Jacqueline Du Pré - Complete EMI Recordings

Advantages: Shows joyful side of tragic Du Pré; invaluable performances; entertaining spots.
Disadvantages: Too short, unfocused, worshipful; expensive for 1 hour film.

...'[She created] ...music so natural that it could not be otherwise, and yet so surprising as to make the heart stand still for just a moment.' --Christopher Nupen, in ‘Remembering Jacqueline Du Pré’ Did the film, ‘Hilary and Jackie’, depress, even devastate you? I do admit to the latter. Fortunately, it also drew me into the music of Jacqueline Du Pré, one of the greatest cellists to have ever lived, and also to have died so young, at 42, with a career cut short at age 28 by multiple sclerosis. Well, I'm glad yet disappointed to have purchased this 1994 EMI documentary film video written and directed by Christopher Nupen. It does show the non-tragic side of Du Pré, but viewers should not expect a full story on her life and music--this is strictly an hour's worth of never-before-seen excerpts from rehearsals and performances... Read review

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Advantages: The Best Recording Ever
Disadvantages: None

...Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85 Jacqueline du Pre and the LSO, conducted by Sir John Barbirolli Madam, you have an instrument between your legs capable of giving pleasure to thousands, and all you can do is sit there and scratch it! So said the eminently witty conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, in reference to a lady ‘cellist. He certainly wasn’t, however, referring to the unmatchable Jacqueline du Pre, who, in my humble opinion, was the most gifted cellist ever and whose short, tragic life is somehow augured by this melancholic recording. It’s an EMI classic, which means that it’s an old, old recording, but so good that it shouldn’t be lost at the bottom of a pile of old vinyls at a jumble sale, but digitally re-mastered and made available for future generations on CD. The original... Read review

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Advantages: Highly burnished, engaging, musically intelligent and emotionally mature playing; beautiful tone is never saccharine.
Disadvantages: Nil.

...It would be one of the most daunting works to take on for any musician, given the history of its recording, yet British cellist Natalie Clein decided to do it. It took her some ten years to get to the point where she felt ready to tackle it again for posterity, and this CD gives her good reason to be proud. ELGAR'S CELLO CONCERTO AND DU PRÉ So what's so intimidating about Edward Elgar's Cello Concerto? Besides its call in the performer for technical virtuosity and a mature musical understanding of the piece, the concerto has also been inextricably linked with Jacqueline du Pré (1945 - 1987), cellist extraordinaire, who was tragically struck down at the prime of life by multiple sclerosis. Her landmark 1965 recording, made when she was just twenty (with John Barbirolli conducting the London Symphony Orchestra), is still hallowed by... Read review

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