BaL 19.03.11 Mahler Symphony no. 10

[Bryn]

It's one of my favourite M10s.

Well performed, yes, but the feeble orchestration, even as touched up by Olson.

[teamsaint]

Coincidently, I'm listening to M10 Sanderling (as recommended by JLW).

You could try the Naxos

I am the proud owner of a copy of the Naxos disc.

I thought the M 10 was in Essex.

[richardfinegold]

My local Library has the CD sets issued by the CSO of live performances through the years. I borrowed a disc featuring a Concert performance of the Mahler 10th led by Jean Martinon. There are no notes, as this was a large box set broken into it's constituent parts, but I am assuming that this was made during Martinon's brief tenure as MD between Reiner and Solti.
The sound is listenable but not top notch. I had listened to the Ormandy/PO 10th yesterday which has been reissued as a 20 bit remaster and the difference is striking. The ear adjusts however.
It is an odd performance. The disc does list the completion as Cooke but listening to it so soon after the Ormandy (which itself does not sound different from the Inbal or Rattle recordings that I have. also of Cooke) I was struck by many apparent differences in Orchestration. Curiously, the biggest changes are in the opening Adagio, which at one point in the middle features very prominet percussion playing. I can't blame a Conductor for wanting to add their own touches to Mahler/10, which due to it's incomplete torso form, would invite such applications. However, why do this to the one movement which GM suppossedly
completed in full?
Martinon has always seemed to me a Conductor that espouses traditional Gaullic virtues of clarity, lightness of impact, and wit. I don't think that these qualities necessaritly translate to Mahler if those are the only elements that are emphasized. Boulez manages to inject these qualities to enhance, but not replace, the more Austro-German flavor of the music. In the more dance oriented middle movements, Martinon downplays the grotesqueries of the mutated Viennese waltzes, and the hints of Eastern European folk music that surface in other recordings go for naught here.
The big whacks in V are very loud --especially in contrast to Ormandy, who curiously downplays them--but lacking in interest; they just sort of hang there divorced from the rest of the movement. The lack of tuning in the percussion doesn't help. The movement never seems to build to any kind of climax and just seems to end without any kind of catharsis
I don't know if Martinon recorded any more Mahler, but I am not in a hurry to investigate.
I am going to listen to some more of the Martinon recordings in this set. I have a disc of Ravel and another of Nielsen from his tenure that are superb, but I wonder if those were outliers. The legend here is that he was run out of town by a critic (Claudia 'Acidy' Cassidy) and a recalcitrant player (Oboist Ray Still), but based on this he may have just been a very bad fit for the Orchestra that Fritz Reiner built.
.

[Roehre]

My local Library has the CD sets issued by the CSO of live performances through the years. I borrowed a disc featuring a Concert performance of the Mahler 10th led by Jean Martinon. There are no notes, as this was a large box set broken into it's constituent parts, but I am assuming that this was made during Martinon's brief tenure as MD between Reiner and Solti..... .

Are you sure it's the CSO which Martinon conducts in this set?
Martinon conducted Mahler 10 in The Hague in the summer 0f 1975, the Dutch premiere of the Cook/Matthews 1974 version (which was already recorded by Morris/New Philharmonia on Philips by then), and the (live-)recording of this concert was issued on a 3LP set filling 3 sides of the LPs, with the other 3 sides filled with Liszt's Faust-symphony. This set was the In Memoriam Jean martinon-set released by the The Hague Philharmonic/Residentieorkest, of which orchestra Martinon was principal conductor at the time of his death.

The differences you describe are consistent with the best part of the amendments Cook and the Mathhews brothers made to the 1964 edition of Mahler 10, which was recorded by Ormandy (my first Mahler 10 too, btw).

[Bryn]

Are you sure it's the CSO which Martinon conducts in this set?
Martinon conducted Mahler 10 in The Hague in the summer 0f 1975, the Dutch premiere of the Cook/Matthews 1974 version (which was already recorded by Morris/New Philharmonia on Philips by then), and the (live-)recording of this concert was issued on a 3LP set filling 3 sides of the LPs, with the other 3 sides filled with Liszt's Faust-symphony. This set was the In Memoriam Jean martinon-set released by the The Hague Philharmonic/Residentieorkest, of which orchestra Martinon was principal conductor at the time of his death.

The differences you describe are consistent with the best part of the amendments Cook and the Mathhews brothers made to the 1964 edition of Mahler 10, which was recorded by Ormandy (my first Mahler 10 too, btw).

It is certainly the CSO which Martinon conducted in the CBC radio recording (as rebroadcast on BBC Radio 3 on CD Master IIRC) I have.

[Roehre]

It is certainly the CSO which Martinon conducted in the CBC radio recording (as rebroadcast on BBC Radio 3 on CD Master IIRC) I have.

Then he recorded Mahler 10 twice.
IIRC there exists a recording of his Mahler 8 given in The Hague a week later as well

[richardfinegold]

Are you sure it's the CSO which Martinon conducts in this set?
Martinon conducted Mahler 10 in The Hague in the summer 0f 1975, the Dutch premiere of the Cook/Matthews 1974 version (which was already recorded by Morris/New Philharmonia on Philips by then), and the (live-)recording of this concert was issued on a 3LP set filling 3 sides of the LPs, with the other 3 sides filled with Liszt's Faust-symphony. This set was the In Memoriam Jean martinon-set released by the The Hague Philharmonic/Residentieorkest, of which orchestra Martinon was principal conductor at the time of his death.

The differences you describe are consistent with the best part of the amendments Cook and the Mathhews brothers made to the 1964 edition of Mahler 10, which was recorded by Ormandy (my first Mahler 10 too, btw).

The disc clearly comes from the CSO series of Concert releases. Judging by the rather dim sounding recording, I am guessing that it came from Martinon's early 1960s tenure, but it possibly could be from a later date if JM returned as a Guest. I seriously doubt that ever happened, given the enmity between him and the powerful Still.
Did Cook et. al make amendments to the opening Adagio?

[Beef Oven!]

Well performed, yes, but the feeble orchestration, even as touched up by Olson.

I disagree. Perhaps your feeble is my lean?

Glad we agree that it's a good performance though.