The complete Symphonies

"Riccardo Muti's Schumann is masterful, disciplined and strong, mainstream in its choice of tempos, and mindful of the occasional thickets in Schumann's orchestration (the VPO's special timbres, of course, give most conductors a head start in this area, and the superb balance is also the work of Muti's producer, Volker Straus)."
(Gramophone)

"Tempos are nicely gauged, the playing is mostly spot-on (violin desks do valiantly in the Second Symphony's Scherzo) and [the] sound quality is warm, immediate and cleanly defined. The "Rhenish" seems to me the more memorable of the performances, again vigorous and neatly phrased, with plenty of lively interplay between sections and a sweetly yielding violin tone."
(Gramophone)

Although Schumann is mostly known for his piano music and songs, he showed an early interest in writing symphonies.
It is most likely that Schumann took inspiration from Adolf Böttger's poem "In the valley spring is blossoming" when writing his first symphony, hence its nickname "Spring" Symphony.

Mendelssohn, a great supporter of the young Schumann, conducted the world premiere of his First Symphony in 1841 and its success encouraged Schumann to follow up with what he himself described as "all sorts of other orchestral plans", with his other three symphonies as a result.

Here, we find Riccardo Muti's truly excellent interpretation of all four symphonies with the Wiener Philharmoniker and bear in mind that up to now these recordings have only been available as two separate Top price CDs. Now we offer them as two CDs for the price of One Top price CD only!