 1977, did you talk with him? Has anyone else conversed with K?
Regards, tjh
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David
Senior Member
Autograph - obtained by me on 13th June 1977 at the Royal Festival Hall in London
Posts: 100
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Post by David on Feb 28, 2010 12:38:06 GMT 1
Hello TJH, Apologies for the delayed response. No, I think that any banter with HvK shortly before he was about to conduct Mahler 6 would have been expecting a little too much. Of course I thanked him in a couple of words but that was it. You may be interested in the background to the autograph which is now framed and hangs in my ‘den’. I had often thought that the inside front cover of the 1972 Tristan and Isolde EMI LP box booklet would look wonderful with an autograph as the photograph doesn’t fill the whole page. On 13th June 1977 I achieved this as Karajan entered the Royal Festival Hall. This entailed loitering around for a couple of hours or so, but had the advantage of avoiding the post-concert melee and was also quite calm and intimate in that there were only 3 or 4 of us waiting. I can clearly remember noticing that Karajan’s hand started to move to and fro before my basic ballpoint hit the page - I estimated at about 180 beats per minute; no doubt this was maintained perfectly until the end of the signature! The image below is about 60% of the actual size and is cropped at the sides owing to the limitations of my scanner. As mentioned previously, it is the size of an LP cover. Best Wishes - David
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2010 6:11:52 GMT 1
Thanks David. I like how the "K" reaches the cuff. In case you are interested, this concert is mentioned briefly on p. 632 of Osborne's book.
On the VPO Strauss Waltzes 2 CD set (1991) with 13 conductors' signatures on each blade of a fan (including HvK), they are in alphabetical order from the left, execpt Szell and M8a's orders are reversed. My theory is if they were in order Szell's signature would cover part of Mehta's. (By the way the autograph I got from Mehta last year after a VPO Bruckner 9 concert would cover up all 13 had he signed on that drawing). Interesting how HvK listed Mehta among the permissible BPO successors (others being Ozawa, Tennestedt, and Bychkov). On the other hand HvK rescinded a concert cancellation after finding out that Mehta was going to be the substitute, so hard to say what HvK thought of him. (How does the forum interpret this anecdote?)
By the way, on that recording, Karajan didn't da capo certain sections of Music of the Spheres, but he did on 1/1/87. Again I am curious about his philosophy on repeats.
Have you noticed how the Mahler 6 1st mvt theme is similar to the Brahms 3 1st mvt theme? And how the Mahler 3 opening is like the Brahms 1 4th mvt theme. Etc. This is a another topic.
For me there are 3 interesting things about Karajan Mahler 6:
Osborne mentions 3 times in his book how K frequently listed this (and Sibelius 4, Berg 3 Pieces, Honegger 3, and Elektra) are the most emotionally draining compositions for him ("emotionally drained for days"). Not even Wagner make this list.
Mahler 6 and Sibelius 4 are two of the few pieces that, to Karajan, end in total tragedy (can't recall where I read this)
Karajan was persuaded not to make a cut in the finale he was thinking about. But he "refused to rehearse the passage." (Osborne p. 811)
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