PROM 63. BRUCKNER 7. RSNO/OUNDJIAN.
Taking just a shade over 60 minutes, this was a notably individualistic reading, a Bruckner 7 striking for its flowing, smoothly-integrated tempi, light transparent textures and a sense of the dance in its rhythmic lift against a consistent underlying pulse. The climactic passages were never heavy or solemn and certainly not Wagnerian! This was a Bruckner performance placed in an organic, Schubertian genealogy.
I liked the way Oundjian allowed the little wind figures (always, with Bruckner, thematically relevant) to sing out individually, sounding apart from the broader thematic current, as the Allegro moderato progressed (principal flute deserves the Silver Nightingale Award); notable too in the Scherzo's birdcalls, with a nice sense of the pastoral. Perhaps the rhythms were just a little flat here, we could have done with more schwung - but Oundjian's lightness and restraint, carefully contrasted with the triumph and lamentation of the adagio, really made you listen.
In the adagio itself, the quasi-climaxes earlier in the movement were kept light and clear, and the layered transparency allowed the arpeggiated build-up to the climax (so often lost by conductors too keen on mere decibels of sonority...) to remain coherently audible against the 1st theme's reprise. The climax might not have been overwhelming enough for some (the inclusion of the cymbals offering some compensation, or at least, sensation) but Oundjian made sure it was the focal point. The violins deserve special praise too - so busy in this work, with deft rhythmic accompaniments and sweetly sung leading melodic lines.
Oundjian may have seemed to be understating his own case in the finale's opening paragraphs; but no - with an eagle's eye on Bruckner's dazzling, shapeshifting tonal landscape, he graded dynamics and tempi carefully, excitement and urgency intensifying each time those galumphing brasses returned with another metamorphosis of the Schubertian dance with which the movement begins. As with the coda to the 1st movement, Oundjian's final pages glowed rather than blazed, which for me is truer to the Brucknerian Seventh Spirit - or at least, the way I prefer to hear it now.
This wasn't a technically flawless execution, but the reading is a fascinating one. I'd love to hear them do it again, perhaps with a touch more polish, another nudge or two of Viennese lilt and swing.
Taking just a shade over 60 minutes, this was a notably individualistic reading, a Bruckner 7 striking for its flowing, smoothly-integrated tempi, light transparent textures and a sense of the dance in its rhythmic lift against a consistent underlying pulse. The climactic passages were never heavy or solemn and certainly not Wagnerian! This was a Bruckner performance placed in an organic, Schubertian genealogy.
I liked the way Oundjian allowed the little wind figures (always, with Bruckner, thematically relevant) to sing out individually, sounding apart from the broader thematic current, as the Allegro moderato progressed (principal flute deserves the Silver Nightingale Award); notable too in the Scherzo's birdcalls, with a nice sense of the pastoral. Perhaps the rhythms were just a little flat here, we could have done with more schwung - but Oundjian's lightness and restraint, carefully contrasted with the triumph and lamentation of the adagio, really made you listen.
In the adagio itself, the quasi-climaxes earlier in the movement were kept light and clear, and the layered transparency allowed the arpeggiated build-up to the climax (so often lost by conductors too keen on mere decibels of sonority...) to remain coherently audible against the 1st theme's reprise. The climax might not have been overwhelming enough for some (the inclusion of the cymbals offering some compensation, or at least, sensation) but Oundjian made sure it was the focal point. The violins deserve special praise too - so busy in this work, with deft rhythmic accompaniments and sweetly sung leading melodic lines.
Oundjian may have seemed to be understating his own case in the finale's opening paragraphs; but no - with an eagle's eye on Bruckner's dazzling, shapeshifting tonal landscape, he graded dynamics and tempi carefully, excitement and urgency intensifying each time those galumphing brasses returned with another metamorphosis of the Schubertian dance with which the movement begins. As with the coda to the 1st movement, Oundjian's final pages glowed rather than blazed, which for me is truer to the Brucknerian Seventh Spirit - or at least, the way I prefer to hear it now.
This wasn't a technically flawless execution, but the reading is a fascinating one. I'd love to hear them do it again, perhaps with a touch more polish, another nudge or two of Viennese lilt and swing.
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