This release celebrates the partnership of the distinguished conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt (1929-2016) directing the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (COE) in a memorable cycle of the complete Schubert Symphonies at the Styriarte Festival in Graz, Austria during July 1988. Harnoncourt was a notable and perhaps controversial Schubertian who, with his favourite orchestra, set about examining everything afresh. The players he worked with in 1988 talk about the way he changed their perceptions, of discovering Schubert’s work for themselves, ignoring the accretions of previous performance tradition. Harnoncourt wanted Schubert’s music to be on the edge, to rebuild it, testing and evaluating the contribution of each instrument and for the players to take as many risks as they wanted.