Mahler 6 Fischer

Gustav Mahler - Symphony No. 6 in a minor, 'Tragische' (1904)
Budapest Festival Orchestra / Iván Fischer
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz: 2,27 GB | NO Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Channel Classics # CCS 2299 | Country/Year: Netherlands 2005
Genre: Classical | Style: Romantic, Early 20th Century

"However, in contrast to Abbado's boring Berliners, Fischer's orchestra plays better, and he's much better recorded. Just listen to the characterful brass in the coda of the first movement, with a particularly fine first trumpet, or the splendid woodwinds in the trios of the scherzo. (…) for a legitimate alternative viewpoint you will find it difficult to do better than this." ~classicstoday

After the highly acclaimed recordings of Mahler Symphonies no. 1, 2, 4 and 6 Iván Fischer and his Budapest Festival Orchestra now recorded the Fifth Sympony with its famous Adagietto in F major for strings and harp - one of the most intimate pieces that Mahler ever wrote for the orchestra.

This is the first disc to be made in Budapest’s new National Concert Hall where the orchestra recently staged a Mahler festival in celebration of the composer’s local connections. Notwithstanding the change of venue and the extra forces deployed, it is very much a typical Budapest Festival production, lithe and alert, without necessarily sounding what older hands may think of as Mahlerian…

It was bound to happen sooner or later: pretty much everything known by Mahler put into one box (16 cd's).EMI and DG–which also drew on the catalogues of Decca and Philips–have each produced complete-edition boxed sets to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Mahler's birth. One set seems like an inexhaustible treasure trove; the other one is more like a mere assemblage of all of Mahler's music.

This 16-disc set contains what is without a doubt the most distinguished collection of Mahler performances ever to have been assembled in one place. DG has sensibly collected all of Bernstein's Mahler for Polygram labels, including the London "Das Lied von der Erde," and all of the orchestral song cycles: "Song of a Wayfarer," "Kindertotenlieder," "Rückert-Lieder," and "Des Knaben Wunderhorn." All of these recordings have been issued separately to general critical acclaim, and despite a veritable warehouse of new Mahler discs in the '90s, Bernstein's versions by and large still reign supreme.

Adam Fischer writes: In the Düsseldorf Tonhalle in late February and early March 2020, we gave Mahler’s Sixth Symphony in three live concert performances which we recorded for this album. This date in the calendar had special significance: the first lockdown period due to the Corona pandemic set in immediately thereafter. The orchestra was playing in full line-up in front of a full house for the last time for a long while. The mood was ominous: we all felt something was amiss, and the next day everything had to be cancelled. We strongly associate those circumstances with our work on the Sixth, and with the foreboding we felt of a catastrophe that has since ruined the livelihoods of many musician colleagues and deprived us all of a meaningful period in our lives.