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What CD Are You Hearing Now?

Wow, I love that. I was about to say it's my favourite, but come to think of it, every time I listen to any of Brahms' symphonies I declare that that particular one is my favourite. Until I listen to another one, and then that one becomes my favourite. :rflmao:
I love all four of them to bits.
I have three recordings of the Third, though none with Abbado. I think I should look for one to add to my collection.
 
Vlad Soare said:
Wow, I love that. I was about to say it's my favourite, but come to think of it, every time I listen to any of Brahms' symphonies I declare that that particular one is my favourite. Until I listen to another one, and then that one becomes my favourite. :rflmao:
I love all four of them to bits.
I have three recordings of the Third, though none with Abbado. I think I should look for one to add to my collection.
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This is the only recording I have of the 3rd.

Of the 3 you own, which one do you like the most?
 
I have the Third (actually all four of them) with Karajan and Berliner Philarmoniker, Günter Wand and the NDR (the Hamburg radio orchestra), and John Eliot Gardiner and the Royal Concertgebouw (very fresh edition, released only two months ago).

Karajan is really nice, extremely competent, perfectly balanced. A solid, profously Germanic performance, and the perfect yardstick to compare the others against. His only flaw is that he doesn't repeat the exposition in the first movement. He never did. I don't think I've ever heard Karajan repeat an exposition.

Günter Wand is very similar. Same sound, same kind of approach, same serious, Germanic flavour. Which is no wonder, considering that both conductors and both orchestras are deeply rooted in the German school of the past century. The differences are very subtle. Wand seems a tiny bit more dynamic. I don't mean dynamic as in faster, but in the sense that differences between extremes are just a bit more pronounced in his performance than in Karajan's. Fast passages are a bit faster than Karajan's. Lyrical passages are a bit more lyrical than Karajan's. But not by much. Just a tiny bit, barely noticeable. Karajan is more balanced, while Wand feels a bit more "alive".
Overall, especially in the final movement, Wand's seems a bit crisper, while Karajan a bit more flexible. But that's not necessarily good or bad either way. Both versions sound great.
Also, Wand repeats the exposition in the first movement. This earns him extra points.

Gardiner is different, but in a very interesting, intriguing way. I have described this set on a different forum when I got it, so I'm going to paste the description that I posted there at the time:

"Overall, there's a general sensation of crispness, of sharpness. If I had to describe these recordings in a single word, that would be "crisp". Or "sharp". The orchestra feels like a well-oiled machine, having all its screws tightened exactly to the correct torque. There's no stray sound, nothing that might betray any trace of weakness in this high precision mechanism. All the instruments are so perfectly synchronized that they feel as if there were only one of each.
The tempo is a bit to the brisk side, but in a very interesting way. In several places, when it was a bit more alert than I was used to, and I knew that a slower section was about to come very soon, I was afraid that he might be too fast by the time he gets there and might ruin it. But no, he was able to slow down just in time, and even smoothly at that, causing me to breathe a sigh of relief.
It feels as if I were a passenger in a car driven by somebody else, approaching a traffic light at a speed that I deemed a bit too high. So I would become tense, I would brace either for impact or for a sharp brake at the last moment, but somehow the driver would manage to slow down perfectly smoothly, and to do it just in time to stop exactly at the right spot, thus relieving me of a tension that now proves to have been unnecessary. It's like he's telling me, "trust me, I know what I'm doing", but I'm not feeling entirely confident; I would like to trust him, but I still feel tense, but in the end it turns out he was right, and I feel relieved.
I'm not sure if my description makes sense, but that's the best analogy I can come up with. It's a very interesting sensation, one that I've never got with those well-behaved Germanic interpretations."

I love all three, each in its own way. All of them are great. If I had to choose just one, I think I would choose Gardiner. Karajan and Wand are both great (and very similar), but Gardiner's performance feels fresh and intriguing. It brings Brahms into the 21st century while still preserving his romantic charm. If I had to name a favourite, he would be it. But I'm happy I don't have to choose, because I like to listen to all three, and each time I do, I love that particular one.
 
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iu
 
Speaking of John Eliot Gardiner and his most recent Brahms symphony cycle, I gave the First a spin today.

