The Polish-Swiss conductor Paul Kletzki was born in Lódz on 21 March 1900 and was educated at the Warsaw Conservatory and University and at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik. Early influences were Emil Mlynarski, Arnold Schoenberg and Wilhelm Furtwängler. After successes as both composer and conductor, he left Berlin for Italy in 1934 and in 1939 settled in Switzerland. Concerts at the Lucerne Festival (1943-46) and La Scala (1946) laid the foundation for his post-war fame. He was among the first conductors of the Philharmonia in London and developed important links with the Israel, Warsaw and Czech Philharmonics. He held posts with the Liverpool Philharmonic (1954-5), the Dallas SO (1958-61), the Berne SO (1964-6) and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (1967-70). He died in Liverpool on 5 March 1973.
Kletzki's
outstanding live performance with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra of
Brahms's Symphony No.4 (a work he did not record commercially) is an important
addition to the conductor's discography. His live Munich performance of
Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony from 1967 gives the collector the opportunity
to hear Kletzki's magnificent interpretation of a work he recorded commercially
only once, in 1946 at the start of his recording career. The overtures
by Berlioz and Mendelssohn are new to CD, as is Wagner's orchestration
of the fifth of his Wesendock songs, a real rarity, dating from 1958 and
featuring the Philharmonia's leader, Hugh Bean. Kletzki's 1961 selection
of Dvo_ák's Slavonic Dances, long unavailable, also appears on
CD for the first time. The compilation is completed by the stereo remake
from 1958 of Tchaikovsky's Capriccio italien, even more impressive than
the excellent mono recording made in 1950. |
