Last Friday the BBC put out on BBC3 a programme based on the words of Arturo Toscanini. This great 
orchestral conductor died more than 50 years ago but he was such a musical giant that his recordings and live performances are still much revered. This TV programme was presented as a theatrical performance set in Toscanini's home surrounded by a very sycophantic family. They praised and questioned the "maestro" to the point of nausea. Allegedly, the production was based on recorded interviews made with the conductor's son towards the end of his life. Many of the things he said were of interest but i would never have presented his words in this bowl of meringue pie. Toscanini was a great conductor with a fabulous memory for music, an incredible eye for detail and an obsession with perfection. He was particularly well-known for his performances of music by Verdi [of course], Beethoven, Brahms and Wagner. The last I still find surprising. Italian volatility and the glorious tunes of Italian opera - which were part of Toscanini's childhood - are not qualities that I associate with Wagner. The first 12in long playing record that I ever bought - or at least, I persuaded my dad to buy for me - was Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra with Beethoven's 6th Symphony. I still have the record, over 50 years later, and it still sounds glorious. Toscanini was born in the middle of the 19th century and he had direct connections with many of the great composers of the second half of the nineteenth century - as well as the early 20th century. Famously, if he had doubts about interpretations of Verdi, he would go and ask the somewhat prickly composer for advice.
orchestral conductor died more than 50 years ago but he was such a musical giant that his recordings and live performances are still much revered. This TV programme was presented as a theatrical performance set in Toscanini's home surrounded by a very sycophantic family. They praised and questioned the "maestro" to the point of nausea. Allegedly, the production was based on recorded interviews made with the conductor's son towards the end of his life. Many of the things he said were of interest but i would never have presented his words in this bowl of meringue pie. Toscanini was a great conductor with a fabulous memory for music, an incredible eye for detail and an obsession with perfection. He was particularly well-known for his performances of music by Verdi [of course], Beethoven, Brahms and Wagner. The last I still find surprising. Italian volatility and the glorious tunes of Italian opera - which were part of Toscanini's childhood - are not qualities that I associate with Wagner. The first 12in long playing record that I ever bought - or at least, I persuaded my dad to buy for me - was Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra with Beethoven's 6th Symphony. I still have the record, over 50 years later, and it still sounds glorious. Toscanini was born in the middle of the 19th century and he had direct connections with many of the great composers of the second half of the nineteenth century - as well as the early 20th century. Famously, if he had doubts about interpretations of Verdi, he would go and ask the somewhat prickly composer for advice.I remember the day Toscanini died; in 1957, when he was 89 years old. On Wednesday 16th January, I went to the Victoria Hall in Bolton to listen to the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra - I think it was my first symphony concert - I was 16 years old. The conductor wasto be Efrem Kurtz. Here was another very distinguished conductor - perhaps not quite in the Toscanini class but a very experienced performer. He had been born in St Petersburg in 1900 and learned his trade in Leipzig, Berlin and Stuttgart. He first conducted the Liverpool Phil in 1954 and then in 1957, the orchestra lost its full-time conductor at short notice. Efrem Kurtz agreed to take over with the young John Pritchard as joint musical directors for two seasons. Thus he came to be in Bolton on the day that Toscanini died. This very tall gangling man stepped onto the rostrum at the start of the concert and told us that the great conductor had died that day and that he proposed to conduct Wagner's Siegried Idyll in memory of the conductor. It was a moving moment and the orchestra gave a heart felt rendering of this wonderful music.
All of this came back to me on Friday when the BBC reminded us of a rather tetchy man but a very great musician.
[the drawing of Toscanini is by Enrico Caruso]
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