Mozart Musical Joke
featuring the Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet
CD Contents & Samples
Buy 4 CDs & save $10!
The Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet was formed by Vienna Philharmonic members
in 1934 and gave concerts throughout Austria under the auspices of the
Wiener Konzerthausgesellschaft. After 1946 they toured internationally and
were one of the first quartets to establish a large LP discography in the
early 1950s with important recordings of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven,
Schubert and Brahms.
Hans Berger was born in 1907 and studied with the legendary Viennese horn
player, Karl Stiegler. He played in the Vienna Symphony during the 1927-8
season and then moved to Germany where he was in the Leipzig Gewandhaus
Orchestra for one season. From 1929 to 1945 he was principal horn of the
Berlin State Opera. In 1945 he returned to Vienna and became a member of
the Vienna Philharmonic in 1946, sharing the duties of principal horn with
Gottfried von Freiberg. He retired in 1972. His son, Roland Berger, became
principal horn of the Vienna Philharmonic in 1962.
Hans Berger‘s youngest brother, Othmar, was born in 1916 and died 1970. He
was a member of Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and father of horn player
Othmar Berger of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.
Josef Koller was a member of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra from 1946
to 1966. |
Special thanks to Hans Pizka for information about the horn
players on this CD. For more about the Vienna Philharmonic‘s tradition of
horn playing visit www.pizka.de.
Both of these early 1950‘s Westminster recordings were digitally restored
from original LP sources. The discs were first cleaned on a Keith Monks Mk
II record cleaning machine. They were played back on a Linn Sondek LP12
turntable with Linn Ittok arm and Monster Alpha Genesis 2000 moving coil
cartridge through an Audio Research SP11 Mark II tube preamplifier. A custom
built PC with Waveterminal 192X sound card and Diamond Cut Five Audio
Restoration software were used in the digital conversion and restoration. |
