Our Summer BAL 13: Brahms Symphony No 3

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

So, Ferney, I will have to add that to my wish list then!!

The Abbado/Brendel Concertos? 'Fraid so!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

But then last night I had another listen to Furtwangler (EMI 1949): gosh! The first movement climaxes incendiary, all sorts of dark corners and anguish...The second movement played as a searching slow movement, the horn/cello affirmative theme in the finale pushed to feel almost frantic, the ending, less quietly celebratory, as it can be, more resigned and exhausted...Surely a great performance, but as RO says, no one performance can reveal all this work has to offer.

[BBMmk2]

The Abbado/Brendel Concertos? 'Fraid so!

Well now you said the concerti by Abbado, I might as well add the symphonies as well!!

[verismissimo]

SCO/Mackerras Brahms 3 is absolutely wonderful. It arrived yesterday and I keep playing it.

Thanks to all who proposed.

[Barbirollians]

The Abbado is marvellous - strangely recently it was cheaper to buy all four original issues on Amazon than the boxed set.

[Barbirollians]

I agree with silvestrione on that Furtwangler recording but I do have a very soft spot for the DG issue . The first time I played it had to stop it and play the opening bars a number of times the sweep of them still thrill me .

[makropulos]

SCO/Mackerras Brahms 3 is absolutely wonderful. It arrived yesterday and I keep playing it.

Thanks to all who proposed.

So glad you like it, verismissimo - it's one of my all-time favourites too.

Among others, most of these have probably been mentioned already, but in their different ways they are all performances that I cherish:

Walter/VPO, 1936
Walter/NYPO
Jochum/BPO (DG 1950s - not sure this has been mentioned?)
Boult/BBCSO (ICA Classics - flawed by some dicey playing but a really stirring performance)
Manze
Cantelli
Klemperer/Philharmonia
Bashmet (ICA Classics)
Mackerras/SCO live at Edinburgh in 2003 (broadcast)

[silvestrione]

The Abbado is marvellous - strangely recently it was cheaper to buy all four original issues on Amazon than the boxed set.

Curious...I ordered this after the enthusiasm here, and from Richard Osborne in his Gramophone article. But I don't like it! Isn't the opening rather leaden footed? And the first movement is marked Allegro con brio, for goodness sake, not Allegro moderato.

I also acquired Cantelli, lovely, and Walter/NYP, whole set very good, intensely musical, if occasionally under-interpreted for my taste.

[Barbirollians]

Sorry I love the Abbado - it is all of a piece and beautifully out together to my ear. I do find Furtwangler more exciting , the Barbirolli gorgeous , the Boult wonderfully structured and the Walter a delight . Abbado is my favourite modern recording though.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Rank-and-File's link to Klemperer's B minor Mass led me to this film of OK rehearsing Brahms' Third with the New Philharmonia. Preparing for what would be his last concert, Klemperer is struggling to communicate following recent strokes (and the sound and visual quality leaves much to the imagination), but it's still an insight to the creation of a great performance :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4AnX4HiEaM&feature=related

... first 20 mins, OK rehearses Brahms, then the Beethoven 4th Pno Conc (with Daniel Adni) then (at 30mins-ish) the performance of the 1st Movement of the Brahms.

[umslopogaas]

I dont particularly like Brahms - too heavy, Germanic, even rather sludgy in the orchestral output, though wonderful in the chamber music - but if you collect 'classical' music on vinyl, as I do, you cant avoid him. Without even warming to his third symphony, I have 13 versions on LP and one on CD:

CD: Mravinsky and the Leningrad PO, 1972

and on LP in no particular order,

Kempe and the BPO, 1961
Monteux and the VPO, 1961
Ansermet and the OSR, 1963
Keilberth and the Bamberg SO, 1965
Reiner and the Chicago SO, 1958
Walter and the Columbia SO, 1960
Barbirolli and the VPO, 1968
Klemperer and the Philharmonia, undated, prob. early 1960s
Kertesz and the VPO, Decca 1974
Giulini and the Philharmonia, Columbia 1964
Leinsdorf and the Boston SO, RCA Victor 1967
Szell and the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam, undated, mono
Bohm and the VPO, 1953, mono

I wouldnt want to pick a best of the pack, but I do recall Monteux and the VPO as particularly confident.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Klemperer and the Philharmonia, undated, prob. early 1960s

Recorded 26 - 27th March 1957.

