Documentation of historic performances is an important and admirable endeavor, but not all listeners have the patience to sit through old recordings that have dreadful sound quality, no matter how artistically significant they may be. Certainly Bruno Walter's legendary Mozart performances warrant scholarly attention and careful preservation, but this March 13, 1958, concert recording of the Requiem in D minor will be a hard sell for the average listener, and anyone who wants a clear, clean, and compelling version of this revered work really should look elsewhere. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra & Chorus are recorded at such a hot level that they overload the single microphone and create distortion in almost every instance where they perform together, even at moderate volume. About the only sections that can be tolerated are the movements for the solo vocalists, such as the Tuba Mirum or the Recordare, where distortion is much less noticeable and the superb voices of soprano Maria Stader, alto Maureen Forrester, tenor David Lloyd, and bass Otto Edelmann can be heard reasonably clearly, whether by themselves or as a quartet. But the loud choruses, such as the Dies Irae, Rex Tremendae, or the Confutatis suffer terribly from the garbled and hissy sound, and listeners will be forced to reduce the volume settings to safe levels if they plan to make it through. This recording is therefore only recommended to die-hard Walter fans, who will love it despite its audio problems.
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