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Originally Posted by Respenus
Thank you very much for this Skybird. Yes, I have to agree, Karajan is by all accounts one of the best and he made the Berliner Philharmoniker what they are today.
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No, I disagree, they are not that good anymore. The fall already began in the late years of Karajan when orchestra and director embraced each other in grim frustration and much hate-love and anger. But even in those final years they were incredibly good-which tells something on how good they were in their really golden days. But from that generation of musicians, not many are left anyway.
My father played in the local rival orchestra, the RSO/DSO Berlin, and both orchestras were in a fruitful mutual competition: technically the Philharmonics had the better strings, and the Symphonics had the better winds. My father sometimes helped out when they were looking for a replacement for an ill basson-player, but he never played with Karajan, or just once, I am not sure. But he met him repeatedly in the foyer of the Philharmonia, over the day, or when the RSO was playing there and Karajan came to listen - he said that Karajan then always loked very lonely, and sad, and was so much standing aside that he was not recognised and was completely overlooked - could you believe that? People did not recognise him, not even journalists, it is almost hard to believe. It surely were two hearts beating in Karajan's chest, two souls in one body. As director, he was a genius, but right this maybe isolated him from the world and it's people. It is tragic. That is why despite all the angry stories, my father holds him in high respect, also because he can judge the quality of his (technical) directing. He says that quality was unique.
Compared to that, Rattle and the orchestra today are just shadows of the past. That man really makes me angry by just being the way he is: a show-man, an entertainer. Many musicians do not like him. The Philharmonics tolerate him because he serves the pupose of attracting more people by his many stunts.