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Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli: "Time's Up!"

  • Douglas Cairns
  • Nov 27, 2025
  • 1 min read

Musicologist Piero Rattalino once mentioned that there exists a recording by Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli of a performance of César Franck's Symphonic Variations which was made on 13 May, 1975, in Zürich under conductor Erich Leinsdorf.  "This recording, made without the consent of the heirs, cannot be released for another fifty years."


Fifty years are now up. Has anyone heard any news? Who are the heirs? If true, why was this recording embargoed? Curiouser and curiouser, as Alice would say.


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["Curiouser and curiouser!" is a famous quote from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland where Alice exclaims as she grows to an enormous size. The phrase is used to mean that something is becoming increasingly strange or bewildering, a sentiment that captures the dreamlike and illogical nature of her journey.]

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