In the complete edition compiled by BR-KLASSIK, the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under the direction of its long-time principal conductor Mariss Jansons explores Mahler's symphonic œuvre. This complete recording of Mahler's impressive symphonies is further enhanced by revealing rehearsal recordings and interesting interviews. In his nine symphonies, Gustav Mahler built up an entire world for himself and his listeners. More than almost any other composer, he tried in his symphonic works to get to the very bottom of the cycle of life, that eternal process of becoming and expiring – so what better complete set of symphonies to express the finest qualities of a modern-day conductor and the unique sound of a leading orchestra?

Mariss Jansons found simple and clear words to express what it was that so fascinated and moved him about Mahler's music throughout his life. He said that the composer’s work always related to what was universal and contained absolutely everything that exists in the world. In his symphonies, said Jansons, Mahler captured nature, faith, love, death, pain, tragedy, happiness, humor, utopia, irony, sarcasm - everything that makes up human existence. Jansons regarded his music as posing questions that ultimately every thinking person has to ask, and everyone can find something in it where they recognize themselves as if in a mirror. There are nevertheless no definitive answers in Mahler, "nothing triumphant that is at one with itself." When he first encountered Mahler’s music, this experience struck Jansons like a bolt from the blue. Gradually, he developed into one of the leading Mahler conductors of his era. The fact that he had the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks as a partner here – an orchestra that can look back on a long Mahler tradition - was certainly a very fortunate coincidence.

"Increasingly, Shostakovich's music is captivating people all over the world and appealing to their deepest emotions. Almost like no other, it bears witness to a traumatic political epoch while remaining a timeless expression of existential human feeling and experience. For me personally," said conductor Mariss Jansons, who died two years ago, "Shostakovich is one of the most serious and sincere composers of them all." Now BR-KLASSIK is releasing two more outstanding performances by this important Soviet-Russian composer: his impressive Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and String Orchestra, and his Ninth Symphony - performed live by the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under its long-time principal conductor Mariss Jansons.

Shostakovich's (first) piano concerto features impressive pianistic virtuosity, bold experimentation, satire, and caricatures of different musical styles. The composer wrote it in the summer of 1933, only a few weeks after the completion of his opera "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk". This concerto in particular demonstrates the immense versatility and magnificent talent of the still carefree 26-year-old Shostakovich. He blends a wealth of musical thoughts and ideas into a colorful and fascinating kaleidoscope. Despite the wealth of different stimuli, the concerto does not seem chaotic or overloaded: the young composer effortlessly maintains the balance. Shostakovich performed a similar balancing act between creative work and conformity to the state in his Ninth Symphony, which premiered on November 3, 1945. Instead of the expected heroic, regime-conformist orchestral thunder along the lines of his Seventh Symphony, the "Leningrad”, the music heard here was playful, without pathos, somewhat witty, full of allusions – yet something did not seem quite right. This musical conundrum, full of ironic refractions and caricatures of melodramatic and triumphant music, was recognized by the censors as a masquerade, yet one that was not easily decipherable.

REVIEW:

I don’t think of any first-rate recording as needless, and this release, despite its short timing, features two excellent performances, even though Yefim Bronfman already has a recording of Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on Sony. That version, from 1999 with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the LA Phil, is nimble and quick, and it finds Bronfman more scintillating than he is in Munich in 2012.

The new Symphony No. 9, BRSO version is a live account from Vienna’s Musikverein in 2011, and in every way it is splendid. Superb recorded sound captures every detail and instrumental color in the score, and the orchestra shows off its world-class status. Jansons’s touch is light and lively, giving the symphony an irresistible buoyancy.

Thanks to some highly individual solo playing from the BRSO’s first desks, which expressively ranges from soulful melancholy to dizzying brilliance, this concert performance displays great emotional variety, including wit and suspense. I can warmly recommend it as one of Jansons’s best efforts in Shostakovich, and you can bypass the stingy timing of the CD by resorting to digital downloads and streams.

This CD is extracted from BR Klassik’s 68-disc Jansons Edition. Final applause is briefly included.

-- Fanfare

Among Simon Rattle's first concert programs as the new chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra was Gustav Mahler's Sixth Symphony. The performances marked the beginning of a new chapter in Mahler interpretation, for Rattle, like his predecessors Jansons, Maazel and Kubelík, is an ardent admirer of the composer. BR-KLASSIK has now released the live recording of the concerts.

Gustav Mahler's Sixth Symphony is perhaps the darkest work he ever wrote – its nickname is "The Tragic". And there is something almost destructive about the final movement. "But strangely enough," says Simon Rattle, "it is also a very classical symphony. Yes, it is extreme, but for long stretches it is less wild than other works of his – although of course it does convey a harrowing message. But it's like a lot of great works: there are always different ways of reading them. I've been conducting the Sixth for forty years now, and over time I’ve come to realise that it also contains hope."

Anton Bruckner 200 (1824-2024)

Dutch conductor Bernard Haitink and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra were linked by a long and intensive artistic collaboration, brought to an abrupt end by his death in October 2021. BR-KLASSIK now presents outstanding and as yet unreleased live recordings of concerts from the past years.