By the way, umsloppy; how many discs do you have of a work that you really like!?

[jayne lee wilson]

I dont particularly like Brahms - too heavy, Germanic, even rather sludgy in the orchestral output, though wonderful in the chamber music - but if you collect 'classical' music on vinyl, as I do, you cant avoid him. Without even warming to his third symphony, I have 13 versions on LP and one on CD:

CD: Mravinsky and the Leningrad PO, 1972

and on LP in no particular order,

Kempe and the BPO, 1961
Monteux and the VPO, 1961
Ansermet and the OSR, 1963
Keilberth and the Bamberg SO, 1965
Reiner and the Chicago SO, 1958
Walter and the Columbia SO, 1960
Barbirolli and the VPO, 1968
Klemperer and the Philharmonia, undated, prob. early 1960s
Kertesz and the VPO, Decca 1974
Giulini and the Philharmonia, Columbia 1964
Leinsdorf and the Boston SO, RCA Victor 1967
Szell and the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam, undated, mono
Bohm and the VPO, 1953, mono

I wouldnt want to pick a best of the pack, but I do recall Monteux and the VPO as particularly confident.

Isn't "heavy and germanic" just a tired old cliche? A former next-door neighbour, scarcely the most sophisticated of listeners, used to describe Brahms that way, and Mahler as 'the same only worse"...

You may seek a sludge-detox via Mackerras and the SCO, Berglund and the COE, or Dorati with the LSO on Mercury.
But are Klemperer, or Reiner, in Brahms, "sludgy"...!? Which means...?

And what, exactly, does "Germanic" mean, anyway? In your context it seems to imply a judgement.
Does it apply to Mozart, or Beethoven? Or the Austrian Bruckner?

[umslopogaas]

"Sludgy and Germanic" is a cliche, but that doesnt mean it isnt true.

"Sludgy" to me means a lot of instruments playing at once, the effect being that individual strands are hard to pick out. Mahler generally is not sludgy, though he is capable of making plenty of noise. Its the sound written by the composer I was referring to, rather than the conducting style: no, I dont think Klemperer or Reiner are more "sludgy" than Dorati, though you might argue that Klemperer is ponderous. On the other hand, you might argue that by being slow, he allows more detail to show through.

"Germanic" is harder to define, but surely there is a recognisable national sound. "French" music uses the same instruments as "German" or "Italian" music, but it doesnt sound the same. And surely "German" opera sounds distinctly different from "Italian" opera? Its not just the language, I think; or perhaps the phonetics influence the musical style (I'm dangerously out of my depth here, someone else please take over).

And as for how many recordings do I have of items I like, the answer is usually less than thirteen! There are composers I like and those I like less, but I have tended to collect recordings over the years, rather than composers. And one cant deny that Brahms is a popular composer and there are an awful lot of recordings of his works. Whereas, for example, Frank Martin, a composer I like a lot, is not nearly so favoured.

[vinteuil]

"Sludgy and Germanic" is a cliché, but that doesnt mean it isn't true.



.

... I agree. The point about clichés is that - by and large - they contain at least a germ of truth.

Umslopogaas - I completely understood what you meant.

I shared all the usual prejudices about Brahms - sludgy, brown, etc. I found my way in progressively - thro' the piano works, the chamber music.

The first time I "got" orchestral Brahms was thro' the marvellous performances of the symphonies with Roger Norrington and the London Classical Players on EMI. There, you could 'hear' the individual lines - especially the inner parts - and it wasn't all lost in a sprawl of approximate sound.

I now really enjoy most of Brahms...