The silliest of all conductor lists

The Gramophone website has published a list of ‘the 50 greatest conductors of all time’.

It is unsigned and may well have been compiled by computer on the basis of who made the most recordings.

Even so, the inconsistencies are staggering.

Not a single Finn in the 50. Nobody from the major school of modern conducting.

The plodding Jochum, Wand, Munch and Gardiner are included, but there is no heart-racing Klaus Tennstedt, no Erich Kleiber, no Van Beinum, no Horenstein, no Järvi – none of the Järvis – no Kondrashin, no Sanderling….. no sense at all to the selection process.

Most striking of all, the two most important conductors in Germany today – Christian Thielemann and Kirill Petrenko – are conspicuous by their absence.

This list appears to have been made by a small-minded, Little England robot.