Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Hartmut Haenchen [PentaTone PTC 5186 004]. Recording location: Concertgebouw, March 2001. Total playing time: 68:35. Format: SACD.
This is another wonderful SACD from PentaTone, a label I am quickly falling in love with. This recording is taken from a live performance and was recorded in the same venue as the Chailly/RCOA/Decca Mahler 5. Since this is a live recording, the excessive reverb issues present on the 1997 Chailly recording are avoided.The 1st movement opens with the trumpet solo played with a great deal of enthusiasm, and the ever-present triplet patters are clear for the most part. The trombones then got somewhat excited and some very minor problems arise. The strings have a wonderful and sweet sound throughout and Haenchen does a wonderful job shaping the musical contours. There is plenty of emotion and I found it very easy to really get into the music. The 2nd movement has a slower and more deliberate start that allows for some added transparency.


While Haenchen's 2nd is definitely amongst the more relaxed movements of my recordings, his interpretation does not lack in intensity where called for. Haenchen does a very fine job handling the many mood swings that occur in this movement. There are a few brief moments where the trombones get edgy again and transparency is sacrificed. The 3rd movement is another fine example of a conductor who wants to keep the music flowing and the feel here is more of one beat to a bar as opposed to some of the other recordings where we are assaulted by a stodgy waltz for the wheelchair ridden. As in the previous movement, Haenchen embraces the frequent mood changes with aplomb. Transitions are handled expertly and one comment I wrote reads "the music smiles". Pizzicato strings are nicely subdued though still come through pretty forward. Other comments include "sometimes edgy trumpet" and the famous horn obbligato is a little more distant as is typical in the hall and generated no goose bumps. Sometimes the horn even sounds a touch wobbly towards the end of the solo. The transition to the end section starts slowly but the tempo quickly picks up to press on to a rousing finale. The 4th movement is another sterling case for how to generate emotion and conviction without having to bore the audience to tears.


Haenchen's 8:54 Adagietto is only 21 seconds slower than Zander's. And like Zander, the music is allowed to express itself unlike Bernstein's nearly 3 minutes longer ponderous take. Needless to say, Haenchen's Adagietto is engrossing, musical and passionate with a lovely string sound. The string bass is sublime as the movement ends and provides a firm foundation as the movement dies away. Well done. The 5th movement opens briskly as though Haenchen does not want the momentum to die. Once again, there is wonderful contrast between sections and the conductor keeps everything flowing. Climaxes are massive yet transparency does not compact. There is not a great deal more to add. My only comments for the remainder of the movement are "he knows his stuff" and "kick it to the end". A hearty bravo is well deserved. This is a very fine recording that offers a splendid performance and a superior mastering job.
Berlin Philharmonic, Simon Rattle [EMI 7243 5 57385 2 3]. Recording Location: Philharmonie (live recording)/Berlin September, 2002. Total playing time 69:00. Format: RedBook.
This performance opens with probably the crassest trumpet solo of them all and the triplet patterns in the solo are inconsistent from phrase to phrase. One thing that struck me right away was the strong string prominence due to the excessively close miking. This prevails throughout the recording. After the opening trumpet solo, the strings tease out a very moving line that is intended to come across as quite mournful and Rattle achieves this effect with real suffering. Certain issues with this movement are some occasionally pecky trombones and trumpets. Halfway through the movement, there is another prominent trumpet solo and the player has some very obvious tuning issues. Of course, the old trumpet geek in me is hypersensitive to such failures. And despite some very soulful playing from the Berliners, there's some podium noise. Keep it down. The 2nd movement opens with vitality though the prominent strings upfront obscure the trumpet and trombones in their texture. Right in the middle of the
movement, Rattle enforces a rather drastic deceleration and I see no indication of this in my score (though to be fair, my Dover score is certainly not the definitive critical edition). Comments include good inner detail that, unlike the Chailly recording, does not detract from the music but simply makes it more interesting.


There is some excellent low brass here and comments were made on Rattle's ability to do wonders with the many changes of moods in this movement. Occasionally, there is some dryness to the recording that was not present in either the Mehta or Inbal recordings. The 3rd movement opens with a very nice flow. Right off the bat, we are treated to the unusual upfront placement of the solo horn obligato. This placement creates a very large and engaging presence and makes for some extremely fine playing. Changes of mood are handled with aplomb and the whole introduction is actually a touch on the aggressive side, rather exciting indeed.


The orchestra builds further steam leading up to the horn obligato part and here and in the later solo, things ranks very high on the goose bumps scale. The horn soloist is likely the most exciting player of all my 14 recordings. There are some minor nits as the string pizzicato playing and the close miking create some imbalances that I have not heard on any other recording. There is excellent woodwind playing and Rattle builds up to a raucous ending.


