Carl Schuricht, who was born in 1880 in Danzig (now Gdansk, Poland), worked frequently until his death in 1967. He conducted the
Dresden Philharmonic during World War II but took Swiss citizenship in 1944. Though he is not as well known as other German conductors active during the 1950s, his recorded legacy is noteworthy: it is among the most extensive of any conductor who trained in the era of
Mahler and
Bruckner. The
Mozart works included here were performed on broadcasts of the South German Radio in Stuttgart in the late '50s and early '60s. They are brisk, somewhat sinewy performances, without the sweetness that is usually given to
Mozart's melodies in both modern-instrument and historical-instrument readings, but with a classic German sense of large-scale line and local counterpoint. The outer movements of the Symphony No. 35 and Symphony No. 40 manage the rare feat of being both hard-driving and unexpectedly detailed. The three operatic arias at the end of the disc are real bonuses: the "Porgi amor, qualche ristoro" by
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf gives an idea of why some of our grandparents got all dreamy when
Schwarzkopf's name was mentioned. Note that the order of the three arias given in the tracklist is wrong;
Fritz Wunderlich's "Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön," from Die Zauberflöte, actually comes last. Probably what happened was that the black print on dark blue background was so hard to read that nobody even tried to proofread it. Despite this annoyance, and despite sound that's just a notch above bothersome, these are distinctive and classic
Mozart readings that those interested in the history of conducting should definitely own.