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My first contact with Mahler's first symphony was in the mid-eighties. From the first movement I didn't understand much, mostly because my simple and cheap turntable was unable to render fine detail at low volume, nor was it capable of high dynamics. The second movement was OK, I liked it. From the third movement I didn't understand too much either. And the fourth movement... disaster. I found it an incomprehensible cacophony, like a dozen frying pans falling down the stairs.

Years later I gave it a second chance. This time I also liked the first and third movements (since I could hear them much better on CD, with good speakers), but I still had difficulties with the fourth. That is, until recently, when someone on a different forum recommended a recording that finally made all the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. Now I absolutely love this symphony from start to end, no exceptions. I can't have enough of it.

This is it. Mariss Jansons and the Royal Concertgebouw, a live recording from 2006. The sound is so good that you can't tell, not even for one second, that you're listening to a live recording. Only the applause at the end gives it away. The sound engineer must have been a genius.

No Mahler lover should miss this recording. And if you don't love Mahler yet, I think this is the best starting point to get to love him.

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jars of clay "the eleventh hour" 2002

What's special about playing this album, is it won't play on any of my other CD players because it's so badly scratched! I bought it in a flea market and couldn't see how truly scratched in the sun that it was.

I have a very early mid 80s Fisher AD-823 player that can magically play anything I put in it without skipping. I have a whole collection of badly scratched CDs that I was going to throw out because of an in-dash car slot load player many years ago, but now I can play all of them because of the Fisher! If you saw the disc in person, you wouldn't believe it.

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Boston Pops I Love a Parade followed by Unforgettable with the Boston Pops with John Williams conducting. If you want feel a march the I love a Parade is the Album for you. I love the ambience of the hall that both recordings captured along with the music, I have a few other Boston Pops with John conductig that are quite fabulous, too. Another is Pops A La Russe. There is also a Rimsky-Korsakov album with the BSO conducted by Ozawa that is a real enlighten experience. So thats just over 4 hours of Great Boston Sounds.
 
Vlad Soare said:
I have the Third (actually all four of them) with Karajan and Berliner Philarmoniker, Günter Wand and the NDR (the Hamburg radio orchestra), and John Eliot Gardiner and the Royal Concertgebouw (very fresh edition, released only two months ago).

Karajan is really nice, extremely competent, perfectly balanced. A solid, profously Germanic performance, and the perfect yardstick to compare the others against. His only flaw is that he doesn't repeat the exposition in the first movement. He never did. I don't think I've ever heard Karajan repeat an exposition.

Günter Wand is very similar. Same sound, same kind of approach, same serious, Germanic flavour. Which is no wonder, considering that both conductors and both orchestras are deeply rooted in the German school of the past century. The differences are very subtle. Wand seems a tiny bit more dynamic. I don't mean dynamic as in faster, but in the sense that differences between extremes are just a bit more pronounced in his performance than in Karajan's. Fast passages are a bit faster than Karajan's. Lyrical passages are a bit more lyrical than Karajan's. But not by much. Just a tiny bit, barely noticeable. Karajan is more balanced, while Wand feels a bit more "alive".
Overall, especially in the final movement, Wand's seems a bit crisper, while Karajan a bit more flexible. But that's not necessarily good or bad either way. Both versions sound great.
Also, Wand repeats the exposition in the first movement. This earns him extra points.

Gardiner is different, but in a very interesting, intriguing way. I have described this set on a different forum when I got it, so I'm going to paste the description that I posted there at the time:

"Overall, there's a general sensation of crispness, of sharpness. If I had to describe these recordings in a single word, that would be "crisp". Or "sharp". The orchestra feels like a well-oiled machine, having all its screws tightened exactly to the correct torque. There's no stray sound, nothing that might betray any trace of weakness in this high precision mechanism. All the instruments are so perfectly synchronized that they feel as if there were only one of each.
The tempo is a bit to the brisk side, but in a very interesting way. In several places, when it was a bit more alert than I was used to, and I knew that a slower section was about to come very soon, I was afraid that he might be too fast by the time he gets there and might ruin it. But no, he was able to slow down just in time, and even smoothly at that, causing me to breathe a sigh of relief.
It feels as if I were a passenger in a car driven by somebody else, approaching a traffic light at a speed that I deemed a bit too high. So I would become tense, I would brace either for impact or for a sharp brake at the last moment, but somehow the driver would manage to slow down perfectly smoothly, and to do it just in time to stop exactly at the right spot, thus relieving me of a tension that now proves to have been unnecessary. It's like he's telling me, "trust me, I know what I'm doing", but I'm not feeling entirely confident; I would like to trust him, but I still feel tense, but in the end it turns out he was right, and I feel relieved.
I'm not sure if my description makes sense, but that's the best analogy I can come up with. It's a very interesting sensation, one that I've never got with those well-behaved Germanic interpretations."