The Adagietto is the second fastest (9:33) but still one full minute slower than Zander's Telarc (8:33). Rattle's tempo in the Adagietto moves at a comfortable pace that is musical, loving, emotional and very appropriate for a love song. However, the Berlin string sound loses out to the better SACD sound of the Zander. In fact, it loses out to Inbal and Mehta as well as all of the SACDs (except for the EBS). Finally, the Adagietto ends with some really fat string bass. My love of fat string bass stems from my hearing the Israel Philharmonic on tour playing Schoenberg's "Transfigured Night" with fourteen double basses. The 5th movement here opens with a nice relaxed feel that doesn't hint at what is to come. This relaxed pace allows for some lyrical music making. Once again, Rattle displays an amazing ability to capture the moods. I scribbled a few comments on the fabulous horn section as well as some on the woodwinds. No other comments survived as I turned off the head and turned on the heart as a hearty and lustful performance came to a most exciting end. Standing ovation time!
Württembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen, Norichika Iimori [EBS 6144]. Recording Location: Studio der Württembergische Philharmonie/ Reutlingen. April 2003. Format: SACD
This SACD title was a gamble that did not pay off, sad since we have what appear to be a very competent orchestra and a conductor who seems to have a good grasp of Mahler's music. It's the recording engineers who cause the issues. To be fair, there are some nice moments but what makes Mahler's music (and not just the 5th Symphony) so exciting is the wide range of emotions and more importantly, dynamics. It is in the arena of dynamics here that everything goes to Hades when the orchestra gets above a certain dynamic threshold. This is about all I will say except for some further insult by way of a number of my RedBook CDs offering substantially better sound, most notably the Rattler, Mehta and Inbal.
Bamberger Symphoniker, Jonathan Nott [Tudor 7126]. Recording Location: Joesph Keilberth Saal/Bamberg, September 15-19, 2003. Total playing time: 72:19. Format: SACD.
This SACD is a very nice example of Mahler's 5th done correctly. The opening fanfare that starts the 1st movement is at a tempo that I find to be comfortable and that gives the symphony an excellent start. There is outstanding clarity in the opening triplets that is sometimes missing in the other recordings (as well as in all subsequent triplet patterns). The intense mood swings that tie together the sub sections of the first movement are all very competent. The 2nd movement opens at a brisker tempo than other recordings but without issue. Some of the close miking gives the pizzicato strings a slightly exaggerated placement but this same miking makes for some vivid and organic-sounding brass and woodwinds.
The 3rd movement is lovely and the famous solo horn part is something I did a little research on due to the prominent sounding soloist. Apparently,
Mahler's scoring of the "Corno Obligato" part has led some conductors to keep the solo horn player apart from the main horn section (which means in the front). I suspect that the horn player on this recording is doing just that as he (like the Berlin soloist) has a very upfront stage presence missing on all the other reading. Needless to say, this unusual placement gives a highly prominent placement for what should be an incredibly exciting solo very capably handled by the Bamberg player. Overall, the 3rd movement is definitely high on the chicken pimple scale. The Adagietto becomes the sole disappointment, treated as a funeral dirge rather than love song. At 10:59 and 3rd slowest behind Bernstein and Inbal, it's simply insufferable and painful to listen to. The 5th movement is far superior again, also offering nice air, transparency and a great deal of inner detail. Sometimes the trumpet and trombones hover on the pecky side but regain their footing quickly. Tempi are brisk overall yet do not convey anxiety to get things done with. Transitions capture the mood swings and portray proper contrast throughout. Overall, this performance would get a live audience to their feet and cheer. One a final note, the sound here is rather tight and I get a mental picture of a wedge-shaped orchestra. My tendency is to listen to the recording first and eventually read the booklet. I was surprised to see a picture of the orchestra in a tight wedge though stage width would have allowed a wider spread.
Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Yuri Temirkanov [WaterLily WLA-WES-76-SACD]. Recorded location: The Great Hall of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, September 20 & 22. Format: SACD.
This is the recording that started this project. I will give a little background first. Unlike all of the other recordings I own, the difference between this and them is the fact that Kavi Alexander had only two nights to record whereas the major labels usually enjoy several rehearsals plus extra sessions dedicated to the recording process. Here, there were no rehearsals, no sessions, no extra takes to fix mistakes. Two nights of live performances and that was it - come hell or high water. Another fact to point out is that the stage of the Great Hall is very wide yet shallow. The entire brass section is forced into the far right corner of the stage, causing serious imbalances when the brass really gets cranking and blows laterally across the orchestra. However, I have to give the recording special recognition for being the most natural sounding album of classical music I have ever heard. This alone makes it a superb addition to my library.
The trumpet solo opens at a tempo that makes the old trumpet player in me cringe. The slow tempo makes for some very abrupt playing from the principal trumpet. My heart feels for him. The slow mournful string melody that follows sounds beautiful but lacks some of the extra accents and emphatic phrasing other recordings tease out. The numerous orchestral triplets that prevail throughout the first half of the movement are nice and clear. There is some marvelous orchestral playing at times but occasionally the French horns get buried while at other times, they belt it out. Overall, this movement is solid and sets the tone for the rest of the symphony. The 2nd movement has less than clear strings though this could be the result of the conductor not letting the very noisy St. Petersburg audience settle down after the 1st movement. There is a good flow to the music and emotion aplenty. Dramatic moments build up nicely though string definition tends to get lost in the bigger climaxes. The mood swings here are captured well. Some of the slower passages made me write "very haunting". One comment pertained to comparing the soundstage on this recording against another SACD, the Tudor SACD with Nott/Bamberger which proved a study in contrasts. The WaterLily casts a very wide soundstage, the Bamberger orchestras is very narrow due to their seating arrangement.