This recording of Bruckner's "Te Deum" and his Eighth Symphony (version by Robert Haas, 1939) documents concerts performed in the Philharmonie im Gasteig in November 2010, and in the Herkulessaal of the Munich Residenz in December 1993.

I could never understand why this wonderful cycle failed to make an impact when it was first issued. Kubelik's sensitivity to detail, his refusal to bully Schumann's vulnerable structures and his ability to penetrate occasional thickets of orchestration, make these 1978-9 sessions especially memorable. Just listen to the cheeky bassoon backing clarinet, 144' into the Spring Symphony's fourth movement, the limpid phrasing of the Rhenish Symphony's Nicht schnell third movement, or the to-ing and fro-ing between first and second violins (usefully separated, as virtually always with Kubelik) in the last movement of the Second, Only the first movement of the Fourth seems to me a little heavy-handed, but then the poetry of the Romanze and the exuberance of the finale more than make amends.

First movement repeats are observed and the playing throughout is rich in felicitous turns of phrase. The sound, though, is a minor stumbling block: violins are thin (one of the few disadvantages of having them separated is that their massed tone becomes mildly diluted), brass a little fuzzy and the whole production less focused than, say, Sawallisch's EMI mid-price Dresden set. But, for me, Kubelik's insights are too varied and meaningful to miss, and I derive as much pleasure from them now as I did 13-odd years ago, when they were first issued on LP. What with a stirring Manfred Overture added for good measure, they constitute exceptional value for money.

-- Gramophone [7/1993, reviewing Sony 48269 and 48270]

BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 1. 1 MOZART Piano Concerto No. 18 2 • Martha Argerich (pn); Seiji Ozawa, cond; 1 Eugen Jochum, cond; 2 Bavarian RSO • BR 900701 (63:37) Live: Munich 7/17/1983; 1 Würzburg 6/22/1973 2


If there are two composers not normally associated with the kind of white-heat performances of Martha Argerich, they are Beethoven and Mozart. Though generally thought of as a pianist of the virtuoso repertoire, including everything from the Liszt Sonata to the Prokofiev concertos, Argerich here shows herself to be not only a stylish player, but a profoundly interesting one as well. While some might describe Argerich’s playing here as “holding back,” I would disagree; she has absorbed the style of the music that she’s playing here so completely that, rather than giving less than normal, it sounds like she is giving just enough.


The Beethoven is very good. The orchestra, at times seems a bit sluggish, especially in the opening tutti before the piano makes its entrance, but Argerich has an ability to breathe life into the performance. Her playing has spontaneity; one feels at times that she is almost improvising the figurational patterns. The vitality and the lightness, which Argerich brings out so well, are evident from her very first entry. The balance between orchestra and piano is maintained well throughout; the soloist and instrumentalists of the orchestra always playing off of each other well. The pianist’s dynamic control is, as always, superb. When Argerich plays the trill in the first movement at 12: 14, the notes detached, and pulls back at 12:16 to begin the trill pianissimo and legato, to only crescendo up a few seconds later, the effect is not only breathtaking, but palpable. The movements that follow are equally well done. Argerich’s ability to produce a transparent , mezza voce sound in the slow movement is ideal. The rapid scalar runs are easy for her, and the effect more of a dynamic surge than ornamental filigree. The third movement is taken at a lively pace, and the offbeat accents sound naturally done—never over the top. This recording is similar in conception to another of Argerich’s live performances with the Royal Concertgebouw under Heinz Wallberg (EMI 56974), though I prefer this rendition with Ozawa.


This is the only recording I know of Argerich playing this Mozart Concerto. As good as the Beethoven is, the Mozart is better. The balance here is even finer than in the previous Concerto, and the colors inherent in the orchestration are brought to the fore—Mozart’s mastery is in evidence here and the performers bring this out especially well. One of my favorite moments is in the second variation of the second movement, the Andante un poco sostenuto, where the strings take over the melody and the piano is left to wander about with its figurative patterns. Later, after the Maggiore section, the same treatment of the melody in the strings and the piano with figurative accompaniment is again done perfectly; this time the figurative wandering, in both the left and right hands of the piano, is even more delicately accomplished. Argerich shows her understanding of this passage and does so with sensitivity. The third movement is the epitome of jollity. The tempo, perfectly chosen, again allows Argerich to keep the scalar patterns light and graceful.


These are both fine performances, ones that I would not hesitate to have in my collection. The sound is good, the piano a bit forward at certain moments, but musically made up for in the performances. As these are staples of the concerto repertoire though, I would still recommend owning a few other fine performances: in the Beethoven, Adrian Aeschbacher with Wilhelm Furtwängler conducting the Lucerne Festival Orchestra (Music & Arts 1018), an older recording with less than modern studio sound, but a fabulous performance, and in the Mozart, Peter Serkin with Alexander Schneider conducting the English Chamber Orchestra (RCA Victor Red Seal 35123—now available on arkivmusic.com as an ArkivCD).


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

This set presents the complete cycle of Brahms’ symphonies, as performed by the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under the direction of Mariss Jansons. It puts the finishing touch on the complete performance of Johannes Brahms’ symphonic works, compositions oriented around the creativity of his great role model, yet in many ways also forward-looking and innovative.

