Bruckner's Abbey

[Cato]

Continuing apace in the Brilliant box (ex-Berlin classics), one of the only three non-Rögner performances in the set:

- Second symphony, in an amazingly lifelike and sweet live 1951 recording. Franz Konwitschny and the RSO Berlin.

As I age, I feel an uncanny unreality surrounding such older recordings, linking us to the fading past.

[Moonfish]

As I age, I feel an uncanny unreality surrounding such older recordings, linking us to the fading past.

As in that we all will one day be part of the fading past....?    It is probably a feeling of reality rather than unreality...     

[Ken B]

The mailman is getting Chaillyized..!!!   

Mine got Reinered, and wow is he ever a grump now.

[Moonfish]

Mine got Reinered, and wow is he ever a grump now.

[André]

Just listened to the 9th symphony under Eduard van Beinum (Concertgebouworkest of course). I have that twice, in Pierre Paquin's stereo effect mastering of pristine lps on Haydn House (beautiful sound), and in the recent cd set of all Beinum Bruckner recordings on Decca. I first listened to the HH recording.

This is definitely one of the GREAT recordings. Everything in it is perfect, provided you can adjust to his fervent, fervid pacing in I. I certainly can. My brucknerian pulse happens to have quickened in the last 30 years. Beinum has all the proportions right. Paragraph after paragraph makes sense when measured and integrated to/with the others. It is all so flowing. The Scherzo of course makes sense at a quick tempo and here, the articulatory and declamatory feats of the orchestra do the malevelence and bite of the music full justice without ever sounding rushed. It is quick no doubt, but the quality of the playing allows the ear to register every single note.

Conversely, Beinum's Adagio is of the heavenly , lenghty persuasion at over 26 minutes. Don't think for a moment that this is a slow tempo. How he conveys the passion of the argument at that tempo I know not, but there is no doubt that this is a searing, passionate, desolate and profound reding of this last symphonic utterance by the Master.

Later this week I'll listen to the Decca incarnation and report on technical matters if I find that they are worth mentioning.

[André]

The fifth symphony is one of Bruckner's toughest nuts to crack. Many who like the composer's more lyrical efforts, and even the mighty, dramatic 8th and 9th symphonies are put off by this leviathan. And yet, it has claims to be the most classically anchored of them all. It contains just about every kind of structural device the classical composers have imagined.

Suffice to say that it is no longer than the 8th and yet, it seems more himalayan in scope than the Tragic. Its first movement is the longest, most elaborate of all his works before the 9th. Its Adagio one of the most hieratic, enigmatic.  Its scherzo one of the most cryptic in its minimalism and the second longest of all. Its Finale drawn on the most ambitious scale ever until that time, crowned by the longest, noisiest coda ever penned.

In any case, it's the second or third symphony by Bruckner I listened to as a teenager and it hooked me for good (t'was the Jochum BRSO version, quickly followed by the Klemperer NPO. Currently I own around 35 versions of all types, character, mien and persuasion. According to the John Berky discography, its timings range from 65 to 95 mins., making it - along with the 8th - one of the most elastic of all Bruckner symphonies.

Over the years I have come to accept all kinds of interpretations, from the turbulent, quasi-maniacal versions of Kegel, Furtwängler, to the mystic, ceremonial Celibidache. My initial fixation with Klemperer's hieratic tempi, geriatric articulation has abted a little. I still consider his studio and live New Philharmonia to be among the greatest things ever put on disc. And yet I veer more and more to the livelier, speedier, 68-70 minutes versions.

I recently listened to four such interprétations on disc that left me enthralled with the greatness of the music.

- Blomstedt and the WP. It's not commercially available. Beautiful, typical WP playing of great power and tonal splendour. Energetic, majestic phrasing and articulation. Refulgent yet considered. Very good ORF broadcast sound. A few clunkers, including what must be a dropped item (mute?) that shatters the beginning of the Adagio. If it was issued commercially it would trump many old favourites.

Rögner and the RSO Berlin (Berlin Classics, now reissued as part of a mostly-Rögner integral on Brilliant). Fast and furious, with big unwritten timpani swells in the right places. Great brass and gorgeous strings. Dramatic conducting that drives the argument home triumphantly. The fly in the ointment is the impossibly recessed horn section in the coda of IV. Fortunately trumpets, trombones and tuba are there in full force and piledrive their combined tonal resources mightily. A thrilling reading.

