Anton Bruckner - Symphony No. 6 (Otto Klemperer)

Information

Composer: Anton Bruckner; Christoph Willibald Gluck; Engelbert Humperdinck

1. Gluck - Overture "Iphigénie en Aulide" (arr. R. Wagner)
2. Humperdinck - Overture "Hänsel und Gretel"
3. Bruckner - Symphony No. 6 in A major (1881, ed. Haas): I. Majestoso
4. Bruckner - Symphony No. 6 in A major (1881, ed. Haas): II. Adagio (Sehr feierlich)
5. Bruckner - Symphony No. 6 in A major (1881, ed. Haas): III. Scherzo (Nicht schnell) & Trio (Langsam)
6. Bruckner - Symphony No. 6 in A major (1881, ed. Haas): IV: Finale (Bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell)

Philharmonia Orchestra
New Philharmonia Orchestra
Otto Klemperer, conductor
Date: 1961 (1, 2), 1964 (3-6)
Label: EMI

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Review

A famous Kingsway Hall recording of the Bruckner Sixth Symphony, now 40 years old, here finds itself paired with half of an excellent LP of German overtures made by Klemperer and the Philharmonia with Walter Legge at the same location four years earlier. Hiss levels are these days relatively high from the older tapes, but the sound is full and warm, and the overtures have never sounded better. Wagner’s extended reworking of the Gluck overture has its own interest, and Klemperer and the players project the music with maximum gravitas, on the largest expressive scale. Not a single routine bar is to be heard. Hänsel und Gretel are transported from a late-September 1960, in foggy London town, to an idealized world of Klemperer’s own making. The result sounds like an urgent live performance of a straight orchestral masterpiece, with no trace of kitsch. Klemperer and the Philharmonia somehow convey enormous affection without a shred of sentimentality.

That critical cliché also holds good for this familiar Bruckner performance with the re-formed New Philharmonia. In the accompanying notes, Richard Osborne once more lauds the undeniable virtues of straightforwardness in Klemperer’s approach, but heard afresh, the playing here just oozes character all through, and makes the competition seem bland. It’s as if music making and music itself really mattered.

The great conductor doesn’t try to fabricate a mass-rally ending for this work, which marked a return to a human compositional scale for the composer after the monumental Fifth, a work designed to overwhelm and to bring us close to heaven’s gate. Listen to Klemperer and the NPO in the Scherzo and Trio, to hear how this music can be related at the same time to an earlier species of German Romanticism, to the nationalist symphonies of the day, and to a future that includes Mahler, not least in the use of the same thematic material at different speeds in adjacent movements. Klemperer clearly relishes the slightly crazed aspects of the last movement, and it’s hard to resist being swept along.

These transfers scrape up more of the original sound than before, and the strings and winds sound fine. The brass, though impressively powerful, can now sound just a little harsh if we bear in mind smoother, more expansive digital successors. But if you don’t have a recording of the symphony, this is still the one to beat.

-- Paul Ingram, FANFARE [3/2004]

More reviews:
http://www.classicstoday.com/review/review-2902/
http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/e/emi62621a.php
http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphony-No-6-Anton/dp/B0000C083Q

http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphony-No-Wagner-Wesendonk-Lieder/dp/B00000J28U

http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphony-6/dp/B000002S1I

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Anton Bruckner (4 September 1824 – 11 October 1896)) was an Austrian composer. His symphonies are considered emblematic of the final stage of Austro-German Romanticism because of their rich harmonic language, strongly polyphonic character, and considerable length. Bruckner composed eleven symphonies, scored for a fairly standard orchestra. His orchestration was modeled after the sound of his primary instrument, the pipe organ.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Bruckner

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Otto Klemperer (14 May 1885 – 6 July 1973) was a German conductor and composer. He is widely regarded as one of the leading conductors of the 20th century. He was the first principal conductor of the Philharmonia. While adopting slower tempi as he aged, Klemperer's performances often maintain great intensity, and are richly detailed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Klemperer

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