OT: Is Bruckner slowly sliding into obscurity?

[ChrisH]

My listening buddy dropped me off a rip of this Bruckner set by Gerd Schaller you can find it here: http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphonies-Nos/dp/B005DVGUKA
He has been raving about this set for the past few weeks. He is an intense 65 year old Bruckner maniac!

Last night I listened to the Schaller 7th. It was flat out amazing. I've never heard Bruckner like this.  His ability to tie together the different musical cells is perhaps equaled only by Klemp or Celi. His tempo is on the fast side, it never sounds rushed or hurried. It's similar feeling to how Celi can be VERY broad though it never feels that way. The balances he achieves are very exact; he allows the woodwinds to really speak, especially in the 1st movement. They are never covered by the strings as the strings are never covered by the brass. You can hear everything. To me though, the best part was that this was an incredibly exciting performance. If half the Bruckner I've heard on disc was this exciting I think we'd have a very different mind of him as a composer.


I've yet to hear the 4th or the 9th. My friend said the reconstruction of last movement of the 9th is far and away the best he's heard. I feel inclined to believe him even though I've not heard it. He's the only person I know who's actually copied out the score to B9 by hand! As he would say, "Chris, in the late 50's you just couldn't order scores on Amazon. I ordered mine from the Library of Congress, then had 3 months to copy it!"

[stillivor]

Some info about Schaller http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerd_Schaller&ei=aBUPT6jqEM-bOtOxmaID&sa=X&oi=translate&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDwQ7gEwAg&prev=/search%3Fq%3DGerd%2BSchaller%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1T4DSGK_en___GB424%26prmd%3Dimvnso



    Ivor

[Russ Smiley]

My listening buddy dropped me off a rip of this Bruckner set by Gerd Schaller you can find it here: http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphonies-Nos/dp/B005DVGUKA
He has been raving about this set for the past few weeks. He is an intense 65 year old Bruckner maniac!

Last night I listened to the Schaller 7th. It was flat out amazing. I've never heard Bruckner like this.  His ability to tie together the different musical cells is perhaps equaled only by Klemp or Celi. His tempo is on the fast side, it never sounds rushed or hurried. It's similar feeling to how Celi can be VERY broad though it never feels that way. The balances he achieves are very exact; he allows the woodwinds to really speak, especially in the 1st movement. They are never covered by the strings as the strings are never covered by the brass. You can hear everything. To me though, the best part was that this was an incredibly exciting performance. If half the Bruckner I've heard on disc was this exciting I think we'd have a very different mind of him as a composer.


I've yet to hear the 4th or the 9th. My friend said the reconstruction of last movement of the 9th is far and away the best he's heard. I feel inclined to believe him even though I've not heard it. He's the only person I know who's actually copied out the score to B9 by hand! As he would say, "Chris, in the late 50's you just couldn't order scores on Amazon. I ordered mine from the Library of Congress, then had 3 months to copy it!"

I won't add anything pithy other than to say that I've listened to these disks in the car on my commute, and the are a revelation.  They're totally attention grabbing start to finish, but there is nothing eccentric (though the 9th's 3rd takes on a totally different character in this complete edition).  Subtle details are illuminated and balances are 'adjusted' in places that seem absolutely right.

[ChrisH]

I won't add anything pithy other than to say that I've listened to these disks in the car on my commute, and the are a revelation.  They're totally attention grabbing start to finish, but there is nothing eccentric (though the 9th's 3rd takes on a totally different character in this complete edition).  Subtle details are illuminated and balances are 'adjusted' in places that seem absolutely right.

It's quite impressive that they managed all of this while performing in a cathedral. They can be an acoustic nightmare for everyone involved.

[The 3 after 1907]

I do think Bruckner's first 3 symphonies are a bit weak, and if you include 0 and 00, that's 5 symphonies that don't really show how brilliant he was. 

[Prospero]

3 was good enough in its early version for Wagner to accept the dedication by Bruckner. Even with Wagner's ego, I doubt there are any more authoritative judges since then.

Tom in Vermont

[stillivor]

I like the first five very much, and love 3 and especially two.

There have been quite a few experts in Bruckner since Wagner, not least Furtwangler, Jochum x 2, Haitink, Abendroth, Barenboim, Tintner and Rostropovich



    Ivor

[Prospero]

True, many advocates of Bruckner, but none of Wagner's stature unless we admit Mahler.

[tream]

I have never myself been that big of a Bruckner fan, but this year I resolved to become better acquainted with the 5th and 6th. The only Bruckner symphonies I have ever heard live iare the 4th, many years ago under Sanderling in Toronto, and the 9th, equally many years ago in SF under de Waart. I have shared the view that the 8th is the greatest Bruckner symphony, or put another way, my favorite, but I recently purchased the SACD with Blomstedt and the Leipzig Gewandhous on Querstand doing the 6th, and it is starting to come together for me, and I have been listening to my SACD of Harnoncourt doing the 5th in anticipation of hearing Blomstedt conducting the SF Symphony this Friday night in the 5th.  I have heard that the Klemperer recordings of these two, especially the 6th, are special so I plan to seek those out (on EMI LPs if possible, which makes it tough when you live in the US!).

Tom

[barry guerrero]

Tom,

Both the Klemperer B5 and B6 are just as good as people say. But there was also a 'pirate' out there of a 'live' B5 that Klemp. did with the Vienna Phil., performed somewhere around the same time (I think). That one is equally good, if not better. Enjoy the 5th with Blomstedt.

[Clov]

Bruckner isn't sliding into obscurity, at least no more so than classical itself. When I observe those keeping keeping classical alive, I can't help but wonder if the masters rather be dead, and dead in all aspects.

[John Kim]

"What do you think of the SFS's sound since MTT took over?"

I think it's a good sound for French, American and 'modern' music. But by-and-large, I think they're also a bit too bright and 'slick' sounding for most Austro-German music. Mahler included.

Barry,

I totally agree.

They sound too 'Hollywood' when it comes to Mahler and Shostakovich to name a few.

John,

[waderice]

Remembering that Herbert Blomstedt preceded Michael Tilson Thomas as MD of the SFO, and linking Bruckner, Wagner, Richard Strauss, and Mahler together as entities feeding off each other as the great names of the late 19th-early 20th century orchestral music oveure, Blomstedt got a positive review in the Washington Post on the Beethoven 4th/Strauss Ein Heldenleben concert he gave with the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, DC, as a no-nonsense, music-first conductor.  Read the review here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/conductor-herbert-blomstedt-lets-the-music-speak-for-itself/2012/02/16/gIQAHw07IR_story.html

It seems that the vast majority of the concert-going public today cannot fathom a musician who places the music before himself, but must place the individual before the music.  That is the main point Ms. Midgette (the critic) is trying to make, and it's too bad that there will not be enough of the classical music concert-going public to read this review and learn something important to get to the next level.

Wade

[barry guerrero]

All I can tell is that I enjoyed both the De Waart and Blomstedt eras in S.F. far more than I am the current MTT one - except when MTT is conducting things like Ives 4th, Verese's "Ameriques", Debussy's "Martrydom of St. Sebastien", etc.