The beauty of Brahmsian symphonic creativity comes to full fruition in these live recordings from the Musikverein in Vienna and the Herkulessaal in Munich under the direction of Mariss Jansons.

BR‐Klassik presents the 2014 live recording from Munich's Philharmonie im Gasteig of the semi‐staged performance of Tchaikovsky's late masterpiece “Pique Dame”, or “The Queen of Spades”. In its long history as a concert orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra has also devoted itself on numerous occasions to opera, under such eminent conductors as Rafael Kubelik and Leonard Bernstein. Chief conductor Mariss Jansons also maintains this tradition, for example with concert performances of Russian operas such as “Eugene Onegin”. With great connoisseurship, Maestro Jansons assembled a group of singers for this performance, sung in the original Russian, who are all native speakers of the language, and very familiar with the work, including Misha Didyk as Herman, Tatiana Serjan as Lisa, and Alexey Markov as Prince Yeletsky.

To mark Britten's 100th birthday, Mariss Janson's conducted the composer's best-known and most moving work, War Requiem, in March 2013. In addition to the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, the Tolz Boys' Choir can also be heard. An outstanding ensemble of soloists rounds off this remarkable recording.

Looking back on the Verdi year of 2013, BR-Klassik has now supplemented its discography with the live recording of a concert highlight of October 2013. + With the Messa da Requiem, the conductor Mariss Jansons is now represented on the BR-Klassik label with Verdi's choral-symphonic legacy. + Together with international soloists Krassimira Stoyanova, Marina Prudenskaya, Saimir Pirgu, Orlin Anastassov and the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Chorus of the Bayerischer Rundfunk is also a fundamental element of the Requiem, and its tonal versatility received special praise from the press. + Giuseppi Verdi’s Requiem, as dramatic a work as are any of his immortal operas and reproached in its day in some quarters as more theatrical than spiritual, was completed in 1874 shortly after the death of the great Italian author and patriot Alessandro Mazzoni, for whom it was performed on the first anniversary of his death.

For today’s musicologists, performers and concert-going audiences, Mozart’s final symphonies are still a veritable miracle. Why they were written remains a mystery, and no-one knows whether Mozart ever heard them performed during his lifetime. One thing is certain: Mozart created three individual, distinctive and unique works here, which complement each other despite their extreme diversity. The symphonies in E Major, K 543 (no. 39), G minor, K. 550 (no. 40), and C Major, K. 551 (no. 41, also known as “The Jupiter”) are the ones that most represent Mozart’s symphonic legacy to later generations of musicians. With its slow introduction, the Symphony in E flat major also opens the entire cycle, already giving the listener a sense of its highs and lows. As early as 1800, the popular "Great" G minor Symphony was praised as the “painting of a passion-stricken soul”. Like its big sister, the "Jupiter" Symphony in C Major, it numbers among the most-played works in classical music and has been immortalized in countless recordings. Nevertheless, these symphonies - probably the most profound ones before Beethoven - reveal themselves as something quite new in every interpretation.

"Mozart placed all the dark sides of human existence into his G minor Symphony", says Herbert Blomstedt, adding that its “passion” continues to fascinate him. The eminent Swedish conductor Herbert Blomstedt, a close associate and regular guest conductor of the BRSO, conducted the E Major Symphony on December 18 and 19, 2019 in the Philharmonie at the Munich Gasteig, the G minor Symphony in concerts on January 31 and February 1, 2013 and the "Jupiter" Symphony on December 21 and 22, 2017 in the Herkulessaal of Munich’s Residenz. The new 2-CD set from BR-KLASSIK now presents these great cornerstones of Mozart's symphonic oeuvre –in the very best sound quality.

The 2015 Munich concert year began at the end of January with two highlights: two performances of Bruckner's Sixth Symphony with Mariss Jansons conducting the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks. The live recording, previously reserved exclusively for subscribers to the orchestra, is now being released on album by BR-KLASSIK - an outstanding interpretation of one of the most important compositions in the Late Romantic symphonic repertoire.

For a long time, Anton Bruckner’s Sixth Symphony (along with his Second) was regarded as something of a ‘poor relation’ in his immense symphonic oeuvre, even though the composer himself had moodily referred to it as his "boldest". In view of its performance figures and recordings over the decades, this has now changed significantly, and the work has earned itself a permanent place in the repertoire. The Sixth Symphony forms part of the creative process of the two preceding symphonies, the "Romantic" Fourth (1874/1880) and the Fifth (1875), and is now seen as an important preliminary stage in Bruckner’s last great upsurge that followed the composition of the "Te Deum" and culminated in the sublime grandeur of his final symphonies, the Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth. Bruckner worked on his Sixth Symphony in A major (WAB 106) from September 24, 1879 to September 3, 1881. He was only able to hear the complete work at one orchestra rehearsal during his lifetime because only the two middle movements (Adagio and Scherzo) were publicly performed in the concert hall of the Vienna Musikverein on February 11, 1883. The first public performance of the symphony as a whole followed only on February 26, 1899 - two and a half years after the composer’s death. It was conducted by Gustav Mahler, who had, however, made changes to the score, presenting it in a radically shortened version.

