Italian conductor Guido Cantelli stirred quite a bit of excitement in the years after World War II, and his career was just reaching its highest level when he was killed in a 1956 plane crash. He was one of a long line of Italians who began their musical lives as small-town church organists. As Italy fell apart in the last days of World War II he spent time in a German labor camp and was taken hostage by Italian Fascists. Arturo Toscanini heard Cantelli conduct after the war and was uncharacteristically effusive in his ...
Read More
Italian conductor Guido Cantelli stirred quite a bit of excitement in the years after World War II, and his career was just reaching its highest level when he was killed in a 1956 plane crash. He was one of a long line of Italians who began their musical lives as small-town church organists. As Italy fell apart in the last days of World War II he spent time in a German labor camp and was taken hostage by Italian Fascists. Arturo Toscanini heard Cantelli conduct after the war and was uncharacteristically effusive in his praises, remarking (according to Robert Matthew-Walker's highly readable booklet notes) to a companion, "That is me directing this concert." In New York, Cantelli emerged as something of an heir apparent to Toscanini, often conducting the New York Philharmonic (then cumbersomely named the Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra of New York) and Toscanini's NBC Symphony. The recordings on this historical release, made in 1951 and 1953, are taken from radio broadcasts of this period. Sound was...
Read Less
