Nikolaus Harnoncourt Live
RCO Live, DDD, 1981-2012 , 09/2022
With live recordings carefully selected from the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra’s vast broadcast archives, the orchestra pays tribute to its late guest conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt in this 15-CD anthology. One of the pioneers in the field of historical performance practice, Harnoncourt not only gave the orchestra an invaluable knowledge of how to play in the Baroque and Classical periods (on modern instruments), his musical philosophy was – and still is – equally compelling with regard to (late) Romantic music
From the first rehearsals for Bach’s St. John Passion in 1975 to the last concerts in 2013, when he took the podium for Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony, Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducted a total of 276 performances with the Concertgebouw Orchestra. These were not only unforgettable and enlightening concerts for the audience – they also proved to be a lasting inspiration for the orchestra.