COMPOSERS: Bruckner
LABELS: Arte Nova
ALBUM TITLE: Bruckner
WORKS: Symphony No. 4
PERFORMER: Linz Bruckner OrchestraDennis Russell Davies
CATALOGUE NO: 82876 604882
My one reservation first. Dennis
Russell Davies starts the slow
movement at an unusually lively
walking pace – not too contentious
in itself, but he’s unable to sustain it
through the climax and coda, giving
the movement an oddly lopsided feel,
structurally speaking. But the rest of
the performance is so revealing that
three stars seems too measly for a
final verdict.
Generally speaking, Davies and the
orchestra perform this first version
of the Fourth Symphony with such
understanding, warmth and authority
that it makes most other versions
I’ve heard sound like tentative readthroughs.
While Bruckner added
some splendid things in the revised
score, it wouldn’t have been a disaster
if he’d left it as it was. Yes, the familiar
scherzo is a better movement, but
the original is fascinating with its
eerie horn-calls (did Mahler see the
score?). Moreover the original finale
is a much better structure, and in
this performance its notoriously
complex rhythms spring to life.
And in all four movements there are
touches of Romantic poetry or sheer
breathtaking originality that one can
only regret losing. Doubts about the
end of the slow movement aside, no
one – not even the intermittently
impressive Georg Tintner on Naxos
– makes quite such a convincing
case for the original Bruckner Four.
Stephen Johnson