Since its premiere in Prague in 1890, Dvořák’s Eighth Symphony has become one of the composer’s most-performed works. Josef Suk, Dvořák’s son-in-law and student-is obviously influenced by Dvořák, but displays his compositional skills in his own right in his Serenade for Strings. Consistently praised for his interpretation of Slavic music, Mariss Jansons conducts the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks in this live recording.

REVIEW

This disc contains three very fine performances and I thoroughly enjoyed it all. The BR Klassik recording is very good indeed. I’ve come to expect clarity and very pleasing, natural sound from this label and this latest disc is another excellent example of their work.

--MusicWeb International (John Quinn)

Born in Prague in 1979, the composer, conductor and chorus master Ondrej Adámek, who studied in his Czech hometown and in Paris, has already won numerous prestigious awards for his orchestral, chamber, vocal and electro-acoustic music. In his musical language, which also repeatedly incorporates elements of distant cultures, he creates unusual musical narratives. He seeks the authenticity of his interpretations by combining voices and movements, gestures and theatricality, phonetic and semantic aspects, and his own specially developed musical instruments. The premieres of Ondrej Adámek's "Where are You?" and "Follow me" were distinctive for their excellent casts, featuring stars such as Magdalena Kožená, Isabelle Faust and Simon Rattle. In Adámek’s "Follow me", a three-movement concerto for violin and orchestra, the melodies are divided between the soloist and the orchestra along the lines of the late medieval hocket technique, whereby the composer seeks to connect a single individual with a (human) crowd. The first performance of Adámek’s "Where are You?" for mezzo-soprano and orchestra was an outstanding event in Munich's concert programme this year. In the eleven-part, approximately 35-minute-long kaleidoscope of sound, dominated by constant motoric movement – ranging from everyday sounds such as the monotonous ticking of a clock to the sweeping, electrifyingly rhythmic pounding of the orchestra tutti – the composer embarks on a search for the human ("Where do we come from and where are we going?") and the divine.

Review

This is music that grabs the listener by the ears and doesn’t let go. I found it completely exhilarating.

Nothing about either score included on this recording is remotely derivative or even predictable. If I were to say that it is as if Adámek had smashed up all previous music into tiny pieces and then reconstructed them into something marvellous and new, that might give the impression that he is some kind of arch post modernist. He is nothing of the sort. Almost miraculously he manages to be both uncompromisingly modernist and yet intensely communicative. Try his setting of what, in effect amounts to St Theresa’s ecstatic, religious orgasm in the seventh song of Where Are You? and what you’ll get is music that verges on the demented but which manages to be deeply spiritual and very sexy! Both scores are full of such wild, rude, exultant moments.

Follow Me is simultaneously a violin concerto and someone having a lot of fun with what a violin concerto might mean. I am not aware of another concerto that concludes with what amounts to a musical lynching of the soloist by the orchestra. One of the characteristics of Adámek’s writing is his absolute command of even the most outré material. Every note delivers an aural punch. He is of course capable of writing music of great delicacy, as in the concerto’s Bach derived slow movement but even here every note makes its point.

The opening movement features orchestral soloists echoing the opening phrases by the solo violin (the ‘follow me’ of the work’s title), phrases the composer explains in his joyous, quixotic note that were inspired by the exaggerated vibrato of a singer in Japanese Noh theatre. The orchestra, in a sense, gathers round the soloist, repeating her phrases. Isabelle Faust is at her imperious best here. This then subsides into silence before the soloist starts again with more seductive phrases. As Adámek puts it, these phrases provoke the orchestra “eventually driving them mad”. This builds and builds as the various motifs combine and recombine. The tension generated by the gradually gathering of tempo and volume is quite ferocious before Adámek pulls the rug from under the expected eruption and the movement ends with weird whistlings and scrapings out of which the slow movement evolves. A great strength of Adámek’s music is to unsettle the listener whilst keeping them on the edge of their seat.

One of the unifying techniques across all three movements of this concerto is what Adámek likens to a kind of musical ping pong where melodies are split, in alternate notes, between soloist and members of the orchestra. This effect plus an extreme elongation of material taken from Bach is most noticeable in this slow movement. It is a strange and mysterious movement that subsides into the uneasy calm from it emerged.

On a purely technical level, the finale combines all the elements of the previous two movements but that scarcely does justice to the effect it has on the listener. The shadowing of the soloist which gives the work its title is allowed finally to work its way from a hushed, fugitive opening all the way to the mighty climax that the opening movement was robbed of. As in that movement, the following of the soloist by the orchestra becomes more combative- a wry nod I think to the lion taming tradition of the 19^th century virtuoso concerto – and the music, dominated by a rogue trombone, constantly threatens to swamp the soloist whose final phrases are delivered off stage before a final thrilling orchestral stampede rounds things off. Is that a tongue in cheek reference to the final sacrificial dance of the Rite of Spring I hear in this final passage? What this description may not capture is that this is all immensely diverting and colossal fun. The world of Adámek’s music may be capable of great seriousness but it never takes itself too seriously.

