Bruckner's Abbey

Started by Lilas Pastia, April 06, 2007, 07:15:30 AM

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Cato

No to the above question, but I have never heard a decent Klemperer performance of Bruckner.

I once sat through his arthritic 5th Symphony back in the 1960's and was positive the record speed had to be on 16 by mistake, instead of 33 1/3, but no.

In fact I cranked it up later to 78, and aside from raising the key, it was a great performance!
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Sean

#381
M, I've only just seen your post, two weeks late. Well I guess I've listened and thought more about the big K than any other conductor, being especially won over by his Bruckner in my late teens, performances I still think are of absolutely transcendental character (don't ask me to explain, that's partly the point). He did have this very odd way though of his phrasing sometimes sounding both coercive and perfectly judged- the VPO Bruckner 8 and the live Mahler 9 being the best examples I know. The Bruckner 8 is obviously a very great performance with immense authority and a lifetime's thought in it but raises questions at the same time: does he imbue the orchestra from within with his perspective or is the approach to the players perhaps too imperious...

Did you meet Karajan?

karlhenning

Quote from: Cato on August 28, 2007, 04:05:40 AM
In fact I cranked it up later to 78, and aside from raising the key, it was a great performance!

0:)

Drasko

Quote from: Cato on August 28, 2007, 04:05:40 AM
No to the above question, but I have never heard a decent Klemperer performance of Bruckner.

I once sat through his arthritic.......

Try to hear his earlier (pre 60s) recordings. His '57 Köln 8th is 12-13 minutes faster than 70s EMI one :o.
And I believe he shaves off some 5 minutes in this 4th linked by Que compared to EMI studio. And that '47 Concertgebouw is probably even faster (still interested, if anyone runs across a copy let me know).

Nothing arthritic about those....

Keemun

Quote from: Cato on August 28, 2007, 04:05:40 AM
No to the above question, but I have never heard a decent Klemperer performance of Bruckner.

Have you heard Bruckner 6 performed by Klemperer and New Philharmonia Orchestra (1965)?  I think it's a great recording.
Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. - Ludwig van Beethoven

Lilas Pastia

Listened to this week: the First symphony, with the redoubtable Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchester under Vaclav Neumann. Although this is over 40 years old, it still holds up very well indeed as a sound experience.

Once more I realize how much the orchestra's personality is the defining factor in a Bruckner performance - probably more so than for any other major composer I know. The conductor worth his salt will bring out the players' commitment and direct the traffic, adding an ounce or two of personal inflections here and there. Not more, nor less. It doesn't mean the results would be similar from one good performance to another. Quite the contrary. Instead of having Maestro X layering his copyrighted Bruckner sauce in New-York, London and Berlin to no audible difference, I'd rather have it the other way around.

In this case, Neumann brings solid musicianship and strong leadership to an orchestra that knows its stuff inside out. My previous sole favourite used to be the very different Haiting COA version: tart trumpets, emerald green, bottled horns, perky winds, athletic and aristocratic strings, all enthusiastically responding to Haitink's no-nonsense, youthful exuberance. At 5 minutes more (11 percent slower), the Neumann-Leipzig is perforce weightier in sound, but no less trenchant or committed. This orchestra's forte is a string section of immense weight and personality. They carry the burden of the argument in terms of momentum and orchestral colour, with the big, boomy timpani and loud-mouthed brass section contributing their own imposing sonorities to the work.

Either way, Bruckner's first emerges as a work of tremendous vitality and almost demonic energy. Were it not for the fact that it's been composed before the so-called "nullte", I'd probably vote it as the most promising in a 'first symphony' contest.

Lilas Pastia

#386
Listened to this week: the ninth under Pierre Boulez. Two versions, Chicago 1999 and Vienna 2001. There are of course similarities between the two interpretations, but the orchestral playing is vastly different, and so is the conductor's approach in these live performances.

Both are big, grim, unsmiling interpretations. There are some surprising rhetorical broadenings in Vienna. In Chicago one hears only the brass and timpani in the climaxes. Strings disappear totally. It's probably not how it came across in concert, but on disc it's quite obvious. Very refined and yet commanding and almost militarily disciplined. Timpani taps at the onset are clear yet ominous, very well judged.  This work has many such seemingly small details that imprint on the memory. Unfortunately the disc crackles badly in most of the loud spots. I'll refrain from passing a judgment.

The Vienna recording hails from the Schauspielhaus, Salzburg. It is clearer. Strings never disappear under the weigth of brass and timpani, indeed they are magnificent throughout, with that telltale sweet, almost saccharine tone.  But it's congested when Pierre and the boys whip it up - which happens a lot. I don't think I've ever heard as many decibels in this work as here. Except from the contemporaneous, disgusting Ozawa Vienna broadcast. With Boulez it works - most of the time. This is the kind of very loud, brutal, dense-coiled orchestral playing one expected from Karajan and the BPO in the late seventies. The coda of I is excellent, with a surprising slowdown and ritard on the last chord. The Scherzo is one mean brute here, it left me speechless. I'd think this particular movement is an unqualified success. The clarity and lucidity of the brass playing at this speed and dynamic level is just astounding. The adagio is not so successful. It's a bit aloof, and the coda is a full December moon harshly beaming on the landscape. No tenderness, no transfiguration, no ecstasy, no spirituality. Unfortunately the horns clam loudly on the ascent to the last chord - and yes, it's loud throughout and stops abruptly. In this particular context it doesn't go down well.

