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Soundtracks to our lives w/e 13/11/10
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IanB
IanB
6761 posts

Edited Nov 17, 2010, 11:13
Re: Soundtracks to our lives w/e 13/11/10
Nov 17, 2010, 11:00
Robot Emperor wrote:
IanB wrote:
Quiet week for non classical ...


Ianb (or anybody else), I seem to remember from earlier STOL threads that you like your Bruckner (apologies if my memory is faulty) and wondered if you had any recommendations for his contemporary Mahler. I have Bernstein's No.5 with the Vienna Philharmonic which I think is amazing, but impartial advice on Mahler seems impossible to find. His fans come across as nutcases to be frank, as do those who really cannot stand his work.



Oh you've some to the right place but I am not impartial. I definitely have my favoutites.

I would start by getting hold of Norman Lebrecht's brilliant Mahler biography "Why Mahler?" and maybe a copy of Mahler 3 conducted by Abbado (- there are two and I prefer the one with the Vienna Philharmonic not Berlin). It's 100 minutes long when conducted right and covers a lot of bases. It's a wild ride and the 4th movement, a setting of a Nietzsche poem, is one of my favourite things in all of music. Especially this recording with speaker cone busting Jessye Norman. There might be more satisfying recordings musically from 40 years ago and more but I think it needs the modern clarity of a recent recording to capture all the details and nuances. The 3rd really needs that I think.

By the time you've spun that a few times and read the biography you'll have a fair idea if this is for you or not.

After that the world is your oyster though I would read the appendices to the Lebrecht first as he is very good in terms of outlining which conductors bring which qualities and on which recordings.

If you come out of all that wanting more then I would go for

Rattle's recording of the 10th
Barbirolli's 5th & 9th

and

Klemperer's 2nd

plus the timeless Walter / Julius Patzak / Ferrier recording of "Song of the Earth"

The last four are all fairly inexpensive these days. The Rattle is probably still full price but it is far and away the most interesting recording of the unfinished symphony.

If you want to get all the symphonies at once then the Kubelik set on DG is often well priced and a very solid set of performances.

Enjoy!
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