MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger


Support us financially by purchasing this from

Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64
Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra / Mariss Jansons
rec. live, 9 October 2009, Philharmonie im Gasteig, Munich, Germany
BR KLASSIK 900104 [45:38]

It was with Tchaikovsky that Jansons first burst onto my radar, with his poleaxingly brilliant series of the symphonies, recorded in the 1980s in Oslo for Chandos. Despite stiff competition from Pletnev, it’s still my go-to choice for the complete set. However, if you could criticise that Chandos set (and, for that matter, the Pletnev one) then it’s for ungenerous use of disc space, and that’s a criticism to level here, too. There was plenty of room for a coupling here, and the disc is made uncompetitive by having only one symphony on it, something that’s only just forgivable because of the super-budget price.

The performance itself is very good, however. Jansons’ sense of pacing is extremely well judged, the opening sounding steady and lugubrious without ever wallowing, and the first movement’s main Allegro sounds urgent and purposeful. There’s a lovely slowing-up for the first appearance of the lyrical second theme, at which the BRSO strings let their hair down and revel in the sheer beauty of the sound. The music then surges with a lovely sense of ebb and flow into a development that propels onwards, climaxing in an exciting coda.

The middle strings that launch the slow movement are beautifully understated, and the knockout horn solo is a model of sustained legato. When the cellos take up the theme it has a lovely, honeyed quality to it, which is answered when the violins take on the counter-theme. The whole movement is a delight, not least in the music’s pained response to the symphony’s motto theme, which rattles out of the trumpets like machine gun fire. Maybe the odd build is a little mismanaged, but you can forgive that in a live performance, and there are no such quibbles with the debonair Waltz movement that follows.

The finale begins and ends with slow music that here sounds gloriously pompous, slightly undermining the composer’s intended triumphal climax, but the fast music in between crackles with excitement and has a lovely feeling of building. Perhaps it doesn’t burn red hot, but if I’d heard this in the concert hall I’d have been pretty happy. The applause from the Munich audience (given here) is certainly warm, if not exactly ecstatic.

This might not be a library choice, then, and it isn’t as consistently recommendable as Jansons’ earlier Oslo performance, but it’s still warmly enjoyable. BR Klassik also throw in a catalogue to mark the label’s tenth anniversary, though I doubt that will swing many waverers.

Simon Thompson

Previous review: Robert Cummings



Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing