Ormandy, who shared the podium with Leopold Stokowski in Philadelphia for two years before he took over as its sole music director in 1938, built on Stokowki’s accomplishments and brought the orchestra to an even greater level of polish. Ormandy remained with the orchestra as music director until 1980, after which he continued as conductor-laureate. He died in 1985. It has been said that Ormandy felt more at home with Romantic and post-Romantic repertoire; the “Philadelphia sound” that he created-which is well-represented on this DVD- beautifully serves the lush, sophisticated orchestrations of composers like Glinka, Strauss, and Rimsky-Korsakov.