Follow Me is, in many ways, the curtain raiser for the even more remarkable Where Are You? My earlier comments have probably already given some indication of what it is like. Written for mezzo soprano and orchestra, it is a song cycle on spiritual themes with texts from the Bible, the Gita and the autobiography of St Theresa. None of this is handled in a conventional manner. The opening section revels in the vowel sounds of the opening line of the Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic. A later movement sets possible Czech translations of those Aramaic words. It’s that sort of piece! The theme that unites these disparate elements is the way in which the spiritual quest for the divine however how high it can raise us comes down to earth with the question ‘Where are you?’ left unanswered. It has to be said that the piece celebrates the quest as much as it illustrates its ultimate failure and it does so with affection and good humour as well as profundity and anguish.

The vocalist is required to adopt a huge range of singing styles from breaths and rolled r’s to folk singing to outrageous coloratura. As in most of his other scores that I’ve heard, Adámek can find music in almost anything and make no mistake – this is a musical event above all else. The composer isn’t advancing some obscure musicological idea but making maddening, frenzied, bewildering, exuberant music. Ultimately, like the spiritual quest it describes, words fail to do justice to this piece. You are just going to have to listen to it.

--MusicWeb International (David McDade)

Two great symphonic organ concertos can be heard on the new album from BR-KLASSIK: the famous Organ Symphony by Camille Saint-Saëns and the lesser-known but highly impressive Concerto for Organ, Strings and Timpani by Francis Poulenc. The Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks is conducted by Mariss Jansons, and the organ soloist is the excellent Latvian musician Iveta Apkalna, one of the most renowned concert organists of our time. In his Symphony no. 3 in C minor, op. 78, the so-called ”Organ Symphony” of 1886, Camille Saint-Saëns succeeded in integrating the organ into the musical fabric of a symphonic work. Of this, the last of his five symphonies, Saint-Saëns wrote: “Here, I gave everything I was able to give. What I have here accomplished I will never achieve again.” Francis Poulenc's Concerto for Organ, Strings and Timpani in G minor was composed in 1938. At a time when it was no longer customary to present a solo concerto for organ, the work, with its unusual choice of instruments, is a tribute to Johann Sebastian Bach. In contrast to the organ compositions by the Baroque master, of course, Poulenc wrote for a large organ that could achieve impressive sound effects. The Latvian concert organist Iveta Apkalna debuted in 2007 with the Berlin Philharmonic under Claudio Abbado. As the titular organist of the new Klais organ at the Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, she played at the opening of the new concert hall in 2017 with world premieres of works by Wolfgang Rihm, together with Thomas Hengelbrock and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester. In 2018, she received prestigious music awards in Latvia in the “Musician of the Year” and “Concert of the Year” categories, and that same year, as part of the centennial celebrations of the Republic of Latvia, she was awarded the highest state order of merit in the country.

Named Gramophone Magazine Editor's Choice for December 2022!

For the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the performances on November 26 and 27, 2021 in the Isarphilharmonie marked the beginning of a new chapter in its Mahler interpretation: with its designated new principal conductor Simon Rattle, the orchestra is now headed by a Mahler admirer every bit as ardent as his predecessors Mariss Jansons, Lorin Maazel, and Rafael Kubelík. The musicians dedicated the benefit concert on November 26 to the memory of conductor Bernard Haitink, who died in October 2021 and was associated with the renowned orchestra for 61 years. The very long silence after the final chord was one of those “goosebumps moments” that one goes to concerts for – and for which music is made in the first place.

Gustav Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, in particular, is understood as the composer’s reaction to a heart ailment that was diagnosed shortly before he wrote the first drafts in the summer of 1908. He was in deep despair, but still scarcely aware of how few years he actually had left to live. With Mahler, it was always in and through music that he tried to come to terms with his life experiences and such topics as farewell, the meaning of existence, death, redemption, life after death and love. He wrote his Ninth Symphony in Dobbiaco, in a kind of creative frenzy, between 1909 and 1910. Its premiere took place in Vienna on June 26, 1912, when the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra performed the work under Bruno Walter. Mahler did not witness the premiere of his last completed work – he had already died on May 18, 1911.

REVIEW:

I would rank Rattle's performance here with the best of the competition and would add that even the classic recordings of Bernstein, Giulini, and Karajan have no significant advantage over Rattle's. In the end Rattle would be my top choice among newer versions and probably the equal of the classic performances on disc.

-- MusicWeb International (Robert Cummings)

If he has always shown very sensitive affinities with Symphony No. 9, Simon Rattle delivers his most accomplished recording to the Bavarian Radio. Recorded live between November 24 and 27, 2021, at the Isarphilharmonie im Gasteig in Munich by Winfried Messmer, [this] powerful orchestral mass presents both great volume and precise definition of timbre and range.

-- Diapason (citation for a Diapason d'or)

The Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and its designated principal conductor dedicated one of the two concerts used for this recording to the conductor Bernard Haitink, who died in October 2021. It is a great tribute to this outstanding Mahler conductor, and Rattle once again proves what a major Mahler interpreter he is as well.