The 3rd movement gets off to a good start though the odd horn placement diminishes the usual presence of the obligato. A few minutes into this movement, the lack of accents and emphasis made me write "sort of vanilla". The big horn obligato solo was anything but big. I noticed a strange imbalance between solo horn and section. It seems that one of the other section players was a much stronger player, obvious when soloist and section trade off repeated notes. Sad to say, the soloist scored low on the goose bump scale. The ending was stimulating again but the overbearing trumpet created serious balance issues. The Adagietto makes for one of the few times on this recording that we get to hear how lovely the St. Petersburg strings can sound. The first half is nearly painfully slow but picks up during the second half for a better impression. The string bass is fairly fleshy at the end. The 5th movement opens at a somewhat slower tempo than others but we hear more development of thematic material as opposed to the uninspired 3rd movement. Once again, balance issues of orchestral placement play havoc with string bass and woodwind clarity. During many of the large climaxes, the brass is simply too loud and we get some especially crass overblown trumpet playing. When the volume isn't too loud, there is some beautiful orchestral playing in evidence. The ending is far too fast, ill defined and almost out of control. The tepid audience response is the weakest I've ever been privy to.


Well, here were are finally, with fourteen recordings of one of the giant works in the world of symphonic music. I am well aware that there are many more recordings of this piece but these 14 give a good indication of what's available. It was also fun to include 5 SACD recordings to see how modern recordings and performances stack up against older ones. Though it was never my intent to arrange these albums in a definitive hierarchy, I will offer some concluding thoughts.


In the RedBook category, the following performances were noteworthy: Mehta/New York/Teldec; Järvi/Scottish/ Chandos; Rattle/Berlin/EMI; and Solti/Chicago/Decca.
Some of the best sounding CDs: Teldec/Mehta and Denon/Inbal
Best SACD performances: Tudor/Nott/Bamberger; PentaTone/Haenchen/Netherlands; and Telarc/Zander/Philharmonia
Best SACD sound: WaterLily/Temirkanov/St. Petersburg
Worst-sounding SACD: EBS/Iimori/Württembergische Phil


Some of the performances that did not fare or compare well:
RedBook: Inbal/Frankfurt; Bernstein/Vienna; Dohnányi/Cleveland; Chailly/RCOA; and Telarc/Levi/Atlanta
SACD: Temirkanov/St. Petersburg
In the ambivalent department, the EBS SACD performance is very good but impossible to enjoy to due to poor sound.
In conclusion:
These 14 recordings are not the end of my search for the "perfect" Mahler 5th recording. Considering that the only performances of Mahler's 5th that ever truly moved me were live performances, a recorded version of the perfect Mahler's 5th will likely never be available. The 14 recordings here are proof of that. The fact that I am a diehard fool for Mahler will never let me end my buying quest. And no, I do not just buy records of Mahler's 5th - all of Mahler's symphonies are fair game. There is a Japanese label called Fontec that has a new Mahler 5 coming out and there is always the MTT/San Francisco Mahler 5 SACD due out in 2006.


In closing, I hope that this overview proves interesting and entertaining. I want to publicly thank Maestro Peter Bay of the Austin Symphony for his insights and historical tidbits regarding Mahler's 5th Symphony. Many thanks, Maestro. As you'll know by now, I favor exciting Mahler and am not afraid of expressing personal likes and dislikes. I am aware that I have left out a few giants like the Bruno Walter/New York Philharmonic/Sony. But since I have recordings by two other 20th century Mahler experts (Bernstein and Solti), I hope that what I am offering is sufficient. Finally, remember that everything I wrote is simply my opinion and mine alone. If I wrote something negative about your favorite recording, I apologize.