[.ca] Wellingtons Victory/Battle Of

Where's Neville Marriner?:
"Wellington's Victory" must be Beethoven's most unintentionally funny longer work. I can't hear it without cracking up. Understand, I ENJOY the piece, but -- far more than Tchaikovsky's 1812 -- it's movie background music a hundred years before there were talkies. This is a well-rendered, exciting recording, but I still prefer the Marriner (St Martin in the Fields) version, with all the hokey sound effects--guaranteed to cheer you up on a bad day. Unfortunately that performance seems to be out of circulation. I recall a newspaper typo of a few years ago (maybe in the New Yorker?) that went like this: "The high school orchestra played Beethoven's 'Wellington's Victory' last Friday night, with Taco Bell's cannon." Yup, them there Mexican cannon sure can make a racket.

If you like the 1812 Overture...:
...you'll like this collection of so-called battle music. Kunzel brings home the power of all three of these works, but the Wellington's Victory is superb. Until I heard Kunzel's interpretation of this work, I felt that Morton Gould conducting his own orchestra was the definitive Wellington. Kunzel's use of dynamics, tempo and phrasing is much more invigorating in this much under-appreciated Beethoven work.

• 'Wellington's Victory'
• Battle Of The Huns
• Hungarian March To The Assault