My initial thoughts:
The outer two movements are sublime. The first movement, to me, doesn't breathe as much as other, more intense readings, but that doesn't detract from the beauty of the playing. Blomstedt's tranquil tempi in the spaces between the huge climaxes have a timeless feel to them which is very effective. The major climax of the movement is quite devastating, and at first I couldn't detect the deep bells (here chimes, I think) but they became increasingly present which made for an interesting effect. This may be one of the more gorgeous accounts of the finale on record, too, and that's in part due to the amazing, rich sound quality. The tempi here feel just right. Not much more to say for now, but these two movements are a must-hear in my opinion.
The inner movements suffer only from issues in tempo and pacing. The artistic quality of the conducting, playing, and sound engineering is great throughout, but both of these movements are quite leisurely. I don't think Blomstedt captures the rustic spirit of the different Ländler dances enough, though the accents and ornaments are all there. The same goes for the third movement, where I again felt like things were a little too well-controlled and not nearly manic enough. The middle section of this movement is phenomenal, but the coda fails to get much faster after each variation. The glockenspiel and that snare roll are a bit drowned out in the mix too, but that's a very small nitpick on my part.
Overall, extremely fine playing from the Bambergers, and Blomstedt conducts very well throughout with some unusual interpretive choices for the pacing of the inner movements. The sound engineers at Accentus are on their A game here (no pun intended), with clear and dynamic sound quality that compares with the best-sounding M9 recordings, namely Daniel Harding, Iván Fischer, and Jonathan Nott. I'll definitely be giving this recording more listens soon.
Topic: Blomstedt Mahler 9 with the Bamberg Symphony (Read 8542 times)