As
part of their celebration of his centenary, DG have reissued
Karajan’s cycle of Bruckner’s nine numbered symphonies
that he set down in Berlin between 1975 and 1981.
The
booklet notes are by Karajan’s biographer, Richard Osborne,
and I think it’s worth quoting what he has to say about
this conductor’s approach to Bruckner. “Karajan’s patient,
lofty way with mature Bruckner – works from the Third Symphony
onwards – is not the only one. There are times when one
might turn to readings that are lighter and quicker, more
overtly dramatic; and there is probably a place too, for
the much more flexible, inspirational approach of a Furtwängler
or a Jochum.” Yet, he goes on: “Karajan’s Bruckner is
a man who contemplates great issues, deeply pondered, and
rigorously argued. They are readings in the valued older
tradition where the route is known intimately in advance
and where the vitality of the playing springs from the
active collaboration between the music, players, and conductor
at the point of performance.”
Osborne
also comments that Karajan’s association with Bruckner
spans over four decades. However, I think I’m right in
saying that that certain of the symphonies – the first
three and perhaps also the Fifth and Sixth – featured much
less frequently in his programmes than did the Fourth and
the last three symphonies. Those four symphonies were works
that he recorded more than once whereas the remainder were
recorded only once and those performances are preserved
in this set.
A
couple of things strike me particularly about these recordings.
One is the sheer beauty of the playing. Karajan was often
criticised, especially in his later years, for an alleged
cultivation of quality of sound as a prime objective in
his music making. Now is not the time to argue the rights
and wrongs of that assertion but I think it’s fair to say
that in the case of these recordings the beauty of orchestral
sound is placed wholly at the service of the music. Secondly,
whilst I wouldn’t disagree with Richard Osborne that one
can find readings that are more fleet and/or dramatic,
Karajan displays pretty consistently a sense of line that’s
tremendously impressive and which is crucial to success
in Bruckner’s long paragraphs.
I
suspect the first three symphonies came late into Karajan’s
repertoire. His performance of the
First Symphony is
a very good one. The reading of the first movement has
fire and drive. The slow movement isn’t one of Bruckner’s
greatest adagios – those lay in the future – but Karajan
moulds it with care and the listener can’t fail to be struck
by the firm bass line on which the BPO playing is founded.
The scherzo has bite and energy and the finale, which has
its powerful moments, seems tightly controlled by Karajan.
The very end is somewhat strident but that’s down to Bruckner’s
relative inexperience and is not the fault of these performers.
For
the
Second Symphony Karajan presents a conflated
text, combining some elements of the Nowak edition with
the Haas text. There’s a good deal of liveliness in the
first movement but the lyrical passages also receive full
value. It’s in those latter passages that the richness
of the Berlin strings pays dividends. The second movement
is marked
Andante and Karajan’s pace does seem a
touch on the broad side but the music is beautifully sung
and the performance convinces. The energy generated in
the scherzo spills over into the finale though Karajan
also does the more relaxed passages of that movement well.
This finale is a bit long-winded for my taste but Karajan
holds it together well and the conclusion, if musically
rather obvious, is exciting.
In
the
Third Symphony Karajan, who normally preferred
the editions by Robert Haas, opts for the Leopold Nowak
edition. The first movement was, by some distance, the
most substantial symphonic movement Bruckner had written
to date. Karajan seems to have the measure of the architecture
and is at the helm of a sonorous, world-class orchestra.
He’s patient in the second movement, obtaining some admirable
hushed playing along the way. The finale is quite fiery
at the start. Later the polka-like second subject trips
along delightfully. At the several dramatic points in the
movement the BPO brass section is superb and the very end,
where the trumpet theme, heard at the outset of the work,
is brought back in major key splendour, is an affirming
apotheosis. At 10:44, just before the concluding peroration,
I thought I detected the merest hint of over-blowing in
the trumpet section; somehow it’s reassuring to have even
the scantiest evidence of fallibility in Karajan’s BPO.
Though
Karajan gives the first three symphonies full value, with
the Fourth we move into the realms of Bruckner’s acknowledged
masterpieces – and to works more associated with Karajan
throughout his career.
At
the start of the
Fourth there’s a proper sense of
hushed expectancy but, as Richard Osborne suggests in his
notes, one doesn’t feel that Karajan is indulging in romantic
musing, rather the movement is soon unfolding with purpose.
There’s plenty of grandeur but a strong impetus is maintained
and Karajan handles the characteristic Brucknerian
crescendi magnificently.
The andante and scherzo are successful and the reading
of the finale is a commanding one. In that movement, however,
I do part company with Karajan at one point. At 2:32 he
inserts what I’m sure is an unauthentic cymbal clash. I
can only recall one other conductor doing this: Tennstedt
in his EMI recording, also with the BPO. But this egregious
addition is absent from accounts by the likes of Haitink,
Böhm and Wand and it’s a surprising lapse of taste by Karajan.
