My playlist for today is right here.

His achievement was his version of a sonic ideal which he created, and then reproduced across decades of recordings. A burnished orchestral legato, a sound that seemed to have no edges, no seams, no places where one phrase handed off to the next. It was a sound unlike many others, and it divided opinion sharply. Some heard transcendence, others heard a self-indulgent interpretation.

I will start with Beethoven’s Fifth because I know it best of those listed, therefore I will be more sensitive to the Karajan’s art.