Author Description

"This biography explores Karajan's life and music making against the background of European music and politics in the years 1908-1989. Periods in Karajan's life hitherto ignored or believed to have been in some way "covered up"--His childhood in Austria during and after the First World War and his early career as a conductor in Nazi Germany - are frankly and revealingly explored." "This is the "jet-set megastar" who was in reality a shy, music-obsessed, often solitary figure and a poor communicator in personal matters, yet who was also the great modern master of the orchestra, a born teacher, deeply loyal to his closest associates, and often very funny. It is the man who made and sold more best-selling LPs and CDs than any other conductor in the history of the phonograph but who, paradoxically, used the phonograph as a preparation for what was for him the holy grail of the conductor's art, the perfect live performance." "The Karajan story is also the story of musicians with whom he worked. It is the story of the postwar record industry, and a number of important musical institutions: the Salzburg Festival; London's Philharmonia Orchestra in the golden age of its founder, Karajan's friend and alter ego Walter Legge; the Vienna Philharmonic and Vienna State Opera; and the Berlin Philharmonic, which Karajan coveted, served, and finally lost in what is perhaps the most extraordinary saga in the history of conductor-orchestra relationships."--Jacket.