Otherwise I enjoyed his exposition of the finale very much.
The coda is outstanding, right from its hushed beginning
right through to the radiant sunburst of the last few pages,
Karajan exhibiting masterful control.
The
Fifth
Symphony is arguably Bruckner’s most intellectually
rigorous work. Certainly, for a conductor it’s the most
difficult of the canon to hang together convincingly.
Karajan is highly persuasive in the first movement. The
main allegro combines energy and majesty. At the several
points where, on the surface at least, Bruckner relaxes,
Karajan maintains focus admirably. This means that the
vast structure of the movement doesn’t degenerate into
a ramble. One particularly relishes the richness and
depth of the BPO strings while the nobility and huge
power of the brass gives equal pleasure. The weight and
depth of the string
pizzicati at the start of
the adagio lays a strong foundation for the keening oboe
theme. The playing throughout this whole movement is
simply glorious – Karajan and his players identify completely
with Bruckner’s idiom and the music is given all the
space, all the length of line that it needs in order
to make its full effect. The finale is an epic composition,
which opens with reminiscences of thematic material from
the preceding movements, rather as happens in Beethoven’s
Ninth. These reminiscences are punctuated by cheeky little
clarinet phrases and I thought perhaps these little interjections
are a little too smooth, but that’s a pretty minor point.
The fugal passages that form such an important element
of Bruckner’s argument in the finale have weight, purpose
and, crucially, clarity. Karajan’s concentration and
his sure sense of the music’s direction of travel ensure
that the musical logic is always compelling and so the
listener’s attention is held throughout the lengthy span
of the movement. The final peroration is toweringly majestic,
crowing what is the finest Fifth that I can recall hearing
on CD.
I’ve
never understood the relative neglect of the
Sixth Symphony,
which is taut and memorable. The first movement is difficult
to pace. Bruckner is no real help, it must be said. What,
precisely, does he mean by the tempo marking, unique in
his symphonies,
Majestoso? To me that suggests a
somewhat broad speed is required but then the opening rhythmic
figure on the violins, which dominates the movement, seems
to demand a forward-moving tempo. To my ears Karajan seems
to be a touch too fleet. But on comparing him with Haitink’s
1970 recording (Philips) and with the one made in 1976
by Wand (RCA/BMG), I find they’re all almost identical
in the pace they adopt. And I’d rather have the lift that
their respective tempi provide than the lugubrious speed
adopted by Klemperer (EMI, 1964)
Given
that three such distinguished Brucknerians have a broadly
similar view of the pacing required for this music I can
only bow to their combined wisdom. Yet I have to say that
I feel Karajan’s reading, superbly played though it is,
appears just a little bit lacking in breadth. This is most
especially apparent in the build-up to the coda and the
final pages themselves, all of which seems a bit matter
of fact. I have no such reservations about the speed adopted
for the Adagio. Here we have a reading of majesty and space.
The playing is glowing and Karajan’s concentration is total.
Climaxes seem to expand quite naturally and nothing is
forced. This performance confirms to me that this movement
is one of Bruckner’s finest achievements. Like the first
movement, the finale is not easy to pace, especially as
it begins almost from nothing. Karajan seems to me to get
things just right and thereafter the movement hangs together
well, which isn’t always the case when things are in the
hands of lesser interpreters.
Richard
Osborne describes the
Seventh as the composer’s “richest
and most luminous utterance.” Karajan was to record this
symphony again for DG, in 1989, this time with the Vienna
Philharmonic. Indeed, that was his very last recording.
There is, perhaps, a touch more spaciousness at times in
the later recording, which plays for 66:15, but the differences
don’t seem material. It’s marvellous to hear the way the
Berlin celli sing out the gorgeous opening theme at the
start of the symphony, their tone golden, the lines long.
Karajan’s unfolding of this movement has a feeling of rightness
and inevitability about it; here, one feels, is a man steeped
in Bruckner. The playing throughout is superb and the interpretation
convinces completely.
The
Adagio is immensely noble in this performance. One marvels
at the sheer quality of the orchestral playing and at the
profundity of the conception – both Bruckner’s and Karajan’s.
The main climax – complete with cymbal clash - has great
breadth and majesty but then the quiet, deep sonority achieved
in the coda is, if anything, even more impressive. After
the blaze of the preceding climax it’s as if the embers
of the movement glow, still containing life and emitting
warmth but now more subdued. Following the profundities
of the slow movement Karajan puts the scherzo across with
pleasing vitality, providing a welcome contrast. The finale
is essentially sunny in tone. Karajan was rather a serious
musician, especially later in life, but he responds very
positively to Bruckner’s geniality in this movement. Overall
this is a very considerable account of the symphony.