Furtwängler's wartime (1942) recording has long been touted for its incandescent interpretation and visionary interpretation, captured in stunning sound (for the period). That one, too is in the 68-70 minutes range. Furtwängler manages some death-defying accelerandos that only he could get away with. Meantime, the orchestra covers itself with tonal glory in an almost melodramatic romp through the score. It is at once fervent, mystic, dramatic and romantic.  A one-off maybe, but no brucknerian worth its salt should be without it.

The Kegel version (on Weitblick) has the redoubtable Leipzig RSO playing the hell out in a spectacular live recording. It is crude, exciting, noisy (the brass!) and yet perfectly proportioned and apportioned. This is a great regional orchestra with one of the toughest, meanest brass brigades around mightily filling the expanses of the Kongresshalle, Leipzig. It is single-minded and multi-faceted at the same time - the music is, and the conductor has the intelligence to unveil its many guises in a masterly fashion. Not for the faint of heart.

[André]

Listened to this week:

Symphony no 5, under Heinz Wallberg. The conductor is at the helm of the obscure NiederÖsterreischische Symponie Orchester (Lower Austria  S. O., also known on some labels as the National austrian Symphony Orchestra). The strings are meagre in numbers, but in this 1966 recording the orchestra plays with commitment and great sympathy with the Bruckner idiom. Wallberg conducts a fairly brisk performance (70 minutes) but it sounds moderate because of the typical austrian soft attacks and affectionate articulation. 3.5 stars.

Symphony no. 4. Lucerne Festival Orchestra under  Claudio Abbado. Splendid playing, but too note-perfect and unctuous for me. Not a misstep or wrong note in sight, it is smooth and buttery (first movement esp.). A beautiful, slightly faceless performance. 3 stars.

[André]

More Bruckner 4ths by Keilberth (NHK Symphony), Schmidt-Isserstedt (NDR Symphony Orchestra) and Bruno Walter (Columbia Symphony Orchestra).

Quickly: the Tokyo Keilberth performance is a big, juicy affair. It starts tentatively, as the first horn is decidedly cautious in his opening solo and things take a while to settle. The Andante is excellently paced, not a funeral march, but a pleasantly atmospheric and suitably sombre jog in the countryside. The scherzo is a blockbuster here. So is the Finale, Bruckner's least successful movement. Excellent sound for the time (live, 1968). A big, bold Romantic.

Schmidt-Isserstedt's interp is contemporaneous (1966) but far smoother in contour and execution. It is also less interesting.

I was very pleasantly surprised at Bruno Walter's muscular, manly take on the work. He starts off more mysteriously by having the string tremolos register at a healthy mf instesd of the more usual pp. It's a small detail, but a telling one. I sat up and took notice. The orchestra plays beautifully. Never have I heard so many deliciously pointed wind playing troughout - a tribute to the conductor, players, and engineers. The coda of the finale is one of the very best I ever heard - along with Celibidache's. A classic, timeless disc in excellent sound.

[André]

The 5th symphony in a 1953 concert performance by the Südwestfunk Radio Symphonie orchester, Baden Baden under the great Hans Rosbaud. Not only is the sound excelent for its vintage, but it's one of the only two mono performances I would include in a Top Ten recommendation (the other being Furtwängler's). It is simple, logical, direct, sensitive and very powerful at once. This short description may sound unglamorous, but these qwualities play to the work's strengths. Recommended

[calyptorhynchus]

How do we feel about the String Quintet? Personally I feel it's a beautiful and characteristic work and I'd recommend it as a way of getting in to Bruckner, a way for people who don't know his music to appreciate the timescales he composed to.

And what are the great recordings? I just have a couple of taped radio broadcasts and a disk of the Vienna Philharmonic Quintet.

[Jo498]

Is the Vienna Phil the one on Decca/Australian eloquence? I think I have this one as well; it is very romantic and sumptuous. My other recording is Archibudelli on Sony Vivarte, coupled with the early quartet. This one is leaner, but despite the HIP players not as much as one would expect. I like the piece, especially the slow mvtm, but am fine with those two, so I didn't explore other options.
There is one with the Raphael Ensemble on hyperion which should be very good, too (I love their Brahms sextets and Mendelssohn quintets).

[calyptorhynchus]

I think I'm pretty much the same, liked the Vienna Philharmonic Quintet recording so much I didn't explore further.

I think Bruckner in this peice did a magnificent job of writing for a chamber group, I never get the feeling it's an orchestral piece (and no-one has ever tried to orchestrate it, as far as I'm aware). A great achievement when you consider that his entire composing life (apart from the early quartet and this piece) was devoted to the orchestra (and voices sometimes).