I love all three, each in its own way. All of them are great. If I had to choose just one, I think I would choose Gardiner. Karajan and Wand are both great (and very similar), but Gardiner's performance feels fresh and intriguing. It brings Brahms into the 21st century while still preserving his romantic charm. If I had to name a favourite, he would be it. But I'm happy I don't have to choose, because I like to listen to all three, and each time I do, I love that particular one.
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For me, Brahms works best with a lean sonority, transparent orchestral textures, and non-interventionist conducting that lets the music speak for itself. One commentator described rhythm as "Brahms's secret weapon." Brahms would sometimes start a melody on the weak beat (e.g., 2 or 4 instead of 1 or 3) to evoke an unsettled feeling until it eventually snaps back to regularity. Consequently the performances I prefer use sharply etched rhythms to clarify the contrasts. Moving right along, in the Third Brahms did not include a true slow movement, the second movement being marked Andante and the third Poco Allegretto. Performances using slower tempos create a lugubrious feeling out of character with the music. Note also that Brahms did not instruct any deviations from the basic tempo in either of the inner movements with the exception of a "poco rit." at the end of the Andante though a conductor would typically apply some subtle adjustments.

The Andante could be thought of as a slowish march, gently swaying, and for me, even a slower tempo can work if the tempo is held steady, as in Reiner/CSO or Skrowaczewski/Halle. The Poco Allegretto, a kind of slower-than-usual scherzo, suffers if played too slowly and with gratuitous, momemtum-breaking tempo adjustments.

A few of my favorite Brahms Thirds:

Antal Dorati / London Symphony (Mercury / 1963): This one has it all. Propulsive and rock-solid tempos, razor-sharp orchestral execution, transparent if typically dry recording. Dorati observes the first movement exposition repeat and breezes through the Poco Allegretto in 4:30, and while the Andante is on the long side it never drags. This is not just an excellent realization in its own right but demonstrates how persuasive a Brahms performance can be when the barnacles are cleared away.

Wolfgang Sawallisch / Vienna Symphony [not the Philharmonic] (Philips / 1963): More genial than Dorati and excludes the repeat, but is similarly bright, energetic, and straightforward.

Fritz Reiner / Chicago Symphony (RCA / 1957): A spirited, unmannered performance in remarkably good if mellow 1957 sound. The beauty of the wind solos must be heard to be believed.

Bruno Walter / Columbia Symphony (Columbia [Sony] 1960): I felt a special pleasure in revisiting this recording since it's the first I ever heard, from my father's LP collection. The CD reissue sounds very good, though the low strings could use more definition. Over the years my suspicion was that numerous other Thirds didn't measure up to this one and that was confirmed when I listened to it a few days ago. Sound is leaner than the typical recording of its era and idiomatic for Brahms compared to performances that obscure intensity and vitality with plush, too-thick sonorities. The Columbia Symphony in this instance was a pickup ensemble in LA; the label applied that name to several ad-hoc ensembles in different locations.

OK, I'll throw in a relatively modern digital recording. Christoph von Dohnanyi / Cleveland Orchestra (Teldec / c. 1988): A lively performance, propulsive in the outer movements and steady in the Andante and Poco Allegretto, captured in fine sound.

Caveats: This is not intended as a comprehensive survey. I have known and loved this music for more than 50 years, and for me it's fun to identify performances that make it come alive. As always, YMMV, and if your preferences are different, I would never cast aspersions on them.

