Last Saturday I listened to Lenny's DGG M1 -- the whole thing -- and loved it. Today I listened to Kubelik's DGG M1 -- the whole thing -- and loved it. But neither recording fared well when I was listening to sample clips and comparing them with other sample clips during this survey. Evaluating a symphony performance by snippets is like evaluating a potential life partner based on seeing his/her tax return from 2004, left ankle, dental records, and 6th grade citizenship report.
That is not to devalue the exercise, only to contextualize it. Wholes may not only be greater than the sum of their parts, but the parts might not even offer a reliable guide to the big picture.
This exercise has not caused me to dismiss any of my old faves even if they fared poorly. However, it did cause me to purchase two M1s I never would have considered otherwise -- Norrington & Solti/CSO -- and to schedule an attentive hearing for Jansons's M1 and all his other Mahler discs, too.
Heretofore I've been lukewarm toward Jansons's Mahler, regarding it similar to Chailly's Mahler, finding little to fault with it, but also little that's exciting (having heard only Jansons's RCO 1 & 5, LSO 6, & Oslo 9). But hearing his M1 along with the other final 4 was exciting and I rated it virtually tied for top place with the only one of my tried & true faves to make the final five (MTT).
All of this makes me wonder just how relevant such exercises are to our normal listening habits. When I listen normally, especially to a piece that I know and love, I sit back in a highly receptive frame of mind, willing the music to carry me away with it. But when I am listening "critically," I'm picking and choosing certain elements to focus my attention on -- usually things that are easy to isolate and describe -- and in the process I might be unable to grasp the gestalt of the work. Maslow's marvelous hammer and nail analogy applies.
Still, it's been a useful and entertaining exercise. I'm grateful to Daniel for setting it up, grateful to the other participants for their comments, and I look forward to the next one!