As
with the Seventh Karajan went on the record the
Eighth once
more for DG, again using the VPO. That superb recording,
made in 1988, has long been one of the versions of this
vast symphonic edifice that I esteem most highly. However,
I wouldn’t want to choose between the Vienna reading and
this present Berlin version.
Karajan
realises expertly the grandeur of the first movement, investing
the music with an appropriate sense of scale. He’s equally
successful in the more lyrical stretches. There seems to
be a complete command of the architecture of the movement
and in Karajan’s hands the music has great reach. The final
climax towers imperiously but then the coda sounds bleak
and spent – what a stroke of genius on Bruckner’s part
to revise this passage, substituting this profound ending
for an all-too-obvious
fortissimo conclusion!
The
third movement, the great Adagio, is perhaps Bruckner’s
single greatest symphonic achievement. Karajan lays it
out magnificently, displaying complete understanding and
an intuitive sense of line. The eloquence of the BPO’s
response is marvellous. If Karajan was indeed guilty of
an obsession with beauty of sound in his later years, as
some detractors aver, then this performance surely vindicates
him. From 22:38 onwards the coda offers a supreme example
of the control and sensitivity of Karajan and his great
orchestra. The finale has all the grandeur and power for
which one could wish and the more subdued passages receive
equal care and attention. In summary, this a very fine
performance indeed and I’m not even going to begin to try
to express a preference between this recording and the
1988 version; it’s a pointless exercise for they’re equally
distinguished. What I would say, however, is that if you
invest in this set then you wouldn’t also need the VPO
versions of either this symphony or of the Seventh.
The
Ninth confronts
us with Bruckner at his most searching. You sense that
at one and the same time he’s reaching out to new vistas
in this work and yet is reluctant to go there, possibly
realising that the old order, in music and in many other
things, was slipping away. Perhaps this accounts for the
spare, often bleak, musical language and, as Richard Osborne
observes, for the lack of a finale. In this work, Osborne
opines, we have “Bruckner at his bravest and most despairing.” I’m
not going to repeat myself. Karajan and the BPO bring to
this work all the fine qualities of interpretation and
execution that have been so evident in the earlier symphonies,
especially the Seventh and Eighth, and give a superb, magisterial
performance. At the end of the Adagio one has a sense of
finis.
So
this Karajan Bruckner cycle has many estimable qualities.
In particular there’s an interpretative sureness of touch
and a fine sense of line and Karajan obtains orchestral
playing that is consistently of the highest quality. I’m
mindful that I’ve commented regularly on the excellence
of the brass and the strings without mentioning the woodwind.
That’s largely because Bruckner’s orchestration relies
so heavily on the string and brass choirs. But the winds
have an important role to play in all these scores and
the contribution of the BPO woodwind players is top notch – as
is the incisive timpani playing. If you like your Bruckner
to sound just a little bit rugged you may find these performances
too sleek, too cultivated but I’d urge collectors not to
spurn them for that reason for sheer beauty of sound is
an important ingredient in successful Bruckner performances.
When
Patrick Waller and I did our
survey of
the Bruckner symphonies a while ago this Karajan cycle
received scant mention. The simple reason for that was
that, as we made clear, our survey had no pretensions to
completeness. Rather, it was a survey of CD versions that
one or other of us possessed and I didn’t own the Karajan
set and Patrick was only familiar with it from LPs. Our
survey is probably overdue for an update since the spate
of Bruckner recordings shows no sign of abating. At that
time this set will certainly demand inclusion.
It’s
risky to confine oneself to a cycle of one composer’s symphonies
by a single conductor unless there is no alternative choice.
At the head of this review I quoted Richard Osborne’s very
sensible view that Karajan’s is not the only way with Bruckner.
I’d not wish to restrict myself to one conductor to the
exclusion of Haitink, Wand or Jochum, to name but three.
However, if for whatever reason you need or wish to limit
yourself to just one version of the Bruckner symphonies
then this Karajan cycle is very worthy of consideration
and will not disappoint.
In
conclusion, a few words about presentation. The discs come
handily packaged in cardboard slipcases within a stout
cardboard box. The booklet contains an excellent essay
in English by Richard Osborne. There’s an alternative note
in German, with a French translation, but this doesn’t
cover each symphony individually, which Osborne does, albeit
succinctly. I don’t know if the sound has been remastered
for this issue but I found it to be full, clear and very
satisfying throughout the cycle. Each symphony is presented
on a single disc with two exceptions. The Fifth and the
Eighth are contained on two discs. In each case the first
movement follows a shorter work (the First and Second symphonies
respectively) with the remaining three movements on the
next disc. This isn’t a major inconvenience, nor is the
fact that, as a result, the works aren’t presented in numerical
order.
This
repackaging of Karajan’s Bruckner cycle affords an appropriate
and very worthy centennial tribute.
John Quinn
Berliner
Philharmoniker/Herbert von Karajan 
