Felix Weingartner - Symphony No. 4; Der Sturm (Marko Letonja)

Information

Composer: Felix Weingartner

• (01) Der Sturm. Overture
• (02-04) Der Sturm. Suite
• (05-08) Serenade for String Orchestra
• (09-12) Symphony No. 4 in F major, Op. 61

Basel Symphony Orchestra
Marko Letonja, conductor

Date: 2005
Label: cpo

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review

ARTISTIC QUALITY: 9 / SOUND QUALITY: 9

I enjoyed the first volume in this series very much, and this next installment continues the favorable impression. Felix Weingartner was a symphonist in the conservative tradition of Mendelssohn (to say he was as modern as Brahms might be pushing it), but he was a very good one. He respected the distinction between “programmatic” and “absolute” music, and so in The Tempest there are colorful touches of percussion and harp, while the symphony features the standard romantic orchestra with no extras. What matters more, though, is the fact that Weingartner wrote good tunes (the lyrical second subject in the overture, for example), and in both the symphony and the serenade he imbues his music with a pastoral freshness that’s quite fetching.

Written in 1916, there’s little in the Fourth Symphony to suggest the ongoing war or the composer’s own straightened circumstances–merely the occasional dark shadow passing over the music’s generally sunny countenance. Is this emotional denial, or simply a celebration of a beautiful and civilized tradition? These very persuasive peformances from conductor Marko Letonja and his Basel orchestra, warmly recorded in both stereo and multichannel formats, let you be the judge.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday

More reviews:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2005/Aug05/Weingartner4_7770982.htm
https://www.allmusic.com/album/felix-weingartner-symphony-no-4-der-sturm-mw0001395701
https://www.amazon.com/Symphony-4-WEINGARTNER/dp/B0009JVOKC

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Felix Weingartner (2 June 1863 – 7 May 1942) was an Austrian conductor, composer and pianist. He studied at the Leipzig Conservatory, and was one of Franz Liszt's last pupils in Weimar. Weingartner was the first conductor to make commercial recordings of all nine Beethoven symphonies, and the second to record all four Brahms symphonies. Despite his lifelong career as a conductor, Weingartner regarded himself as equally, if not more importantly, a composer. Besides numerous operas, Weingartner wrote seven symphonies, a sinfonietta, violin concerto, cello concerto, orchestral works, string quartets, quintets and lieder.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Weingartner

***

Marko Letonja (born August 12, 1961) is an Slovenian conductor. Letonja studied piano and conducting at the Academy of Music in Ljubljana. Following his studies with conductor Otmar Suitner at the Academy for Music and Theater in Vienna, Letonja went on to be music director of the Slovenian Philharmonic Orchestra from 1991 to 2003 and Music Director and Chief Conductor of both the Symphony Orchestra and the Opera in Basel from 2003 to 2006. Since 2012, Letonja has served as the chief conductor of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg and as the chief conductor and artistic director of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/marko-letonja-mn0002189240

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FLAC, tracks

Links in comment

Enjoy!