The Karajan Official Remastered Edition comprises 13 box sets containing official remasterings of the finest recordings the Austrian conductor made for EMI between 1946 and 1984, and which are now a jewel of the Warner Classics catalogue.

For many, Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989) – hailed early in his career as ‘Das Wunder Karajan’ (The Karajan Miracle) and known in the early 1960s as ‘the music director of Europe’ – remains the ultimate embodiment of the maestro. The release of the Karajan Official Remastered Edition over the first half of 2014 marks the 25th anniversary of the conductor’s death in July 1989 at the age of 81.

Karajan was closely associated with EMI for the majority of his recording career (specifically from 1946 to 1960 and then again from 1969 to 1984). EMI’s legendary producer Walter Legge sought him out in Vienna just after World War II and the long relationship that ensued embraced recordings with the Vienna Philharmonic, the Philharmonia (the orchestra founded by Legge), the Berlin Philharmonic (of which Karajan became ‘conductor for life’ in 1955), the forces of La Scala, Milan, and the Orchestre de Paris.

The Karajan Official Remastered Edition features primarily symphonic and choral music. The entire edition will comprise recordings remastered from the original sources in 24-bit/96kHz at Abbey Road Studios, the world’s most renowned recording studio.

In 1981, Gramophone wrote that “No living conductor has done more for the music of Sibelius than Herbert von Karajan”. These recordings of five symphonies and five tone poems, made with the Berlin Philharmonic in the latter years of Karajan’s association with EMI, complement the Sibelius recordings from the years to 1960 that feature in the ‘Orchestral Spectacular’ Box.

Sibelius’ music, with its extraordinary sonorities and organic use of form, provides an ideal vehicle for Karajan’s mastery of the orchestra.