Search - Bruckner, Skrowaczewski, Saarbrucken Rso :: Symphony 5

Stunning

Gregory M. Zinkl | Chicago, IL | 07/28/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Well, the great thing about classical music is that different performances appeal to different people.



I love this version of the 5th. I have for a long time. Skrow's conducting and interpretation are outstanding--there's a reason who has won the Bruckner medal. The orchestra plays like a superstar. The strings don't have the weight of Vienna or Berlin, but then again, most orchestras don't have the $$ to have such large string sections! The string playing, however, is second-to-none. They have a gorgeous sound that is all their own.



For comparisons, I have: Gielen, Schuricht, Jochum (Philips and DG), Theilemann; I don't have any Karajans, and with the exception of his EMI 4th, I find him leaving me cold (but in awe of the technical accomplishments). They all offer something, but Skrow comes through in spades. The way he and his forces drive home the finale is outstanding.



If you want a Bruckner performance that is intelligent, well-played, and emotionally involving, I can't recommend this one high enough."

A decent but not outstanding Bruckner Fifth

Kenji Fujishima | East Brunswick, NJ USA | 07/31/2004

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is a decent but overall not outstanding performance of Bruckner's mighty Fifth Symphony.



The good points first. Conductor Stanislaw Skrowaczewski shows a scrupulous attention to detail in this performance that, more often than not, makes the piece sound fresh. All throughout the performance, you hear some little orchestral details here and there that you might have heard buried under the loud brass in other performances, now expertly brought to the surface by Skrowaczewski. Often those little things you hear are delightful; on occasion, though, it simply feels like detailing for its own sake. Still, it adds a certain interest and appeal to this performance, thanks in no small part to the sound recording, which sounds very fresh indeed.



As for the whole aural picture itself---well, the results are decidedly mixed. The inner movements work the best. The second movement Adagio is played swiftly, yet there is no lack of expressive force, and it never feels rushed (except maybe at the end). And the third movement Scherzo is also well-done, sounding convincingly weighty and "Austrian," as this music probably should. The problems are in the outer movements. The Finale's central fugue goes pretty well, taken steadily and yet with palpable underlying momentum to carry the listener along. And yet, in its outer sections, I wasn't always convinced by some of Skrowaczewski's tempo manipulations---he never sounds willful, but there's nothing wrong with taking the entire exposition in one tempo, as it is in the score. It is the first movement, though, that poses the biggest problems for me. There's nothing wrong with Skrowaczewski's broad tempo for the Allegro sections, but the orchestral playing simply doesn't have the proper weight of sound to justify the tempo. In Karajan's DG recording of this work, he takes an even slower tempo all throughout, and yet the Berlin Philharmonic, esp. its savage brass, make it sound truly monumental instead of merely slow and steady like it sounds with the Saarbrucken players here. Despite moments when the trumpets come through with a nicely loud sound, the Saarbrucken brass just seems too reined in (maybe deliberately reined in by its conductor?), and the strings cannot quite cover for the weak horns. (In addition, the timpani is nearly inaudible much of the time, which is certainly a problem in the first movement.) These inconsistencies in the playing of the Saarbrucken Radio Symphony Orchestra make the first movement a less-than-electrifying affair, and while the rest of the performance doesn't suffer quite as much, I think overall this concern is enough to bring this performance down a notch.



In short, Skrowaczewski's Bruckner Fifth has its outstanding features---notably, its freshly considered detail and its sound long-term structural command---but the sometimes weightless quality of the orchestral playing make the whole thing sound less than the sum of its parts (with an especially flat first movement). For those looking for a Bruckner Fifth on a budget, I would suggest the recently-reissued (on EMI Encore) Welser-Most performance with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, which presents a much tauter view of the piece but with all the weight of tone that one could ask for in this epic piece. It's cheaper than this Oehms Classics release, and overall a better performance. If Skrowaczewski was to have, say, the Vienna Philharmonic at his disposal in conducting this piece, this performance might be truly special. As it is, it's decent---sometimes slightly more than that, but overall merely decent."