Pierre Monteux (1875-1964) was one of the greatest French conductors of the twentieth-century, his career extending to almost 70 years, a fine musicians admired throughout Europe and the United States. He first came to international pre-eminence when he conducted – as music director of Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes – the world premiere of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring in Paris in May 1913. Within a few years, he was conducting regularly in the United States and, after the end of World War I, in Europe as well. In the USA, he was music director of the Boston Symphony and San Francisco Symphony Orchestras from 1919-24 and 1936-52 respectively, and in this unique collection of finely-restored broadcast performances of Russian music under his direction we can experience again the magic and virtuosity which the universally-loved maestro invariably brought to his performances. A fabulous record.

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