Clarity of vision and tonal splendour characterise this live performance of Mahler’s epic ‘Resurrection’ Symphony under Paavo Järvi. The Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra is joined by the Orféon Donostarria and soloists Alice Coote and Natalie Dessay.
Following their Virgin Classics disc of ‘Mahler Movements’, released in 2009, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and Music Director Paavo Järvi are now heard in a live recording of Mahler’s epic Symphony No 2, ‘Resurrection’.
This epic work comprises five movements and calls upon two soloists, a mezzo soprano, who sings the fourth-movement ‘Urlicht’ (here Alice Coote) and a soprano (Natalie Dessay), who soars over the massed forces in the final movement. The orchestra is joined by the celebrated choir from the Basque country, the Orféon Donostarria, which has been described by the Neue Zürcher Zeitung as “a miracle of sonic glory”.
The Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra (also known as the hr-Sinfonieorchester) became internationally celebrated as a Mahler orchestra in the 1970s and 80s, when Eliahu Inbal was its principal conductor. Now, the Estonian-born Järvi has established a distinctive approach to the Austrian composer’s music. As the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung judged after the concert performances of the ‘Resurrection’ in May 2009:
“It was to be expected that Järvi’s Mahler interpretation would not expend its energies on sentimentality or bombast. He is intent on exploring the wealth of contrasts in this symphony, to clarify structures and to crystallise the often innovative overlaying of compositional processes … His artistic understanding guaranteed a thoughtful, subtle interpretation, which was crowned by the contribution of the Orféon Donostarria choir from San Sebastian, splendidly accurate in its intonation and nuanced in its dynamics. Natalie Dessay and Alice Coote, meanwhile, impressed with the inspiration and intensity of their expression.”
The Frankfurter Rundschau felt that “it was as if an angelic lucidity had taken hold of the orchestra,” while the Frankfurter Neue Presse stated that: “The HR Symphony Orchestra again provided an impressive demonstration of its command of monumental material of this kind … Paavo Järvi exercised immaculate control over the huge forces … and cultivated a sound that was both transparent and imbued with intimations of death and resurrection.”
Those observations on Järvi’s vision of Mahler echo the critical response to the CD of ‘Mahler Movements’: “Even dyed-in-the-wool Mahlerians will hear things anew”, proclaimed Journal Frankfurt, while Fono Forum, Germany’s leading magazine in the field of classical recorded music, commented thus on the Adagio fragment from the 10th Symphony: “[Järvi’] shapes Mahler’s … final word atmospherically and sculpturally, convincing us of its unique greatness as a freestanding movement, while also developing its bold formal concept in a way which precludes even a moment’s doubt as to the validity of the fragment.”
Järvi, born in 1962, will become Music Director of the Orchestre de Paris from the 2010-11 season. In addition to his post in Frankfurt, he holds the position of Music Director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and is Artistic Adviser to the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Director of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen.
