Limited 21 CD set. American musical history. He first recorded the Second with the Philadelphians anonymously for the "World's Greatest Music" series in March 1939, and nine months later conducted a tauter, "official" version for release on RCA. Both are included here along with Ormandy's other recordings for "World's Greatest Music", all made in 1938: the Mozart G minor, Beethoven's Fifth, Schubert's "Unfinished" and the Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 2 and 3. Two other famous Brahms recordings from 1939 are the Alto Rhapsody with Marian Anderson and the Double Concerto with Jascha Heifetz and Emanuel Feuermann, about which Gramophone's original reviewer wrote: "Rarely can the powers of two string players have been so fully extended, so richly proved... The whole thing is tremendous: a manifestation, for all who have an ear of the soul, of the composer's greatness of heart and mind.