Right in the first movement, he succeeds in drawing the whole Mahler world in its gripping originality with magnificent breath. Rising and collapse are always close together, and the exciting alternation between tension and release is maintained throughout the symphony. At the same time, this reading is not lacking in sensuality. There is both lyrical beauty, full of abyss, and the light-hearted (and artfully illuminated) play of sound and movement. The three-movement back-and-forth of emotions leads to the Adagio finale, which Rattle conducts thoughtfully and in moderate tempo. The music dies away in a deeply moving 24 minutes with nostalgia, sadness and also some thoughts of hope.

The orchestra is brilliantly disposed and fascinates with both differentiated coloration and the greatest possible transparency. Under Rattle’s direction, Mahler, the orchestral musicians, and he himself merge into a single instrument.

-- Pizzicato

Superbly played and recorded, from November last year (Isarphilharmonie im Gasteig), a memorial concert for Bernard Haitink, Sir Simon’s third recording (following Birmingham and Vienna, both EMI/Warner) of Mahler Nine sports a first movement, if not without a few cosmetic touches, that is a flowing and feisty affair, defiant, better to be alive than not, with impassioned fortissimos, and only in the concluding few minutes does the music issue calmness as well as bittersweet sentiments, although it seems too sudden as well as much too soon – bearing in mind how the Symphony will end, spare and fading to nothingness. The second movement, with its competing waltz and ländler, has its tempo contrasts well-managed, but is perhaps a little too manicured – it needs to be rougher, more rustic and pesante. Poker-faced sophistication suits the ensuing ‘Rondo-Burleske’, its counterpoint wonderfully clear (antiphonal violins swirl either side of the podium) albeit greater bite is sometimes required, and it’s a surprise that Rattle doesn’t linger more in the central section (his is a tempo-related ‘trio’), and the conclusion is thrillingly fast and rendered with A+ virtuosity – the abyss awaits. The final Adagio follows more or less attacca (I can vouch for such a joining from an LSO concert years ago) and is a dignified if intense leave-taking, powerful (vibrant strings, eloquent woodwinds) and ethereal, with a cathartic climax and a hypnotically controlled paring down of resources as expression becomes more and more off the radar.

-- Colin's Column

Rossini: Il barbiere di Siviglia

This BR-KLASSIK CD features recordings of concerts on February 28 and March 1, 2013 in the Philharmonie im Gasteig.

Zubin Mehta is closely associated with the city of Munich and the orchestras based there. From 1998 to 2006, he was General Music Director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, and has similarly close ties with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Tchaikovsky wrote his Symphony No. 5 in E minor, op. 64, the so-called "Fate Symphony,” in 1888. All four movements of the work are permeated by the so-called “fate” theme. Together with his fourth and sixth (“Pathétique”) symphonies, the fifth is one of Tchaikovsky's most popular.

Franz Liszt's symphonic poem "Mazeppa" is based on a poem by Victor Hugo and uses musical material from the composer’s fourth "Etude d'exécution transcendante" from 1846. The symphonic poem was composed in 1850 during Liszt's tenure as court conductor in Weimar, and was first performed on April 16, 1854. Liszt's symphonic poem describes the wild ride across the steppe of the emaciated and exhausted Ivan Masepa (Mazeppa), tied to the back of a horse. He is finally rescued by Cossacks, who take him to Ukraine.

Sony Classical is pleased to announce a new batch of reissues from the CBS/Sony and RCA Victor/BMG back catalogues. This latest instalment of the popular series showcases Mozart and Chopin along with conductor Robert Craft’s pioneering Webern recordings and the global journeys of that irrepressible musical explorer Yo-Yo Ma.

Sir Colin Davis was indisputably one of the greatest Mozart conductors of the last century, both in the opera house and in the recording studio. In Munich in the early 1990s, near the end of his tenure as chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, he recorded several of the popular serenades and wind concertos (“Davis is completely at home in this music and brings to it grandeur and delicacy in good measure and judicious balance” – Gramophone). And in 1998, as the Dresden Staatskapelle’s first-ever conductor laureate, he recorded twelve opera overtures (“Beautifully turned string playing, wonderful contributions from the wind section, and transparent textures: it all represents splendid ‘big band’ Mozart in the modern tradition” – Classics Today). These superb RCA recordings are now reissued in a 4-album box set.

REVIEW:

Colin Davis’s RCA Mozart CDs from the 1990s, mostly with the Bavarian RSO, tend towards more relaxed tempos than on his earlier analog recordings, a live coupling of the Posthorn Serenade and the Bassoon Concerto recorded at the Mozartfest in Würzburg in June 1992 claiming among its many virtues textural opulence (Eberhard Marschall’s bassoon is among the richest in tone that I’ve ever heard) and, as Christopher Headington noted in these pages (9/94), an unhurried finale ‘despite the Presto marking that tempts less experienced conductors’. You might additionally note Davis’s Toscanini-like vocalizing at the start of the Andantino, a romantic reading that works wonderfully well. Also included are similarly affecting accounts of Eine kleine Nachtmusik, the Wind Serenades Nos 10-12, the Clarinet Concerto (with a mellifluoussounding Karl-Heinz Steffens), and the one CD featuring the Dresden Staatskapelle, an hour’s worth of overtures. I’d never clocked on previous occasions the strong similarity between the very brief Bastien und Bastienne Overture and the opening of Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony. As Mozart orchestral compilations go, this is among the best, one that you should return to with constantly renewed pleasure. The recordings are full-bodied.

