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New Recordings
- K.S.
Symphony No. 4
Bayerisches Staatsorchester, Kent Nagano conducting
(Sony ****)
Classical
BrucknerSymphony No. 4
Bayerisches Staatsorchester, Kent Nagano conducting
(Sony ****)
Symphony No. 5
Philharmonia Orchestra, Benjamin Zander conducting
(Telarc ***1/2)
Symphony No. 5
Orchestre de Champs-Elysees, Philippe Herreweghe conducting
(Harmonia Mundi ***1/2)
Symphony No. 7
Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart, Roger Norrington conducting
(Hanssler ****)
This notable spate of Bruckner recordings comes from unlikely sources, conductorwise. None shares anything close to the composer's Austrian or even Germanic identity, but with Kent Nagano and Roger Norrington, they set unconventional new standards for their respective works.
Nagano has made distinguished Bruckner recordings, but this one uses the very first 1874 version of the Symphony No. 4. The entire scherzo was subsequently rewritten; reportedly, not a single bar went unchanged. But never does this version feel like a mere warm-up for something more definitive; it's simply a different point on a long symphonic journey. Unlike many outings with early versions of Bruckner symphonies, this one is played as if it's the final version, and by one of Europe's great orchestras.
Not all of Norrington's adventures in original performance practice go beyond the interesting-
experiment stage. But this Bruckner 7th radically and convincingly recasts the symphony in a smaller, swifter sound envelope that's anything but portentous, has some exhilarating accelerandos, and in moments of undeniable spiritual revelation, blazes with the best of them. His Stuttgart orchestra isn't great but more than does the job (a considerable achievement when a standard work is so completely rethought).
Next to these recordings, even revisionist conductors such as Benjamin Zander and Philippe Herreweghe seem a bit tame. Herreweghe's must be heard if only because it takes a harder line than Norrington on the use of period instruments, resulting in many welcome surprises in terms of chord voicing and orchestral texture. Zander's set includes a bonus CD with the conductor's explication of the symphony and its parallels with classic cathedral structure (even including diagrams in the booklet). That, too, must be heard, and the performance is a good, solid basic-library reading of the sprawling score.
- David Patrick Stearns
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