Gustav MAHLER (1860-1911)
Symphony No 10 in F-sharp major
(1910)
Performing version by Deryck Cooke (1976 - 3rd Edition, 1989)
Minnesota Orchestra/Osmo Vänskä
rec. June 2019, Orchestra Hall, Minneapolis, USA. DSD
Reviewed as 5.0 multi-channel download, available from
eclassical.com
BIS BIS-2396 SACD
[78:20]
This new BIS recording of Osmo Vänskä and the Minnesota Orchestra
performing the “Cooke-3” version of the Mahler Tenth was covered by my
colleague, John Quinn, in early March here on MWI –
review.
In general, I agree with his very favorable impression of it, but here
I’ll try to cover some of its other aspects, with perhaps a slightly
different emphasis. Like him, I’ve obtained all of Vänskä’s Mahler
performances so far. I believe the conductor has only the Third, Eighth and
Ninth remaining to be recorded in the cycle now, with performances of the
Ninth scheduled for later this year, assuming those performances actually
take place in our current Covid-stressed environment. So perhaps the Ninth
Symphony will be the next to appear in his BIS Mahler series.
This recording of the Tenth succeeds on both the interpretive and
engineering fronts, and the playing of the orchestra is outstanding for its
clearly audible fervor and coloristic variety. It may be a bit surprising
for listeners to realize that Vänskä has shepherded the Minnesota players
for almost 20 years (having started his musical directorship in Minnesota
in 2003), and the conductor/orchestra rapport seems to be revealed afresh
on each new recording. This nearly 20-year period includes the bitter
strike and lockout of 2012 (the longest labor dispute in U.S. orchestral
history), when Vänskä resigned his position to show solidarity with the
players while they were locked out.
One aspect of the playing which is becoming an almost signature
characteristic of Vänskä’s recent work with the orchestra over the last few
years is his penchant for the expressive use of extremely hushed
pianissimos (and I mean extraordinarily hushed!), and it shows up again in
several sections of this new recording. This affinity for extreme quietness
in the softer sections has been much more noticeable in the conductor’s
Minnesota recordings than in his earlier recordings with the Lahti Symphony
Orchestra in Finland. Some critics have called Vänskä’s employment of
barely whispered dynamic levels an overused affectation, but, so far, I’ve
been convinced by it.
Indeed, the dynamic range on this recording is formidable, easily capturing
both ends of the dynamic spectrum, and, to my ears, the engineers have
evoked a remarkably true to life quality. There are of course some
listeners who are uncomfortable with the wide dynamics of BIS recordings
and complain that if they have the softer sections turned up to an audible
level, the louder sections will blast them out of their house, or out of
their car! While I certainly sympathize with those whose home or car
environment is too noisy to enjoy a full-dynamics recording like this one,
I nevertheless have to applaud the achievement of the engineering staff in
conveying the realistic sound range which the orchestra musicians and
conductor clearly strove to create. In addition, the left-to-right spread
of the orchestra is outstandingly precise and convincing, while the depth
is also magnificent. Detail abounds, but never seems unnatural or pushed
forward. (Remember, however, that I’m reviewing the 5.0 multichannel
version of this recording, not the regular stereo version.)
By the way, I used to have the 1999 Rattle/BPO recording of this work on an
EMI DVD-audio disc in my collection. I did not keep this album, not because
I was dissatisfied with the performance, but because I found the recording
too artificial sounding, with too much audible evidence of the use of spot
microphones, whether I was listening in multichannel or regular stereo. In
my view, audio engineering should be of the “art which conceals the art”
variety, and, in the case of the Rattle/BPO recording, I was, alas, too
aware of the art exposing the art! Which was a shame, because this
recording captures what I feel is Rattle’s most successful outing in a
Mahler symphony.
Moving from the sonics of the Vänskä recording to the performance itself,
the overall interpretation flows naturally, with the many disparate
sections still characterized well. His opening Adagio, at 26:42, is a bit
slower than most other recordings of this movement, but its expressive
inflections are effective (the beautiful string playing here is a big
plus!), and I was never wishing that he’d just get on with it. To the
contrary, I felt that the conductor was taking the right amount of time for
the movement, with all its mood changes and contrasts, to produce the
precise dramatic effect for each section. Similarly, in the second movement
(the first scherzo), Vänskä balances the transitional intensities and
“virtuoso” changes of meter and tempo with unerring control, and he
produces the type of brilliance this movement needs.
I’ve always been a bit confused about the short third movement,
“Purgatorio”. Its character has always seemed to me almost bucolic, and I
remember being shocked when I first saw Mahler’s indications on the last
page of this movement’s short score, with its indications of “Erbarmen”
(“Have mercy”), “O Gott! O Gott! Warum hast du mich verlassen?” (“O God! O
God! Why have you forsaken me?”), and “Deine Wille geschehe!” (“Thy will be
done!”). And these remarks appear in a movement which, if one added some
jingle bells to the orchestration, would not be out of place in the Fourth
Symphony! In any case, Vänskä returns here to a slightly slower main tempo
than one hears on other recorded performances, with the emphatic
accentuation of his interpretation suggesting even more kinship to the
first movement of the Fourth Symphony.
The transition between the last two movements (second scherzo to the
finale) is of course characterized by those impactful bass drum thuds, and
I don’t know of another recording where they’ve been more impactful than
this one! Talk about a surprise symphony! And once again, the strings (and
really, the whole orchestra) manage to convey the alternate anguish and
consolation of Mahler’s finale in an almost exalted way.
As for alternate recordings of the Tenth, there is the afore-mentioned
Rattle/BPO recording, whose sonic signature may not bother some listeners
as much as it does me (Warner 5034202 -
review). I also want to put in a good word for the Seattle
Symphony and Thomas Dausgaard (on that orchestra’s own label, SSM1011:
Recording of the Month -
review), who keeps
things moving a bit more than Vänskä does, but he’s much more successful in
this work than in a number of his other recent recordings, such as his
Bruckner Sixth, where his relish for speed impacts his performances
negatively, with lightweight articulation and insufficient depth of tone.
Fortunately, such superficial triviality doesn’t occur in this Mahler
performance. And finally, if stereo rather than multichannel is your
preferred sonic medium, I daresay that the finest recording from a sonic
point of view might be the “one-point microphone” Inbal recording with the
Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony on the Exton label (part of their “Laboratory
Gold Line” series, OVLX00089, download only), a more successful recording than Exton’s earlier
“one-point microphone” recording of Inbal and the Czech Philharmonic in the
Mahler First. But alas! Just as with that earlier recording, Inbal’s Tokyo
Mahler Tenth is ruined by the conductor’s obsessive and all too audible
crooning as he conducts – what a waste of outstanding engineering!
I do not believe in a “best” recording in most repertoire works, but, given
all its merits, this new Vänskä/Minnesota issue should certainly be
considered seriously as a choice in this Symphony.
Chris Salocks
Previous review:
John Quinn
