New York Philharmonic
Gavin Dixon
Alan Gilbert chose a surprisingly low-key programme to open the New York Philharmonic’s three-day Barbican residency, Bartók’s genre-defying Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta and Mahler’s modest Fourth Symphony. But it proved an engaging combination, and showed off many of the orchestra’s great strengths. Gilbert himself led with a steady hand, although his tempos were often propulsive, and even if some of the Mahler felt superficial, there were many moments of magic, especially in the last two movements, welcome reminders of the orchestra’s considerable form with this music.Bartók’s Read more ...
David Nice
This is difficult. An official obituary, such as the one I’ve just finished for The Guardian, has no problem in pointing out the achievements of Kurt Masur’s distinguished career. Whatever his party-line status in Honecker’s East Germany, which he used to get the Leipzig Gewandhaus rebuilt to his own satisfaction, Masur did play a crucial role as one of five spokesmen preventing a Tiananmen Square-style massacre before the Berlin Wall fell. In 2001 he responded swiftly with his New York Philharmonic to give a memorial performance of Brahms’s A German Requiem, motivated players to give free Read more ...
Gavin Dixon
Jaap van Zweden is going places. At 55, he is already 16 years into a second high-profile musical career. His first, as a violinist, saw him appointed leader of the Concertgebouw, the youngest ever to hold the position. From there, he moved to the conductor’s podium, and is now Music Director of the Dallas Symphony and the Hong Kong Philharmonic. According to some rumours, he is also under serious consideration for the New York Philharmonic. But when we met, our conversation began with a more immediate engagement, the première of Magnus Lindberg’s Second Violin Concerto with Frank Peter Read more ...
graham.rickson
Nielsen: Violin Concerto, Flute Concerto, Clarinet Concerto Nikolaj Znaider (violin), Robert Langevin (flute), Anthony McGill (clarinet), New York Philharmonic/Alan Gilbert(Dacapo)Nielsen's Violin Concerto opens with a crash and a growling pedal note. It's an unlikely opening to one of the most genial concertos in the repertoire. Sibelius's concerto is full of chilly glitter, but Nielsen offers his listeners a friendly hug. Everything that's great about this composer's music is here. The tunes are good. Structurally it's interesting. Tempi are predominantly slow, though the music is packed Read more ...
Gavin Dixon
Visits by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra are always an adrenaline boost for musical life in London, and yesterday evening was no exception. The first concert in their brief residency took in Finnish, French and German music (plus one Russian piece – the big Swan Lake waltz for an encore), all presented with a distinctly American accent. This is an orchestra that trades in big sounds, delivered with clarity and confidence. It is a seductive combination, and while subtleties were often overlooked, they were rarely lamented for long, as the sheer joy of the music-making swept you along.Esa- Read more ...
graham.rickson
Nielsen: Symphonies 5 and 6 New York Philharmonic Orchestra/Alan Gilbert (Dacapo)Nielsen told the press that his sixth and final symphony was “in a lighter vein than my other symphonies – there are cheerful things in it.” There are cheerful things in the other five too; the blazing positivity of this composer's music is its most endearing characteristic. No. 5 closes with an incandescent major chord, while No. 6 bids farewell with a farting bassoon pedal that would have pleased Haydn. This is a strange, occasionally baffling symphony, more capricious and wayward than its predecessors. Read more ...
Kimon Daltas
When Alan Gilbert’s Nielsen Project with the New York Phil and Danish label Dacapo is completed next year, it will total four CDs including the six symphonies, three concertos (flute, violin, clarinet) and two bonus overtures. The latest instalment (Symphonies 1 and 4) has just been released, while earlier this month the orchestra performed the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies and Maskarade Overture in three concerts which were recorded for release in January 2015. On the morning after the first of those concerts, Alan Gilbert talked about his love for Nielsen, why he’s jumping at the opportunity Read more ...
graham.rickson
Nielsen: Symphonies 1 and 4 New York Philharmonic/Alan Gilbert (Dacapo)Alan Gilbert tears into the opening of Nielsen 4 with some ferocity, sustaining the forward motion very nicely indeed. Until, well, we'll get to that later. This symphony needs to feel slightly unhinged, a boiling cauldron of sound. You suspect that this performance works so well because Gilbert hasn't micromanaged things, letting an on-form New York Philharmonic let rip. The brass scythe through the first movement with precision and abandon, and Gilbert's especially good at managing the tempo and metre changes. Read more ...
graham.rickson
Beethoven: Symphonies nos 5 & 7 Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique/John Eliot Gardiner (SDG)John Eliot Gardiner’s set of period-instrument Beethoven symphonies was a bestseller in the early 1990s. Technically brilliant, immaculately played and lavishly packaged, the readings followed Beethoven’s contentious metronome markings and remain a seminal listening experience, despite the claims of more recent sets by Emmanuel Krivine and Jos Van Immerseel. Gardiner’s new pairing of nos 5 and 7 was recorded live in Carnegie Hall a year ago. The pace still feels driven, the tension high Read more ...
igor.toronyilalic
The problem with being the closest major European capital to the United States is that touring American orchestras always visit us first or last. When they hit London, they're exhausted. This was very noticeable the first time the New York Philharmonic dropped by with their new chief conductor Alan Gilbert a few years back. They were a pale and baggy-eyed lot compared to the alert team I'd seen and heard just a few months before in New York. This time exhaustion wasn't the problem. They hadn't performed Mahler Nine since early January when the fourth movement was interrupted by the Read more ...