[André]

Symphony no 9. Berliner Philharmoniker, conducted by Joseph Keilberth (1960 live recording, Testament).
I love the Hamburg Phil recording of that work on Telefunken. It is slightly older (1958), but being a studio effort from a great label it still sounds wonderful. Keilberth is a tellurian, volcanic yet patient brucknerian. For those who love the first Karajan BP recording, it offers a similar experience in a raw, unvarnished yet polished interpretation.

The live Berlin performance is even more extreme in this immensely involved, dedicated performance. I believe it is probably the most flooring, sock-it-to-them performance I have heard. The playing has that hugeness of sound the Berliners at full throttle could provide when prompted to do so by the right conductor. Unfortunately in the last few minutes the brass are audibly tired. This is quite understandable considering they have given their considerable best throughout the evening.  A formidable, exceptional performance by one of the best brucknerians ever.

Symphony no 5, the Dreden Staatskapelle under Giuseppe Sinopoli. Another huge-sounding virtuoso orchestra, whose massed forces are likely to be found intimidating at full volume. Sonically they could not be more different than the berliners. Sinopoli guides them expertly in the huge vistas of that behemoth of a work. Yet I find it all a wee bit marmoreal and intellectual. IOW slightly unengaged  from the podium. As if the conductor was content to let that Mercedes of an orchestra nonchalantly strut their stuff at the gallery. Lest that sound like a dull interpretation, it is emphatically not. But the sonic perfection is such that this is what registers first - before the greatness of the music and before any conductorial concept - of which one hears rather little other than solid, Study, powerful gestures and patient build up of the mighty climaxes. Great sound. A solid "A", slightly below the best (Klemperer, Rosbaud, Celi Munich '85, Suitner, Kegel, Furtwänger, van Beinum). On a par with Rögner, Marthé, Horenstein, Gielen,Blomstedt. I could very well imagine this being a preferred version. It has it all, in spades.

[Dancing Divertimentian]

In all my years of listening there have been performances which have literally moved the earth beneath me, sapped all the oxygen from my lungs (temporarily ), flooded me with excitement, and whisked me through some E.T.-like musical wormhole into whatever dimension lay in waiting.

But to this day I've never had a performance threaten me with what I suspect must be some Holy Rite since it happens so frequently to others yet somehow has been completely out of reach for me: the jerking loose of a tear.

Dang if it ain't the truth. Not anything on a fountain-like level mind you but this very evening my eyes welled up like they never have before. All brought to me by the good folks of the Vienna PO with Boulez holding the golden reins. 

Can't give higher praise than that for this mighty performance. 




[asin]B00004TL2N[/asin]

[jlaurson]

Notes from the 2014 Salzburg Festival ( 2 )
Bruckner Cycle IV • Barenboim, WPh

Lorin Maazel was a fixture at the Salzburg Festival, leading 119 performances between 1963 and 2013.
It made sense, therefore, to slap an "in Memoriam" label onto one of this summer's performances and even more so
to make it one of the concerts in which a requiem featured... and furthermore with an orchestra that had a history with
Lorin Maazel. The first such concert happened to be the Vienna Philharmonic's opening shot under Daniel Barenboim—
the beginning of this year's Bruckner Cycle at the Salzburg Festival...

[TheGSMoeller]

A new Fischer Bruckner 7th disc. Here's a positive review from the Hurwitzer and an attempted humorous negative Amazon review (click on the image), which I would normally think should be the other way around. But Hurwitzer's review has me very interested. Anyone heard this one yet?

[asin]B00K0ZIL6A[/asin]

[Ken B]

Ha! Greg, very nice, a praying, monk-ish frog. Being like a monk: monky. A monky frog. Nice.

[TheGSMoeller]

Ha! Greg, very nice, a praying, monk-ish frog. Being like a monk: monky. A monky frog. Nice.

The Monky Frog King keeps you in his prayers, Ken.

[Drasko]

A new Fischer Bruckner 7th disc. Here's a positive review from the Hurwitzer and an attempted humorous negative Amazon review (click on the image), which I would normally think should be the other way around. But Hurwitzer's review has me very interested. Anyone heard this one yet?

[asin]B00K0ZIL6A[/asin]

I'll be definitely getting it, sooner or later. The extended excerpts on last week's CD Review on BBC sounded great and I'm always game for some nonmolassed Bruckner.
There is another intriguing review over on RMCR (followed by usual blather).
Even without those I'd be very curious because Fischer/ Budapest Festival Orchestra is, for me, most consistently interesting conductor/orchestra combination active these days.

[Brian]

I am very interested already, because it's Fischer/BFO, but the speedy paces throughout (the first two movements are 18 minutes each) suggest that, at the very worst, it will be a good discussion topic. We'll get some fun debates out of it, and how can you complain about that?