Born in Antwerp, Cluytens graduated from the Royal Flemish Conservatory with first prizes in piano, harmony, counterpoint, and fugue. He followed his father in the post of conductor of the Antwerp Opera and in 1932 became the conductor at the Théâtre du Capitole of Toulouse, conducting primarily the orchestra concerts. In 1935 he was first conductor of the Opéra National de Lyon where he became the musical director in 1942. During World War II he led the Vichy summer concerts, which may have led to his short-term blacklisting by the musicians' union at Bordeaux. In 1947, he became the musical director at the Opéra-Comique where he conducted 40 works between 1947-1953. In 1949, he replaced Charles Munch as principal conductor of the Paris Conservatory Orchestra, which post he held until 1960. His death at the age of 62 occurred coincident with his reputation emerging not just primarily as a conductor of the French classics, but as an interpreter of the standard German/Austrian repertoire.

Click on image for full size printable inlay image	1st movement 2nd movement 3rd movement 4th movement
Click on image for full size printable inlay image	1st movement 2nd movement 3rd movement 4th movement
Click on image for full size printable inlay image	1st movement 2nd movement 3rd and 4th movements

"...imbued with a kind of strength and vitality that is richly satisfying, and the 1958 recording is first-class." Alan Sanders in Classical Recordings Quarterly Autum 2011

" Here is indeed a strong performance and this is one of the best things I have ever heard this conductor do. It seeks to make no effects, but by very virtue of its honest strength ends by making a great impression. " Gramophone March 1959

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1st movement 2nd movement 3rd, 4th and 5th movements

"An exceptionally good and clear recording allows this most beautiful performance of the Pastoral to be heard at its best. Throughout the Berlin players are on top of their form, with soloist after soloist turning his phrases with the utmost happiness, and allowed too by good recording balance to be a clearly audible soloist without struggle ; only the flute, sometimes, might perhaps have stood out rather more readily from his background."

"Cluytens gives an easy-going reading of the work, refusing either to hurry the first movement or to be unduly delayed by the second. The third is particularly happy: not •nly is the very desirable repeat made, but the energetic 2/4 section has an impulse only rarely allowed it in sedate performance—towards the end the rustic dancing might readily be believed to be getting out of hand until the trumpet-call announces a return to sobriety. The storm, too, lacks nothing in terror, and subsides to a flowing and beautifully controlled finale."M.M. reviewing in The Gramophone Nov. 1957

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1st movement 2nd movement 3rd movement 4th movement

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