Pressemeldung: Andris Nelsons neues Album: Bruckner Symphonien Nr. 1 und 5, Wagner “Tristan und Isolde” Prelude und Liebestod – 11.2.2022 (VÖ) – englisch only
11.02.2022
English only
Bruckner the Bold
“The First and Fifth Symphonies are remarkable.
Bruckner composed these works as uncompromisingly and as boldly as only few other works”
Andris Nelsons
Bruckner composed these works as uncompromisingly and as boldly as only few other works”
Andris Nelsons
New album opens with the Prelude and Liebestod from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, music that inspired Bruckner while he was working on his First Symphony and secured his lifelong love for the older composer’s work
“Under Nelsons’ baton Bruckner’s spiritualism and Wagnerian grandeur soar”
Wholenote Magazine
Wholenote Magazine
Andris Nelsons’ acclaimed cycle of the symphonies of Anton Bruckner with the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester continues with two remarkable works that show the Austrian composer’s creative imagination in all its glory. Their latest album, set for release by Deutsche Grammophon on 11 February 2022, places Bruckner’s Symphonies Nos. 1 & 5 in company with the Prelude and Liebestod from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde. The pairing of the two composers, a feature of the series, casts fresh light on the influence Bruckner took from Wagner and also highlights the overwhelming expressive intensity of both men’s music. Above all, this sixth album – recorded live at the Leipzig Gewandhaus – reveals the vivid emotional contrasts at the heart of Bruckner’s monumental symphonic scores.
“Bruckner was forty when he began work on what we now call his First Symphony,” notes Andris Nelsons. “At the time, he was known as a church organist and composer of sacred music. He had little money and even less confidence in his abilities as a symphonic composer. Yet the First Symphony, much like the Fifth, is touched by his youthful energy as well as his existential plight. This tension creates an extraordinary spiritual depth to these strikingly bold and uncompromising works. We chose to record the First Symphony in the revised version Bruckner made towards the end of his life. The Gewandhausorchester musicians have a deep sensibility and understanding for the composer’s sound world, and I am so glad that Deutsche Grammophon was present in Leipzig to record our performances ahead of the bicentenary of his birth in 2024. We hope this album will touch the hearts of many listeners, and also give newcomers a chance to discover and love this beautiful music.”
Critics have recognised the special qualities of musicianship and interpretation invested by Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester in their Bruckner series. “There’s a consistently superb playing from all sections of the orchestra,” observed the Guardian (London) of the cycle’s initial recording in 2017 of the Third Symphony, hailed by Gramophone for its “direct, clear-sighted and spacious” qualities and for Nelsons’ “meticulous” attention to details of dynamics, phrasing and tonal balance.
Superlative reviews also followed the releases of Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony and the Prelude to Wagner’s Lohengrin (2018); the Seventh Symphony and Siegfried’s Funeral March from Götterdämmerung (also 2018); and the double-disc set of the Sixth and Ninth Symphonies together with the Siegfried Idyll and the Prelude to Parsifal (2019). “Andris Nelsons and his Leipzig players provide a masterclass in the creation of a sound world that perfectly serves their larger purpose,” noted Gramophone, meanwhile, of the cycle’s fifth instalment (2021), which presents both the Second Symphony and the monumental Eighth, as well as the Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.
The Gewandhausorchester was among the early champions of Bruckner’s symphonies, adding his music to its repertoire in the mid−1880s. In December 1884 the orchestra drew international attention to the composer’s work when it gave the world premiere of his Seventh Symphony under the direction of the charismatic Arthur Nikisch. The Austro-Hungarian conductor performed the complete cycle of symphonies with the orchestra during the 1919–20 season, setting the foundations for a fine Bruckner tradition in Leipzig. Before embarking on its latest series for Deutsche Grammophon, the Gewandhausorchester had twice recorded the complete symphonies, with Kurt Masur and Herbert Blomstedt respectively, and made many recordings of individual symphonies under, among other leading Bruckner interpreters, Franz Konwitschny and Kurt Sanderling.
Andris Nelsons’ Deutsche Grammophon discography, which also includes the complete Beethoven symphonies and the first five volumes of a Shostakovich cycle, reflects his desire to be fully immersed in the works of a particular composer. The Latvian conductor’s next project for the Yellow Label trains the spotlight on the major orchestral works of Richard Strauss, which he has recorded with his two orchestras, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Gewandhausorchester. Their 7-CD set, complete with a joint performance of the Festliches Präludium for large orchestra, will be released on 6 May 2022 ahead of an extensive European tour with both orchestras comprising concerts in London, Vienna, Leipzig, Hamburg and Paris (9–31 May).
