80 years ago today, Karajan made his first appearance as Aachen’s Music Director with a production of Beethoven’s ‘Fidelio’. According to the music critic Dr Wilhelm Kemp, Karajan’s youth and inexperience nearly counted against him at his audition for the position, although Karajan biographer Richard Osborne suggests it may have been more to do with the players recognising that Karajan, being a taskmaster and perfectionist, could make their lives that much more difficult! However the orchestra soon came to accept Karajan’s intense rehearsal style as they recognised that it was breeding superior results. Willy Wesemann, a first violinist in the orchestra, summed up the feeling as follows: ‘In the beginning it was very difficult playing under Karajan. He demanded so much. His working methods were more spontaneous and more intense than those of his predecessors. Quite simply, he was different. And what he eventually achieved was greater; it came closer to perfection.’
Posted on: Thu, 18 Sep 2014 13:30:51 +0000
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