Kurt Masur brought the Berlin Staatskapelle to the Royal Festival
Hall in November 1967 to perform Bruckner’s Seventh in the conductor’s
edition of choice, the 1944 Haas. This is now therefore the
earliest commercially released Seventh by Masur, predating by
seven years the Leipzig Gewandhaus Denon/RCA of 1974. It’s this
and also the New York 1991 traversal that are the best known
of his recordings of the work. However we must give serious
consideration to the frisson of this live London performance.
Once again this source shows that a simple yet optimum recorded
set-up can deal very nicely indeed with even a problem venue
such as this. The dynamics of the first movement register with
strong layering, for example, and the balance between string
and wind choirs is equally assured. This is a result of sound
conductorial balancing and adept microphone placement. The quiveringly
malleable Staatskapelle strings are on good form and the brass
has fine blended tone - powerful but not strident. Small untidiness
in the lower brass in the second movement is of little overall
matter. More importantly one feels things are held in reserve.
All this is in the service of a fine and judiciously directed
performance that tapers eloquently without indulging some of
the more metrically off-putting devices to which Masur became
increasingly prone in this work. A quarter of a century later
the sense of freshness implicit in this reading had become occluded,
fussed over and was ultimately to prove less convincing. Here
tempo and dynamics decisions are more structured.
Certainly when judged against a more direct and fluid and fluent
performer, such as Volkmar Andreae, Masur can appear somewhat
discursive at certain moments. But Andreae’s (Music
& Arts) is not the only way and Masur’s more malleable
and destabilised approach is the product of a different perception.
For Masur-watchers who need to note the trajectory of his performance
history with this symphony the Leipzig 1974 recording is on
CD on Denon, RCA and Eurodisc but it saw extensive service on
an Eterna LP. There’s a French National from 2005 and 2007 on
Karna KA-240M and Dirigent DIR0185 (and Harvest HC 06126). The
New York Phil recording is on Teldec CD 73243 (and variants).
Less well known perhaps is/are the Schleswig Holstein Festival
Orchestra performance(s) from 2003 on Orchestra CD DSM 37677150
and En Larmes 03-423 – I haven’t been able to ascertain if this
is in fact the same performance.
There are however strong reasons interpretatively to prefer
this 1967 reading and with highly sympathetic sound into the
bargain, Masur admirers have now found another reason to acquaint
themselves with this performance.
Jonathan Woolf
Staatskapelle Orchestra, Berlin/Kurt Masur 