In any case, if that comes out on a commercial recording, I'll certainly buy it. That kind of unsentimental, tough, forbidding interpretation is not my cup of tea, but it's hugely impressive. I would say this is the polar opposite of the Walter concept.

J.Z. Herrenberg

Quote from: Lilas Pastia on September 06, 2007, 06:58:43 PM
Listened to this week: the First symphony, with the redoubtable Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchester under Vaclav Neumann. Although this is over 40 years old, it still holds up very well indeed as a sound experience.

I know this recording very well, Lilas Pastia, and it's my favourite First. The Finale under Neumann is electrifying.

Brucknerian greetings from Delft, the Netherlands!
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything. -- Plato

Lethevich

Uploaded an out of print Helgoland performance by Wyn Morris and the Symphonica of London from CD on request.

I strongly recommend that anybody on a connection better than 56k give this piece a try. It'll appeal to Wagner fans, it's a mature composition, and whether or not you consider the text silly (I don't have an English translation sadly, see the Wikipedia page for the German text), it's a stirring and musically wonderful composition.

http://www.mediafire.com/?1szm3gt93xg
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

Drasko

Quote from: Lethe on September 22, 2007, 08:25:07 AM
Uploaded an out of print Helgoland

Thanks :-*


Demanding sob that I am, can't help but asking, would you happen to have the accompaning Liebesmahl?

Lethevich

Quote from: Drasko on September 22, 2007, 08:32:16 AM
Thanks :-*


Demanding sob that I am, can't help but asking, would you happen to have the accompaning Liebesmahl?

I almost considered beginning uploading that and saying it's on the way, but I thought "nobody can be as obsessively completist as me... I won't bother". :D

Uploading now - it'll take up to 40 mins. :)
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.


J.Z. Herrenberg

Thanks, Lethe, for Helgoland! I know this work exists, and that it's a late work, but this is the first time I'll be listening to it!
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything. -- Plato

Keemun

Quote from: Lethe on September 22, 2007, 08:25:07 AM
Uploaded an out of print Helgoland performance by Wyn Morris and the Symphonica of London from CD on request.

Thanks, downloading now.   :)
Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. - Ludwig van Beethoven

Lilas Pastia

#394
Anybody who likes Brahm's overtures will know what to expect - and not to expect: mature, full-blown brucknerian language and rhetoric but in a 'lesser' form. It's one of those great "occasional" works that really deserves to be heard more often.

This particular performance defines the term 'granitic'. Suitable for a work that describes an impregnable rocky island in the North Sea. Yes, the place does exist!

not edward

Excellent. This performance really does blow Barenboim away: it's amazing how much more gravitas the work has when played this much slower.
"I don't at all mind actively disliking a piece of contemporary music, but in order to feel happy about it I must consciously understand why I dislike it. Otherwise it remains in my mind as unfinished business."
-- Aaron Copland, The Pleasures of Music

Lilas Pastia

Off to listen to it!

P.S.: Lethe, you wouldn't happen to have the original lp coupling, Wagner's Liebesmahl des Apostel ? ;D

Lethevich

#397
Quote from: Drasko on September 22, 2007, 08:32:16 AM
Demanding sob that I am, can't help but asking, would you happen to have the accompaning Liebesmahl?

Quote from: Lilas Pastia on September 22, 2007, 09:07:58 AM
P.S.: Lethe, you wouldn't happen to have the original lp coupling, Wagner's Liebesmahl des Apostel ? ;D

http://www.mediafire.com/?9umjye3in22
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

Lilas Pastia

A dream come true!  :-*

Wagner's Liebesmahl is a weirdly constructed work. It's about 35 minutes long and for the first 25 minutes it's strictly a capella. Then the orchestra comes in, at the moment where the Holy Ghost descends on the apostles. From there on it's an exciting orchestral-choral pageant. Thrilling stuff.

marvinbrown



  TODAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2007 I discovered Bruckner for the first time in my life.  I listened to symphony no.0 (Skrowaczewski) and symphony no.00 (Tinter) today and just fell in love with Bruckner's music. Much like the music of Wagner  0:) (one of my all time favorite composers) Bruckner's first 2 symphonies had a profound emotional effect on me.   I had to find out more and just bought this set from amazon. For the first time in a very long time I am really excited!!!

 

  Just wanted to come on board this thread, I know I am late, but hope there is room for me, a Bruckner newbe, here.

  I will spend all of next week listening to Bruckner's symphonies. 
 
   marvin