Re: Barenboim Mahler 7


Michael Schaffer wrote:
jrsnfld@xxxxxxx wrote:
Michael Schaffer wrote:
Vaneyes wrote:
Michael Schaffer wrote:
Below, a review from Classical Source. I note the Hodgson review page
mentions the Philharmonie as being the venue, as Hurwitz did in his
review.

Which is it? Philharmonie or Lucerne Festival? CD Universe and Arkiv
Music say Lucerne.

Funny too, at Warner Classics Website there's a link to a favorable The
Independent/Rob Cowan review. Only trouble is, Rob's review heading
lists the recording's with the Berlin Philharmonic.

Geez, what confusion! heh heh

Confusion aside, I'll probably bite...when I see the CD
attractively-priced as a previously-enjoyed.

http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_cd_review.php?id=3331

Regards

The recording was made live in the Philharmonie on 2/26 and 2/27, 2005.
I don't understand the reservations classicalsoource has about the
sound. It makes it sound as if there is a lot of spotmiking going on,
but in fact that spotmiking is for the most part very nicely placed
within the larger sound stage. There is no instruments leaping out at
you or suddenly coming to the foreground.
Let me also say that the recording overall is a good representation of
what it actually sounds like when you sit in row 15 or so with the
orchestra laid out in front of you, and it also captures the sound of
the actual orchestra on mic quite nicely. I don't understand how the
other reviewer could have confused it with the BP since there is quite
an audible difference between them and the Staatskapelle Berlin. The
latter sounds a lot more like the Staatskapelle Dresden than the BP,
which is easily explained because they were in the Eastern part of the
country too before the wall fell. The difference to the Western
colleagues isn't *that* great, but noticeable, especially in the string
sound which is a little less creamy, but has a firmer core which helps
clatify the textures here a lot, and the brass sound is a little more
open and mellow than the BP, but with raspier low brass.

Thanks for the venue clarification.

Re spot-miking, thought I read another review that took issue with
distant-sounding brass. Hodgson mentioned distant-sounding cowbells,
which I'd say is fairly normal, so I don't see much issue with that.

Maybe distant as opposed to zoomed into the foreground. But the brass
is very much there, behind the strings and woodwind, but you have no
problems at all hearing it. I think some people are spoilt so much by
that CSO/Solti stuff that they think an orchestra is basically a brass
band with a little strings and woodwind on the side.

The Solti recording is outstanding in many ways, but thoroughly dated
in terms of sonics and not particularly truthful in terms of the
impression of Solti's way with the music or the orchestra's sonic
spectrum.

That is not to say, however, that there isn't excellent clarity
(relatively fine for 1970) that allows one to hear all of the sections
of the orchestra. Furthermore, the alternating comfort and discomfort
with which Solti pulls the listener about, much in accordance with the
spirit of the music and the letter of the score, shows him to be an
excellent guide to the dark and light of the piece. He has mastered
it--whether by athletic conditioning and rhythmic insistence or simply
by giving a few good cues to a peerless orchestra, I really can't say.
It doesn't matter. It works for me and I have never had trouble with
the pacing or the flow.

The prominence of the brass is obvious, but it is not an unpleasant or
inappropriate balance

for Sousa. For Mahler, that sound is not very good.

Maybe better for Mahler than for Sousa. Sousa sounds better with a
band. With an orchestra, the whole sonority needs to be adjusted away
from the brass to make any sense of the silliness of the arrangement.


given (a) the section itself, which has that
unforced brilliance at all volume levels--this approach would be
intolerable with a number of orchestras I can think of whose sound
spreads or wobbles at loud or soft volumes and (b) the fierceness of
aspects of the interpretation (Solti really lays into some of the
"bumps" and accents along the road in the first three movements, as if
that's his favorite leitmotiv). Like his Ring, this music is literally
hurled at the face of the listener sometimes, and any listener up to
the challenge is in for a treat. I see much room for Mahler 7s that are
unflinching as this--this is not a performance for the shy. Revel in it
and you get the point and a huge thrill as well as some deeply poignant
moments along the way.

Of course, Solti has some brilliantly sensitive soloists in the mix,
too, and therefore we hear exquisite contrasts, not some kind of
all-out attack of brass. This is very musical playing. Mahler 7 has so
much tremendously intricate counterpoint that no recording with poor
balance is going to work. To Solti and his Decca engineer's credit,
this recording has as much or more dramatic flow as most recordings
that keep the brass more in check. The counterpoint is there and it has
appropriate energy, which is an indication that the balance is viable,
if not to everyone's taste.

By and large, the orchestra has heft all the way around, especially of
course the lower strings, and penetrating woodwind, but the brassiness
makes this recording an intense experience I wouldn't want any serious
Mahlerian to miss. It deserves real contemplation and it's a good show.

However, turn to an extent recording of how the orchestra sounded, in
concert, in this piece, in a better hall somewhere on 57th Street in
New York City in 1970, and you get a different picture. The brass are
still gloriously uninhibited in playing their markings, but the bloom
on the string section is back to more realistic perspective, and the
winds are less cutting but full and sweet. More importantly, Solti's
handling of the "rubato" of the work is simply outstanding--as good as
he is at most of the gear shifts in the Decca recording, in concert he
is balletic and sweet. Everything that sounds good now sounds
jaw-droppingly warm, clear, and *sensitive*--including the brass and
timpani. One wonders what Decca really did to dry out the sound, but
they didn't give us any extra clarity, just less of what made the
orchestra great.

