Zinman M7

[John Kim]

Barry,

Thanks for the report.

So, overall would you rank this one as high as Zinman's M6th you (and I) raved so much?

How is the sound quality?

John,

[barry guerrero]

The sound quality seems consistent with the rest of the Zinman series. I don't have any problem with it. I'm not sure that I'd rank this quite as high as the 6th, but I do like it very much. For me, Barenboim and others have done a better job of stepping on the gas in some of the faster variations located in the back one-half of the finale. I call them "variations" because, to me, the finale doesn't seem to behave as a strict Rondo from start to finish. It becomes somewhat fantasy like in the last nine minutes or so. Zinman tends to unify tempi in the finale perhaps a bit more than I personally like. But as someone has already pointed out in this thread, Zinman does bring out the deep bells and cowbells sufficiently near the end. The ending is quite strong. I've got to run now.

[barry guerrero]

I've been listening to this Zinman M7 a bit more, and I really like it a lot. I think these Zinman recordings can grown on one, as you listen to them more frequently. The rhetoric is toned down a bit, but the musicality of the performances just carry the day. If Zinman had just gone a bit more nutzoid in the back half of the finale, I would put this one at the top of my list. Maybe I still will anyway. He's rather like Haitink in the finale; meaning that he tries to unify some of the tempi through all the little variations, sub-sections, and twist-and-turns located in the last 9 minutes of the finale. But once he gets to the end, there's plenty of peeling bells to suit anyone's taste. 

This is why I think of the Zinman cycle as being sort of the modern equivalent of Kubelik's.

[groucho8]

zinman's mahler is thorough perhaps too thoro u gh. i believe christov  aschenbach is the one to listen to lately  ;his drive is unforgetable.

[barry guerrero]

I like Eschenbach too. But he does have tendency to make performances very expansive (long i.e. slow).