No contemporary Italian was as successful an instrumental composer in the concert hall in the period after World War I as Ottorino Respighi with his four-movement symphonic poems, 'Fountains of Rome' (1917), 'Pines of Rome' (1924) and 'Feste Romane' (1929). In these works, programme music experienced a magnificent revival. When this Boston Symphony recording was made on 8-track analog in 1977, the nightingale's song was not recorded during the orchestral sessions but added in from an additional tape when the 2-track master was mixed a few weeks later in Hanover. That additional tape is no longer in the archives. So, in preparing this new release for DG's Original Source Series, producer Rainer Maillard decided to use one of Hampe's original recordings (as chosen by Respighi himself), playing the 1910 shellac disc (matrix no. 7438r) on an acoustic gramophone in the Emil Berliner Studios' echo chamber and mixing it in (in real time) while cutting.