Eleven 11s
2. The Choice
by David Barker

The Eleven
Knowing that I couldn’t provide a totally comprehensive survey, I chose to review eleven recordings for the obvious gimmick. In fact, I had access to sixteen recordings, so had to make a decision about which ones to keep.

Before beginning this article, I owned and had heard only three: Haitink, Caetani and the London Rostropovich. I ordered the famous Stokowski, downloaded the Lazarev and borrowed the Berglund, Barshai and Rozhdetvensky from friends. The remainder were accessible online through my subscription to the Naxos Music Library.

Ten of the eleven chose themselves, on the basis of historical importance and/or critical acclaim. Of the remaining six, two were second recordings by a conductor already selected (DePreist/Oregon, Caetani/Melbourne) and a third was considered very mediocre (an early Naxos recording). This left three - Kitajenko (Capriccio), Bychov (Avie) and Pletnev (Pentatone) and after auditioning each, I chose the former, a selection which will probably surprise you.

So the “first XI” is (in order of recording date):

	Houston SO/Leopold Stokowski rec. 1958 EMI 5652062
	Bournemouth SO/Paavo Berglund rec. 1974 EMI 7477902
	USSR Ministry of Culture SO/Gennady Rozhdestvensky rec. 1983 Olympia OCD152
	Concertgebouw O/Bernard Haitink rec. 1983 Decca 4444302 (boxset)
	Helsinki PO/James DePreist rec. 1988 Delos DE3380
	West Deutsche RSO/Rudolf Barshai rec. 1999 Brilliant Classics 6324-7
	London SO/Mstislav Rostropovich rec. 2002 LSO Live LSO0030
	Cologne Gürzenich O/Dmitri Kitajenko rec. 2004 Capriccio C71036
	Royal Scottish Ntl O/Alexander Lazarev rec. 2004 Linn CKD247
	Milano Giuseppe Verdi SO/Oleg Caetani rec. 2005 Arts 476768
	Royal Liverpool PO/Vasily Petrenko rec. 2008 Naxos 8.572082

A listing of all recordings (excluding the most recent Naxos/Petrenko) is available here.

There is a full listing of all reviews of the symphony on Musicweb is available here.

Next >>
Introduction	The Choice	General Comments
First Movement	Second Movement	Third Movement
Fourth Movement	Conclusions	What Others Have Said

 

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