April, 2022: Symphony No. 4: Zdenek Mácal / Halle Orchestra / Classics for Pleasure
In the mid-sixties he was on the road to success, having won a number of international competitions, including the Dmitri Mitropoulos Competition in New York. In the autumn of 1967, he became the principal conductor of the Prague Symphony Orchestra. When Soviet tanks dashed hopes of a better life, hundreds of thousands of people emigrated from Czechoslovakia to the West. Zdenek Mácal did likewise and continued his promising career abroad. Soon after emigrating, he became music director of the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Hanover Radio Orchestra. He got noticed overseas, and was offered a series of important engagements, among them chief conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, music director of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra. He was guest conductor of some of the best American orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, as well as the Berlin Philharmonic and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in Europe. During his career Zdenek Mácal conducted more than 170 orchestras on four continents. However, during much of this time he was almost forgotten in his homeland, because the communist regime censored news of the success of emigres. Mácal made his one Bruckner recording with the Halle Orchestra, an ensemble that has had a spotty career with the composer. Music Directors Stanislaw Skrowaczewski and John Barbirolli featured Bruckner concerts, but Mark Elder has clearly avoided performances during his long tenure. This recording was made in April of 1986 and was issued on EMI's mid-priced Classics for Pleasure label. The recording had a brief appearance as a compact disc, but then the label was abandoned and the recording has not surfaced since. |