--Gramophone

When Handel composed his Judas Maccabaeus in 1746 he had brought to an end his activity for the (Italian) opera in London and begun a second career as an oratorio composer, which at first got off to a very successful start but then soon experienced a decline, for which there had been various causes. Judas Maccabaeus is the evidence that Handle had recovered from this setback, and to this day the work is considered one of his most successful. Rafael Kubelík relies, without ifs and buts, on the Handel Edition by the North German musical scholar Friedrich Chrysander that appeared in the second half of the 19th century and represents a monument of the scholarly musical historicism that probably could appear only in Germany and not in England, Handel’s artistic home. Apart from the old-fashioned German translation, most astonishing is the drastic cuts that Chrysander made. This historical live recording from 1963 presents Fritz Wunderlich as Judas together with Agnes Giebel, Julia Falk, Naan Pöld and Ludwig Welter.

To celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (BRSO) in 2024, the BR-KLASSIK label is releasing previously unreleased recordings of concerts for the first time on CD and as a stream. Excerpts from Richard Strauss's comic opera "Die schweigsame Frau" ("The Silent Woman") were pre-produced as studio recordings for a television program in November 1960. The impressive cast was almost identical to that of the opera production at the Salzburg Festival in 1959 under the premiere conductor Karl Böhm: Hans Hotter (Sir Morosus), Hermann Prey (Barber), Fritz Wunderlich (Henry), Ingeborg Hallstein (Aminta), and many others sang. Here, Heinz Wallberg conducts the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. In contrast to the live recording from Salzburg, which is marred by the clearly audible stage noises of a turbulent production, the outstanding cast of singers in this recording is more effective. The BR-KLASSIK label is now marking the 75th anniversary of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (BRSO) in 2024 by making this previously unreleased studio production available for the first time on CD and as a stream.

After the death of Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Strauss thought he had reached the end of his operatic career – but then he found a librettist of equal calibre in Stefan Zweig, who provided him with "the best libretto for an opéra comique since Figaro" (Strauss). The comic opera was written between 1932 and 1935 and, despite the fact that Zweig was a Jewish librettist (who had since emigrated), Strauss managed to have the opera premiered in Dresden on June 24, 1935, conducted by Karl Böhm. However, because the composer insisted on printing Zweig's name on the posters and in the program, the Nazis boycotted the performance. After the Gestapo intercepted a letter that Strauss had written to Zweig expressing his delight at the successful premiere, the composer finally fell out of favor. The opera was taken off the program after only three performances and was not performed at any other German theater until 1946. Strauss resigned from the presidency of the Reich Chamber of Music "for health reasons".

Strauss endowed "Die schweigsame Frau" with an overabundance of musical ideas: turbulent ensembles and individual tone colors, light comedy, and grand arias alternate. He casually quotes himself and a dozen other composers, including Rossini, whose "Barber of Seville" was the model for his talkative and manipulative barber. Music connoisseurs appreciate the many musical allusions in the work.

The Dutch conductor Bernard Haitink and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra enjoyed a long and intensive artistic collaboration, which was brought to an abrupt end by his death in October 2021. BR-KLASSIK is now presenting outstanding live recordings of concerts from the past years that have not yet been released. This recording of Shostakovich's Eighth Symphony documents a concert given in September 2006 at Munich’s Philharmonie im Gasteig.

For Shostakovich's contemporaries, educated in the spirit of Socialist Realism, it was clear that the Eighth Symphony had to have a programme and, even more specifically, a topical reference to current events. And at the time, there could hardly have been anything more topical than the recent, decisive turning point in the war in the form of the battle for Stalingrad. It is therefore hardly surprising that the Eighth Symphony, composed in less than nine weeks between July 2 and September 9, 1943, was also referred to as the "Stalingrad". Under the pressure of circumstance, Shostakovich was obliged to develop an aesthetic of ambiguity, secret hidden meanings and abysmal irony that was almost without parallel in cultural history. This work also expresses the sheer compulsion under which a musical language in conformity with the system had to be created.

Haitink first conducted a Munich subscription concert in 1958, and from then on was a regular guest with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra – either at the Herkulessaal of the Residenz or at the Philharmonie im Gasteig. This congenial collaboration lasted more than six decades. The orchestral musicians and singers enjoyed working with him just as much as the BR sound engineers. As an interpreter of the symphonic repertoire, and especially that of the German-Austrian Late Romantic period, Haitink was held in high esteem throughout the world. With him, Dmitri Shostakovich's symphonies were also always in the best of hands. Haitink’s driving principle was to make the sound architecture of a musical composition, with its complex interweaving, transparently audible; extreme sensitivity of sound was combined with a clearly structured interpretation of the score.

Leif Ove Andsnes is a leading pianist of his time, known for his exceptional musicianship and subtil touch, his considerable technical flair being unfailingly put at the service of his interpretations. He was a pioneer for being the first home-trained superstar pianist to have emerged from Norway. This box is the story of a 20-year partnership that has yielded a rich seam of recorded treasures, first for Virgin and then for EMI. Running through this cornucopia of 34 albums (36 CDs), we find recurring themes: Grieg (Andsnes even recorded some Lyric Pieces on the composer's own piano at Troldhaugen), Nordic music in general, Schumann, Rachmaninov, Schubert.

