Shostakovich 4,5 & 6 Oslo PO/Makela

[Pulcinella]

Tell me (in your opinion)his pertinent points please

The dynamics marked in the score that (for whatever reason) didn't come through in the recording.
Elsewhere (in the DH thread?) you appeared to ridicule the fact that he referred to the score, iirc, but his points seem valid to me.
Something marked sfff should be audible, I'd have thought.

[ucanseetheend]

I will tell you how DH is someone to be ridiculed, A few years ago he "reviewed" recordings of Vaughan Williams Symphony cycle and RVW 5th. On both occasions he rubbished Bernard Haitink's EMI LPO cycle and in particular the 5th which was deemed 'too slow tempo '.However later in his (fantasy) review of the 5th he chose a recording by another orchestra for his top 3 and said 'actually I have nothing against slow'. It just highlighted how he used the RVW tirade of BS to dig at Haitink.Since that review actually I have never looked/ listened to his BS until the Makela /DSCH came out. After hearing the recordings myself and then seen his review it confirmed that the guy is full of himself and his prejudices on Classical music.

[richardfinegold]

The Guardian gave this set a rave

[oliver sudden]

Annoyed by DH’s schoolboy name-calling I listened to my favourite bite-sized movement from the release, the middle movement of 6, just to get an idea how deficient the Oslo Phil woodwinds’ sfffs were. Alas he does have a point there although I would hardly damn the recording solely on that basis (those accents are very badly written and this is far from the only recording where they don’t register).

Thing is, though, I sort of expected a clinical, technically proficient, uninvolving reading. What I heard was a sloppy, badly balanced, uninvolving reading with wobbly tempo. If the other movements are this bad (and I will certainly check them when I get a moment) then it’s all looking a bit dire.

[richardfinegold]

Annoyed by DH’s schoolboy name-calling I listened to my favourite bite-sized movement from the release, the middle movement of 6, just to get an idea how deficient the Oslo Phil woodwinds’ sfffs were. Alas he does have a point there although I would hardly damn the recording solely on that basis (those accents are very badly written and this is far from the only recording where they don’t register).

Thing is, though, I sort of expected a clinical, technically proficient, uninvolving reading. What I heard was a sloppy, badly balanced, uninvolving reading with wobbly tempo. If the other movements are this bad (and I will certainly check them when I get a moment) then it’s all looking a bit dire.

Well it’s interesting how everyone hears differently. I couldn’t disagree more with your comments re: performance
The orchestra is a tick below the heaviest hitters in the virtuosity department but if I lived in Oslo and had to hear them as my regular band it would not be a hardship

[ucanseetheend]

Well it’s interesting how everyone hears differently. I couldn’t disagree more with your comments re: performance
The orchestra is a tick below the heaviest hitters in the virtuosity department but if I lived in Oslo and had to hear them as my regular band it would not be a hardship

Perfectly put and not 'wobbly' as in previous rant by Mr Sudden

[Pulcinella]

Perfectly put and not 'wobbly' as in previous rant by Mr Sudden

Please be considerate in the language used in comments on other forum members: Oliver gave what I felt was a considered reaction to the movement he listened to, which is in no way a rant.

What I found more interesting were the comments underneath the DH clip. While it's sad that some people are put off even investigating for themselves (saying, thanks for saving me money), there were many other thoughtful (and critical) comments, equally not rants.

I'm certainly no fan of KM's interpretations, for example not taking to his recent live Proms Petrushka any more than to his recording, but maybe he's trying to bring a gentler, less spiky/aggressive approach to DSCH's music than we are used to. Time will tell if his approach holds water.

[oliver sudden]

I'm certainly no fan of KM's interpretations, for example not taking to his recent live Proms Petrushka any more than to his recording, but maybe he's trying to bring a gentler, less spiky/aggressive approach to DSCH's music than we are used to. Time will tell if his approach holds water.

I see nothing wrong with that sort of thing in principle—some of Haitink's recordings along those lines have aged very well indeed. The first movement of Mäkelä's 6 certainly fits that description and pleased me much more than the Allegro. The Oslo orchestra's timbres (or at least the ones Mäkelä gets from them) are all very rounded, especially in the woodwind solos. Hardly any reediness in the cor anglais solo, the long flute solos were also warm and wistfully elegant rather than bleak and, well, cold. That unfortunately did deprive the one-note horn solo of the relief it can have... along with the fact that the horn itself also got a bit lost in the texture. I'm more used to hearing that solo as a consoling ray of warmth and when the flutes have already sounded like fireside musings that's not how it's going to come over! Of course it doesn't have to be that way but in the traditional way of things that's a clear turning point in a long movement that doesn't have many of them.

I still hear the tempo as a bit unsteady at lots of moments in the second movement. Around 0:30 there are a few players who would clearly prefer to go a bit faster. Around the 1 1/2-minute mark there's a treacherous spot where the high woodwinds have every semiquaver in the bar except the first, which is of course very hard to get together with the rest of the band and alas they don't. At 2:16 there's a big jump in tempo which didn't really do anything for me and while the woodwind sfff moments aren't the deal-breaker for me that they were for a certain online personality, he certainly has a point re their absence. The flute and bass clarinet are neither completely together nor balanced in their duo. The first bar of the timpani solo at 3:40 is basically lost in the preceding chord. Some of the demisemiquaver runs in the woodwinds are a bit smudged. Basically I reckon the movement could have done with a bit more rehearsal and/or recording time.

The thing is... this (which I have just found more or less at random) isn't necessarily any more precise than this (it's also a concert of course) but it has players who are taking the music somewhere special and a conductor who is channeling their energies to make something amazing and at the same time keeping a firm hand on the tiller. It's another league of musical experience as far as I'm concerned and Mäkelä is all a bit anonymous by comparison.

Rant over! Until I listen to the 5 or the 4.

[Pulcinella]

Not reviewed in October's Gramophone, which has just arrived.

[ucanseetheend]

Not reviewed in October's Gramophone, which has just arrived.

Really poor quality by supposed No1 classical music magazine

[Petrushka]

Really poor quality by supposed No1 classical music magazine

According to Hurwitz it was reviewed by Guy Rickards in the September issue but I can't find it in the magazine at all. I wonder if it was pulled following Hurwitz's rant?

Or I might have got it mixed up with another Hurwitz rant.

[ucanseetheend]

According to Hurwitz it was reviewed by Guy Rickards in the September issue but I can't find it in the magazine at all. I wonder if it was pulled following Hurwitz's rant?

Or I might have got it mixed up with another Hurwitz rant.

No, it wasn't in September.I have messaged Gramophone and editor Cullingford via a well known Elon Musk application, as yet no reply.