
The WDR Symphony Orchestra of Cologne, featured on this album, is known for its interpretations of 20th-century music and has premiered works by composers like Stravinsky and Stockhausen.
This album is part of the posthumous Günter Wand Edition, which aims to present his radio recordings that were not commercially released during his lifetime.
Günter Wand actively promoted contemporary music, repatriating "degenerate music" banned by the Nazis and commissioning dozens of world and national premieres.
Günter Wand was appointed Germany's youngest General Music Director in Cologne in 1946, where he was responsible for rebuilding operatic and concert life after World War II.
Günter Wand, the conductor on this album, began his career at age twenty as a rehearsal pianist and later an operetta and opera conductor.
The recordings on this album were made by Westdeutscher Rundfunk Köln in 1952 for Mozart's Mass and 1953 for Schubert's Stabat Mater.