Apology for Karajan

Le Regard Libre N° 57 - Danilo Heyer

In 2019, we celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the death of the man who led the highly prestigious Berliner Philharmoniker with an iron fist for thirty-five years: the famous Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan. We could hardly have found a better opportunity to praise the performer who sold by far the largest number of classical music discs..

It's no easy task, to say the least, to account for all the achievements of this giant, who dominated the world of classical music in Europe for several decades. The tone was set from the outset: a child prodigy of the piano, he quickly became Germany's youngest Generalmusikdirektor. Karajan revived the Berlin Philharmonic; he helped to resurrect Tchaikovsky and to impose the original languages in operas; many of the artists who worked with Karajan's orchestras and orchestras, including his own, were also involved.