The Schubert Ninth is one of my favorite classical symphonies and I own a ridiculously large number of recordings of it ... including three by Toscanini, four by Furtwaengler, two by Szell and Bruno Walter ... as well as digital offerings by Bernstein, Rattle, Abbado (2 versions) ... you get my drift! This 1950s stereo recording by the late, much-lamented Ataulfo Argenta was a major surprise ... lean and propulsive, but beautifully shaped by subtle use of rubato, I rank it alongside Toscanini's 1941/42 Philadelphia Orchestra recording and Abbado's later (digital) recording with the Mozart Chamber Orchestra as something close to perfection. Stereo sound is very fine ... incredibly good given the recording's age ... and Argenta has his French orchestra playing with both precision and warmth. Yes, those very French French horns take a bit of getting used to ... but their nasal quality is underplayed and, in any case, probably a fair representation of the kind of small-bore brass that would have been heard in Schubert's Vienna had Schubert lived to hear it performed there. This CD, expertly transferred by HDTT from a 15 ips tape source is a major discovery ... and a thoroughgoing delight as a performance!