And finally, for those who love Brahms but haven't yet explored his chamber music, indescribable riches await you. Spin some up and be moved!
 
rf225 said:
For me, Brahms works best with a lean sonority, transparent orchestral textures, and non-interventionist conducting that lets the music speak for itself. One commentator described rhythm as "Brahms's secret weapon." Brahms would sometimes start a melody on the weak beat (e.g., 2 or 4 instead of 1 or 3) to evoke an unsettled feeling until it eventually snaps back to regularity. Consequently the performances I prefer use sharply etched rhythms to clarify the contrasts. Moving right along, in the Third Brahms did not include a true slow movement, the second movement being marked Andante and the third Poco Allegretto. Performances using slower tempos create a lugubrious feeling out of character with the music. Note also that Brahms did not instruct any deviations from the basic tempo in either of the inner movements with the exception of a "poco rit." at the end of the Andante though a conductor would typically apply some subtle adjustments.

The Andante could be thought of as a slowish march, gently swaying, and for me, even a slower tempo can work if the tempo is held steady, as in Reiner/CSO or Skrowaczewski/Halle. The Poco Allegretto, a kind of slower-than-usual scherzo, suffers if played too slowly and with gratuitous, momemtum-breaking tempo adjustments.

A few of my favorite Brahms Thirds:

Antal Dorati / London Symphony (Mercury / 1963): This one has it all. Propulsive and rock-solid tempos, razor-sharp orchestral execution, transparent if typically dry recording. Dorati observes the first movement exposition repeat and breezes through the Poco Allegretto in 4:30, and while the Andante is on the long side it never drags. This is not just an excellent realization in its own right but demonstrates how persuasive a Brahms performance can be when the barnacles are cleared away.

Wolfgang Sawallisch / Vienna Symphony [not the Philharmonic] (Philips / 1963): More genial than Dorati and excludes the repeat, but is similarly bright, energetic, and straightforward.

Fritz Reiner / Chicago Symphony (RCA / 1957): A spirited, unmannered performance in remarkably good if mellow 1957 sound. The beauty of the wind solos must be heard to be believed.

Bruno Walter / Columbia Symphony (Columbia [Sony] 1960): I felt a special pleasure in revisiting this recording since it's the first I ever heard, from my father's LP collection. The CD reissue sounds very good, though the low strings could use more definition. Over the years my suspicion was that numerous other Thirds didn't measure up to this one and that was confirmed when I listened to it a few days ago. Sound is leaner than the typical recording of its era and idiomatic for Brahms compared to performances that obscure intensity and vitality with plush, too-thick sonorities. The Columbia Symphony in this instance was a pickup ensemble in LA; the label applied that name to several ad-hoc ensembles in different locations.

OK, I'll throw in a relatively modern digital recording. Christoph von Dohnanyi / Cleveland Orchestra (Teldec / c. 1988): A lively performance, propulsive in the outer movements and steady in the Andante and Poco Allegretto, captured in fine sound.

Caveats: This is not intended as a comprehensive survey. I have known and loved this music for more than 50 years, and for me it's fun to identify performances that make it come alive. As always, YMMV, and if your preferences are different, I would never cast aspersions on them.

And finally, for those who love Brahms but haven't yet explored his chamber music, indescribable riches await you. Spin some up and be moved!
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Thank you for the recommendations. I will check them out.
How about the Second? Any suggestions for that?
 
Phantom of the Opera - original cast with Michael Crawford and Sarah Brightman.

For me, the guys and girls that followed, while stunning in their own right, just don't quite hit the spot in the same way.
 
Vlad Soare said:
Thank you for the recommendations. I will check them out.
How about the Second? Any suggestions for that?
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I've recently listened to two that I really like, one from the Sawallisch / Vienna Symphony set, and Herbert Blomstedt with the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra. The former does not include the exposition repeat in the first movement; Blomstedt does. I'll try to work in some others between other listening projects. In general, I think the Third is more difficult to bring off persuasively while it's easy to find really good Seconds.

Incidentally, Blomstedt is now 97 and is still conducting, though he has canceled some recent engagements. I'm a huge fan. Also, Christoph von Dohnanyi, whose Third I recommended and whose Second I have previously enjoyed, is 94 and also still working. The old rule of thumb is, composers die young, conductors live long.
 
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