Brainwave Symphony CD 4

When the Bamberg Symphony and their principal conductor Jakub Hrůša went on tour in Germany with Mahler’s Fourth Symphony in January 2020, no one would have thought that this symphony in particular would become a kind of “symphony of fate” of the year, for only two months later, the performance of major symphonic works was impossible for a long time after the “corona lockdown” in Germany, which hit cultural institutions particularly hard.

Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 4 in G major – Kathleen Battle, sporano; Wiener Philharmoniker; Lorin Maazel
Classical | 1 CD | EAC Rip | 236 Mb | FLAC+LOG+M3U | No Cue | Full scans | 3 RS links
Publisher: Sony Classical

One of the best performances of Mahler's Fourth Symphony

Here, William Schumans Credendum appears for the first time ever in stereo in any format. It is one of the loudest pieces of music ever written. The work takes its name from the Latin for "that which must be believed." It was commissioned through the Department of State (the first time a government agency had ever commissioned a piece of music) to honor UNESCO…………….

Taneyev - Symphony No.4, Apollo's Temple in Delphi - Evgeni Svetlanov (1990)
Melodiya | USSR | SUCD 10-00021 | 1990 | 1 CD | EAC Rip | FLAC (img + cue), LOG | Covers (jpg 300 dpi) | 5 Tracks | TT 46:54 | RAR 197 MB + 3% Recovery
Classical / Sympohonic / Orchestral

Symphony No.4 in С minor, Op.12 written by Taneyev in 1896—1898, was a landmark in the composer's long musical quest. The musical entr'acte «Apollo's Temple in Dephi» from the operatic trilogy «Oresteia» on Aeschylus is a hymn to Apollo, full of light and life force. Through the majestic diatonic structure of his music Taneyev expressed his admiration for ancient art. This entr'acte sound as majestically in Svetlanov's interpretation — it is a hymn to all the beautiful things existing in this world, on this planet.

Superbly crafted and convincingly modern, though imbued with an expressivity most modern composers would have abjured, the Fourth and Fifth symphonies of English composer Richard Arnell arguably deserve to be heard as often as the symphonies of his contemporaries Alwyn and Arnold. In this superlative coupling of his Fourth Symphony from 1948 and his Fifth Symphony from 1957, Arnell emerges as a cogent composer ……..

James Leonard @ AllMusic

Kenneth Woods, Principal Guest Conductor of Stratford-upon-Avon based Orchestra of the Swan, has made international headlines for his ongoing cycle of world-premiere recordings of Hans Gál’s Symphonies. The set, paired with the symphonies of Robert Schumann, has been featured on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered and Performance Today, The New York Times, The Washington Post, in Gramophone and BBC Music Magazine, and dozens of other newspaper and online reviews, introducing a new generation to Gál’s wide-ranging and extensive oeuvre. Woods and OOTS continue the cycle with Gál’s Second and Schumann’s Fourth….

Woods and OOTS continue their cycle which pairs these two composers, with the world-premiere of Gál’s Fourth and Schumann’s Second. Written in his ninth decade and premiered in 1975, Gál’s Fourth and final Symphony is scored for chamber orchestra and akin to a concerto grosso. The music exhibits Gál’s trademark pastoral and lyrical style, yet inwardly this is music of intense rigor and deep concentration. While Gál’s compositional pedigree is strongly linked to the Austro-German tradition of the Viennese classical masters, Schumann’s Second looks to an earlier era, taking much inspiration from the spirit of J.S. Bach with its contrapuntal textures and chorale themes.

The Finnish contemporary composer Kalevi Aho's (b. 1949) fourth symphony from 1972-73 is here coupled with the composer's song cycle "Kiinalaisia lauluja" ("Chinese songs" - sung in Finnish, beautifully performed by Tiina Vahevaara) from 1997.This is contemporary music with a remarkable high musical quality and expressive impact - it is no wonder that Aho is regarded being Finland's leading composer of today. Because these two works are indeed original, deeply moving, powerful, and memorable……..

L. Johan @ Amazon.com

Szell's performance is again of quite a different order, one of the very finest ever put on disc, white hot even beyond Bernstein's. The late John Culshaw, producer at the sessions in Walthamstow Assembly Hall in 1962, used to enjoy telling the story of winding up an already angry George Szell. That inspired tyrant of a conductor was furious at the start of the session to find that many players were not the same as those who had just given the concert performance with him. When he came back to listen to the first playback Culshaw deliberately kept the controls rather low, making the result seem dull. That prompted Szell, back on the podium, to unleash a force in the subsequent takes that has to be heard to be believed.