Brainwave Symphony CD 4

In Gustav Mahler's first four symphonies many of the themes originate in his own settings of folk poems from the collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy's Magic Horn). A case in point, Symphony No. 4 is built around a single song, Das himmlische Leben (The Heavenly Life) which Mahler had composed some eight years earlier, in 1892. The song presents a child's vision of Heaven and is hinted at throughout the first three movements. In the fourth, marked ‘Sehr behaglich’ (Very comfortably), the song is heard in full from a solo soprano instructed by Mahler to sing: ‘with serene, childlike expression; completely without parody!’

After a period-instrument reading of the Symphony no.1 that received unanimous acclaim from the critics, François-Xavier Roth and Les Siècles return to Mahler. Joined by the luminous voice of Sabine Devieilhe for the famous finale, they offer us their vision of the Fourth Symphony, which in its own way marks the composer’s transition to modernity, and reveal unsuspected colours and instrumental balances. We still have much to learn about the polyphonic transparency possible within Mahler’s big orchestra!

The Fourth Symphony has acquired a rather special status in the last few decades. It is Shostakovich’s first really mature symphony (a distinction which used to be conferred on the Fifth), and though Shostakovich had not quite finished it when he was viciously attacked in the pages of Pravda, the general consensus has been that it represented the composer’s genuine artistic aims, unsullied by the pressures of official interference.

Soli Deo Gloria is proud to release the last instalment of its successful Brahms Symphony series which sees John Eliot Gardiner and his Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique explore the music of Johannes Brahms. This album is a celebration of the Fourth Symphony and the various pieces that contributed to its making.

The Fourth Symphony was written at a particularly crucial point in Tchaikovsky’s life. 1877 was not only the year of his disastrous marriage but also the year in which he began his fifteen-year correspondence with his patroness Nadezhda von Meck. The F minor Symphony has always been a popular work with its muscular and melodic writing. Infused throughout the score is the sense of ‘fate’ which Tchaikovsky believed controlled his destiny as he described in a letter to Madame von Meck, “the fateful force which prevents the impulse to happiness from achieving its goal … which hangs above your head like the sword of Damocles.”

Fellow composers such as Ambroise Thomas and Charles Gounod attended the Symphony No. 4 premiere in Paris, 1856, and were moved to amazed admiration. French critics approvingly wrote how ‘finely thought out, expansively developed, and clearly and brilliantly written’ the score was.

For their first collaboration on harmonia mundi, Pablo Heras-Casado and Anima Eterna explore the world of Bruckner. The first instalment in this series is his tremendous Symphony No.4. An apotheosis of architectural rigour and poetry, this cathedral in sound, thanks to the unique sonorities of the period instruments played by the Bruges orchestra, regains its lightness and elegance in dazzling orchestral colours.

For their first collaboration on harmonia mundi, Pablo Heras-Casado and Anima Eterna explore the world of Bruckner. The first instalment in this series is his tremendous Symphony No.4. An apotheosis of architectural rigour and poetry, this cathedral in sound, thanks to the unique sonorities of the period instruments played by the Bruges orchestra, regains its lightness and elegance in dazzling orchestral colours.

The Mahler 4 has a special connection to the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. It was recorded by 4 of its music directors in succession: Mengelberg, Van Beinum, Haitink, and Chailly. They also recorded it with Bernstein and Solti. At the time Haitink made this recording in the 1960's, the strings of the orchestra still possessed the gruff, woodsy sound that was one of the ensemble's notable characteristics. It is highly suitable to Mahler's folk like themes. The performance here is moderate in tempo; the playing never seems rushed. Haitink makes even the dramatic pauses in the work seem intrinsic to the overall structure. Overall, there is a soft ambience to the orchestral sound. Nevertheless, the climax to the slow movement is highly dramatic, and it flows very naturally into the tempo for the finale.

The Fourth is probably the best of Rubinstein’s Symphonies. Written in 1874 it’s a deeply uneven and ultimately unconvincing work but contains enough perplexing turbulence to elevate it far beyond the merely decorative, beyond the post Mendelssohnian symphonic statement. If it never reaches the heights of a genuine Romantic crisis symphony it contains intriguing material sufficient to warrant more than a second hearing and this Naxos issue, first issued on Marco Polo 8.223319 in 1991, provides just such an opportunity.