Valery Gergiev, though
undeniably charismatic, is not everyone’s
cup of tea as a conductor. Speaking
to an experienced orchestral musician
recently, I was struck by his low opinion
of the Russian maestro; "..all
those fluttering fingers – what are
they for?", he fumed, "heavens,
the job’s difficult enough as it is
without unnecessary distractions from
the very person who is supposed to be
there to help!". Sometimes, it
does indeed seem that Gergiev has been
reading accounts of totemic conductors
of the past – Furtwängler in particular
– and has adopted some of the externals
of their styles.
That may or may not
be fair; the acid test is to be found
in the musical results he obtains. These
too are variable, though there is no
denying the expressive power of his
best work. The three Tchaikovsky symphonies
recorded here have the potential benefit
of having been taken from live performances.
For a number of reasons, the Fifth is
the least successful; for one thing,
no conductor has ever, for me, managed
to conceal the comparative weakness
of the work itself, its structure comprising
conventionality spiked with gimmickry,
its conclusion strident yet unconvincing.
Then there’s the recording, which is
poorly balanced, the brass often obscuring
important detail. I’m quite sure it
didn’t sound as bad as this live.
On the credit side,
the other two symphonies receive genuinely
fine performances. The Fourth, composed
at a time of crisis in Tchaikovsky’s
life, has a first movement which is
a true masterpiece of symphonic composition,
and is effectively a symphonic poem
in its own right. Gergiev allows it
to unfold with dignity, yet injects
real drama into the feverish climax
at its heart. In taking this approach,
he avoids some of the gratuitous tempo
fluctuations which many interpreters
lazily adopt.
The slow movement suffers
from that acrid Viennese oboe tone,
making the great solo at its start rather
hard to listen to. In spite of this,
however, Gergiev still manages to capture
the feeling of fireside nostalgia. The
remaining two movements are equally
good, though this symphony always suffers
from the fact that, after the high anxiety
and drama of the first movement, the
remaining three inevitably feel anticlimactic.
Not much a conductor can do about that,
but Gergiev and his players do their
best to make the music eventful and
highly coloured.
The recording of the
Pathétique is in many
ways the most interesting. The concert
at which it was made took place on the
day the news broke internationally of
the Beslan siege. Gergiev was born in
that part of the world, and clearly
felt especially deeply the horrific
fate of those children. Of course one
can never say for certain how much such
circumstances really affect the nature
of a performance. Suffice to say that
this does seem to me a particularly
deeply felt and high-octane account.
There are lapses, such as the impetuous
rushes of the first movement’s beautiful
second theme, or the poorly defined
opening of the 5/4 Allegro con grazia.
But the famous march is genuinely
thrilling, while the magnificent grief-stricken
finale has grandeur as well as sorrow.
This is greatly assisted by the glory
of the VPO’s string tone, which is as
sumptuous and as plangent as ever.
A bit of a mixed box,
then, but containing versions of the
fourth and sixth symphonies which are
very fine, and which have the virtues
of live performance while avoiding some
of the acoustic pitfalls this can sometimes
bring.
Gwyn Parry-Jones
see also review
by Michael
Cookson
Vienna Philharmonic/Valery Gergiev 
