Bruckner's Middle Symphonies at Carnegie Hall

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Parent Category: Other Festivals

Category: Music

Published on Monday, 06 February 2017 19:11

Written by Jack Angstreich

The extraordinary Anton Bruckner symphony cycle at Carnegie Hall, with the Staatskapelle Berlin under the admirable direction of the renowned Daniel Barenboim, continued impressively with the fourth concert, which was presented on the evening of Monday, January 23rd.

Barenboim and the ensemble beautifully sustained the high level of musicianship they had achieved on the first three nights of the cycle, opening with a luminous performance of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's lovely penultimate piano concerto, the No. 26 (the "Coronation"), with the maestro conducting from the piano. However, the most sublime music yet heard in the series was the eloquent account of the ensuing, grand Symphony No. 4, the "Romantic"—heard here in the revised, 1878-1880 version—one of Bruckner's most purely accessible essays in the genre. The enthusiasm in the applause following this surpassed that of the previous programs, and understandably so.

The next evening opened with a charming reading of the appealing Sinfonia concertante in E-flat Major for Oboe, Clarinet, Bassoon, Horn, and Orchestra, controversially attributed to Mozart, with Gregor Witt on oboe, Matthias Glander on clarinet, Mathias Baier on bassoon, and Radovan Vlatković on French horn, each one very fine. The second half of the program was a study in extreme contrast, featuring the titanic Symphony No. 5. From a technical viewpoint this was the most remarkable accomplishment thus far in the cycle, if only for the realization of the awesome finale. Fittingly, Barenboim and the musicians drew enormous applause.

A pinnacle amongst the Mozart works in this series was achieved on the following evening with a dazzling account of the exquisite Piano Concerto No. 22, with Barenboim again conducting from the piano. This was one of the finest presentations of the composer's piano concertos that I have ever heard in the concert hall and the soloist was in supreme form. The astonishing lucidity of the Mozart was even more strikingly equaled in the performance of the challenging Symphony No. 6, heard in an elegant and confident reading that, one hopes, presages further delights to be encountered in the final three concerts of the cycle. The musicians were once again robustly applauded.

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