* * * Laureate Conductor(s) * * *

Don't be afraid about the recording quality after the first seconds of listening: in this passage Abbado's pianissimo is truly ethereal and the acoustics of the large Dresden hall is certainly not ideal. Then things get immediately better and personally...

There are many recordings of the Ninth (including a beautiful version in video with the Berlin RSO) conducted by Jochum, but it is not so easy to come across a live performance of the Te Deum.
In this 1977 concert Bruckner's most famous choral work is proposed after the third movement as a virtual "Finale", as Karajan sometimes did....

Another complete Szell concert featuring a great work not included in his "official" discography: Bartok's Violin Concerto no. 2. Also an opportunity to listen to an important soloist who passed away in 2023 and is not remembered as much as she deserves...

It is certainly not usual to precede a performance of Mahler's Ninth with a piece by Johan Strauss II, but it is precisely the complete program of this 1975 concert at the Konzerthaus in Vienna.
However, Giulini treats "An der schönen blauen Donau" as a tone poem and above all as a symbol of the "Austria Felix" as opposed to the "Finis Austriae" represented in Mahler's last completed work....