SCHUBERT: SYMPHONY NO 9 GIULI

I could never understand why this wonderful cycle failed to make an impact when it was first issued. Kubelik's sensitivity to detail, his refusal to bully Schumann's vulnerable structures and his ability to penetrate occasional thickets of orchestration, make these 1978-9 sessions especially memorable. Just listen to the cheeky bassoon backing clarinet, 144' into the Spring Symphony's fourth movement, the limpid phrasing of the Rhenish Symphony's Nicht schnell third movement, or the to-ing and fro-ing between first and second violins (usefully separated, as virtually always with Kubelik) in the last movement of the Second, Only the first movement of the Fourth seems to me a little heavy-handed, but then the poetry of the Romanze and the exuberance of the finale more than make amends.

First movement repeats are observed and the playing throughout is rich in felicitous turns of phrase. The sound, though, is a minor stumbling block: violins are thin (one of the few disadvantages of having them separated is that their massed tone becomes mildly diluted), brass a little fuzzy and the whole production less focused than, say, Sawallisch's EMI mid-price Dresden set. But, for me, Kubelik's insights are too varied and meaningful to miss, and I derive as much pleasure from them now as I did 13-odd years ago, when they were first issued on LP. What with a stirring Manfred Overture added for good measure, they constitute exceptional value for money.

-- Gramophone [7/1993, reviewing Sony 48270 and 48269]

Before the First World War, especially for the famous ballet ensemble "Les Ballets Russes", one of the most important dance companies of the 20th century, and its impresario Sergei Diaghilev, Igor Stravinsky composed the first three of his great ballet music works for large orchestra, indeed, the most important of his ballets in general: "L'oiseau de feu" (The Firebird) in 1910, "Petrushka" in 1911, and "Le sacre du printemps" (The Rite of Spring) in 1913. The first of these ranks as a pioneering work of the early 20th century – and the third, regarded as a key work of 20th-century music due to its extraordinary rhythmic and tonal structures, can both be experienced on this new release from BR-KLASSIK - in live recordings with the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under its chief conductor Mariss Jansons, and in masterly interpretations. Diaghilev, a formative figure in 20th-century ballet, had founded the Ballets Russes ensemble in 1909 in Paris, where it first performed before moving to Monte Carlo in 1911. The first performance of Stravinsky's "Firebird" took place on June 25, 1910 at the Paris Opera House, and "Le sacre du printemps" premiered on May 29, 1913 in the newly-built Théâtre des Champs-Élysées - a day that went down in history as one of the great artistic scandals of the 20th century. The furious protests from the Parisian public combined with the highly negative critical reviews all ended up making Stravinsky famous. His truly futuristic music has now established itself internationally and is an integral part of concert programs, and one can still hear why it so enraged audiences over 100 years ago. (“The Firebird" can be heard in Stravinsky’s ballet version of 1945.)

All Mahler scholars have agreed from the very start that Gustav Mahler embarked on an entirely new path with his Fifth Symphony. Even for his immediate contemporaries, such as the conductor Bruno Walter or the music critic Paul Bekker, the Fifth marked the beginning of a new creative phase, and Mahler himself was also keenly aware of this – which is why he was all the more upset by the fact that his work was not understood at its premiere in Cologne in October 1904 and, even later, met with a largely negative reception. In 1905, following an unsuccessful performance in Hamburg, the composer complained: "The Fifth is an accursed work. No-one understands it.” It was only after Mahler’s death in May 1911 that people slowly began to appreciate the piece. The Fifth ranks today as one of Mahler's most popular symphonies. This is due in part to Luchino Visconti's 1971 film adaptation of Thomas Mann's novella "Death in Venice", which used the symphony’s world-famous Adagietto to great effect: the movement enjoyed unanimous approval from the very start, and has now advanced to become Mahler's “greatest hit” and the most famous work in his entire oeuvre. In its structure, the symphony does not follow the classic four-movement form, but presents us with five movements in three sections. Conceptually, Mahler relies on methods he had already tried and tested in the work’s great predecessors, the Second and Third Symphonies. The centerpiece of the work is a lengthy scherzo full of grotesque humour, inspired by Jean Paul, while its resting-point is the Adagietto, which certainly bears many of the hallmarks of Mahler's slow movements. The harsher sound of this symphony ushered in a new creative phase for Mahler – one that he developed further in the Sixth. The maximum use he makes of the tonal means available already clearly anticipates the Ninth, in which he begins to abandon tonality altogether and encompass the transcendental aspect of the music. This Munich concert event of March 2016, now released as a CD by BR KLASSIK, is an outstanding interpretation of one of the most important compositions of the international symphonic repertoire of the early 20th century. „Gustav Mahler himself feared that the „chaos!“ In his Fifth Symphony would deeply unsettle his audiences. The work has long since become popular, and the Adagietto has even become Mahler’s "greatest hit."

Classical Music

[In Suor Angelica] Popp and Patané himself are the main attractions. She...is touching throughout and moving by the end.

-- Gramophone [9/1997]

MOZART: OPERA ARIAS CAROL VAN