Anyone who heard the CSO live under Solti remembers that smooth, clean,
but paradoxically dark string sound. It had both fullthroated, resonant
bloom and impeccably tuned focus

I did. The strings were very well together and the sound was very
clear, but there was no "fullthroated, resonant bloom". It was a fairly
thin and wriy sound.

You'll find this surprising, of course, but warm and fuzzy though they
can be, one of the "thinner" sounding orchestras I've heard was Berlin
Phil, under Abbado. I remember hearing them in Mahler at the Kennedy
Center and wondering where the heck the strings had gone. I could see
them sawing away but all that "gossamer beauty" had no substance or
bloom or depth or cleanliness. By contrast, Chicago had exactly what
was missing. It's a different sound concept, but if you don't get it,
you don't get it. I suspect you were trained to listen for something
else. That's all I can imagine that would explain what you hear versus
what I hear.


---at all dynamics, which under Solti
in particular, meant they could be supple and intimate like a string
quartet and yet blazing with penetrative intensity. That, not the brass
sound, was the real hallmark of Solti (he could get a semblance of this
effect with other orchestras, too, actually),

true, because the brass didn't sound anywhere as "legendary" live as
one the doctored Decca recordings. They actually sounded much better,
very clean and professional, but nothing lots of other orchestras can't
provide as well, often with more inner glow and richer sound quality.
But none of the brass sections didn't really have a very characteristic
colors. No real trumpets, horns, trombones, more like greyscales of the
same basic color.

To my ears the characteristics are all too obvious, all to basic and
"real" to how brass ought to sound. I can't imagine why you couldn't
hear that, but I know from your other posts that you have certain ideas
about what constitutes "glow" and "richness". These are not invalid
attributes, and we all hear them in our favorite orchestras, but there
are just so many of us who have heard, live, all that "legendary" glory
in intonation, balance, blend, glow, weight, effortlessness, clarity,
control, sensitivity, power, and top-to-bottom match in hue, at all
volume levels, in Chicago, that I really can't take your assessment of
this brass section very seriously. You write perceptively about many
matters, but this isn't one of them. I like many other brass sections
from around the world, but "better" is not a word I would use with any
of them--not compared to Chicago. Interesting, wonderful, yes...Better?
No.

The only constructive thing I can say about it is that you seem to have
a peculiar bias against "clean"--you seem to have no love for it,
either in string playing or in brass playing. You associate it with
colorlessness or neutrality. I think this is as much a key to your
distaste for Reiner as for the CSO's sound. Tone (and overtone!) is
critical to conveying an emotional message, so I can see how this is
disturbing to you at a very basic level, but I assure you I hear all
the richness and glow, plus the cleanliness, in those sounds.



and that's what's
compromised in the early Decca efforts in Chicago. You hear evidence of
it, but it's only half the sound-picture. The brass are of course
exciting, but one's ear tires of such splendor (or starts to take it
for granted) without the commensurate dazzle that Solti encouraged
elsewhere in the orchestra.

The concert recording remains, for me, a far superior document and
easily one of my favorite Mahler 7s--for the sensitive, intelligent
mastery of the conductor, the brilliantly manic and musical
sensibility, and the stupendous virtuosity from every section.

--Jeff

Ugoddabekiddin. That whole recording is a hack and blare fest. You may
have overlooked that there is also a CSO recording with Abbado which is
on a much higher level in every single respect. If you want to write
one of those CSO hagiographies that seem so important for the American
psyche, take this recording and preach about it. Or Giulini's Mahler
9th with the CSO. Not Solti's bulldozer jobs. Those are just nasty.
Strange. You write so many perceptive posts, but what happened here?

I listened (you may note I was actually raving about the live concert,
not the Decca rendition) and reported what I heard. My tastes are quite
different than yours in this respect, though I certainly like dozens of
other Mahler 7s.

This isn't any more of a hagiography than I might write of my favorite
Cleveland, Philadelphia, Boston, Amsterdam, or Berlin recordings, or
Maderna, Mitropoulos, Molinari-Pradelli, De Sabata, Rosbaud or any
other of my favorites. I just happen to hear something great in Chicago
too. You don't, that's all. I can preach all day when I detect
something outstanding, and especially when I detect a lack of
appreciation among others.

I heard Abbado do M7 with the CSO in New York, and naturally I taped a
live broadcast from Chicago, and listened to it many times, before
buying his first DG recording. I know you like the DG, but it isn't a
patch on what the broadcast showed. Just like this Solti example, the
broadcast showed so much suppleness that I don't get from the
recording. The performance I heard in person fell short of both on
several counts, unfortunately, but I have my theories about that. In my
opinion, Abbado/CSO had a good M7 in them and didn't quite get it in
the "can." I imagine his BPO recording is an improvement and I'm
surprised you haven't bought it.

The Giulini M9 is a marvelous performance--certainly a favorite on many
counts--and yet it is actually a bulldozer job in a critical respect to
the way Giulini handles the tempi in the first movement. Solti is no
bulldozer like that. He may have his flaws, but he did not ignore the
acceleration the way Giulini did. Despite this, I love the way the CSO,
or most any orchestra, played for Giulini...the recording is great but
flawed. I won't bore you with my impressions of Solti's Mahler 9, which
I did hear live.

Had you been sitting there next to me at Bernstein's Shostakovich 7 or
Solti's Schubert 5 or his "Fetes" or Lutoslawski and said what you did
about how professional and tonally gray and uninteresting you found the
CSO strings or brass, I most definitely would have shaken my head in
pity. No offense, but you would have seemed deaf! :-)

--Jeff

.

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