Mahler – Symphony No.5
Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra; Myung-Whun Chung
Deutsche Grammophon 481 154-0
Mahler – Symphony No.10
Orchestre Metropolitain; Yannick Nézet-Séguin
ATMA ACD2 2711
Two very different recordings pose the question: how “live” is a live performance? The Korean conductor Myung-Whun Chung has brought the Seoul Philharmonic to the world’s attention thanks to his recording contract with the venerable yellow label and the orchestra certainly sounds fabulous in this latest DG recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony. Though it is difficult to say precisely whether the credit lies entirely with the conductor or the German Tonmeister team, the results are sonically exceptional. It is, after all, quite unusual to detect the grainy sound of contrabassoon doublings so distinctly in the concert hall or to apprehend orchestral balances this clearly in real life live performances. In any case, Chung proves himself a master of this familiar work, conducted from memory and sensitively interpreted with a convincing Viennese lilt in the lengthy third movement Scherzo and a moving yet not maudlin performance of the celebrated Adagietto. The challenge of the Rondo finale is adroitly solved by taking a middle-ground tempo that binds together the ever-shifting tempi of the disparate sections.
Review
From the outset of his Tenth Symphony it is clear that Mahler was tentatively entering into a new sonic realm of expanded chromaticism and rhythmic freedom, tragically cut short by his untimely death at the age of 50. He left behind skeletal sketches of the entire work which has been reconstructed several times, the most familiar of these being the third Deryck Cooke version presented here. For the most part the Orchestre Métropolitain delivers an impressive performance save for some occasionally ragged playing by the brass section. Though the normal OM string section has been doubled in strength for this performance, they still fall 17 players short of the Seoul forces and the difference is telling. Nonetheless Nézet-Séguin uses this to his advantage, bringing forth a beautifully veiled pianissimo behind the exquisite flute solo in the moving finale of the work. ATMA’s production is far less interventionist, spliced (not altogether seamlessly) together from multiple performances in long takes with a modest array of microphones. Despite the disparate production values of these two releases it is the ATMA recording I find myself returning to most often; Nézet-Séguin clearly has something special to say about this least familiar Mahler symphony and I am willing to forgive its relatively minor shortcomings.
