All Saints Music:

		List Price: $17.98		Label: Deutsche Grammophon Salesrank: 13054 Released: April 10, 2007
		Our Price: $9.97
		Used Price: $7.40
		Media: Audio CD

Mstislav Rostropovich: Cello Concertos Reviews:
Remembering Slava
2008-05-03 - I give this CD set 5 stars is merely for sentimental reasons. It was released around the time when Slava turned 80. A month later on April 27, 2007, he passed away. Commemorating this great musician, how can you not buy the 80th birthday CD release? I have most of the Slava recordings, even the early Melodiya LPs. Almost all of the works on the 2 CDs were previously released or have superior versions by Slava. Only one 3 minute long piece is the first CD release: the Paganini Moto Pepetuo.

The two bigger works:

These are Melodiya recordings of the 50's. The Schumann Concerto recorded in 1960 with Rozhdstvensky released by DG is a far superior than this version in terms of performance of Slava, the orchestra and the sound quality. The Saint Saens Concerto is the same story. I would recommend the Giulini (Coupled with Dvorak Concerto) from EMI.

I confess that I have only listened to one of the two CDs once and only the Moto Pepetuo, a technically amazing show piece. It shows Slava's great cello techniques, but it is by no means a great musical piece or one of Slava's great musical interpretations.

I often take the CD box out of the shelf and look at its cover, reminiscencing a dozen of Slava Cello concerts I attended in Washington D.C. and in Chicago in the mid 80's and early 90's. They were truly experiences of a life time.

Early, youthful Rostropovich, who is 80 this year.
2007-07-14 - First the most important stuff: sound quality through out is very good to excellent.

These two CD's are two Westminster vinyl albums, one from 1953 and the other from 1954, with a short Paganini with no known recording history thrown in to extend these two CD's, which are "short in time" for CD's. The first CD runs under 45 minutes, but the double CD set is priced accordingly and is a bargain.
Several of the album cuts were never released on a CD before this set, which celebrates Rostopovich's 80th birthday, Of course they are all mono recordings. While listening to the music you will never miss the stereo, as the high sound quality through out permits Rostropovich to shine.
Westminster was the best vinyl source for anything Russian classical way back when, only to be, perhaps, out done by the recent Yedang CD's.
These performances show a young developing celloist, already a master of the cello...exubriant and at the same time..warm and moving ..quite suprising and most rewarding.
Mistislav is my favorite celloist. If he touches you, I recommend these early satisfying recordings.
5 stars for the recordings, 4 stars for the compilation.