Sparing neither effort nor expense, I bought a copy of The Art of Conducting: Legendary Conductors of a Golden Era.

I recommended a viewing of The Art of Piano and have several times loaned out The Art of Violin to fiddle students. I am less enthusiastic about this DVD. It's not that there is anything wrong with it; for those who've spent a lifetime listening to great orchestras play through the literature, I'm sure it will be informative. I fear that for the newcomer it will be a tad disappointing. Those who offer commentary are helpful to some extent, but their contribution seems a bit slender, especially when compared to the sort of interviews conducted on the other two DVDs. That leaves the viewer to draw some pretty tenuous conclusions, it seems to me, from the little he learns here.

Some of the works represented are not the things you're likely to have heard often. If you are a serious person you will have heard the Egmont Overture and Till Eulenspiegel enough, but I'm not sure how many hearings of the Shostakovich 5^th Symphony, the Kalinnikov 1^st, Strauss's Künstlerleben, Dvorák's The Wild Dove will prepare you to appreciate what these conductors did with it.

So much real appreciation of culture rests on as broad a base as possible: an adequate standard of comparison.

I'm sorry about this because it is worth hearing how these conductors differ from those we hear today. If you're so inclined, you might borrow it from a library or friend, but I'm not sure how much cash you should part with.

There are some historical and architectural points of interest such as the first performances of the Berlin Philharmonic after the war. Though the camera and lighting technology doesn't always do justice to the venues, if you know the hall, you will recognize Smetana Hall in some performances of the Czech Philharmonic. This is one of the most beautiful halls I've ever seen. If I am ever abducted and taken to Prague, I will devise a cunning escape and flee to Smetana Hall, a few pictures of which you can find here:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/dissidens/SmetanaHall2.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/dissidens/SmetanaHall1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/dissidens/SmetanaHall5.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/dissidens/SmetanaHall6.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v284/dissidens/SmetanaHall4.jpg

By contrast there is the Leningrad Philharmonic Hall, which in my view represents a pathetic failure of the imagination; one is a temple to a culture, the other is a pretentious bit of propaganda. (That's just my opinion though. Perhaps some of our Estonian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian readers will write to box my ears.)

At any rate, this is a judgment call. Watch it if you like, but don't come crying to me if you think you've been sent on a wild goose chase.

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The Art of Conducting
Teldec/Warner Music Vision
0927-42667-2