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Topic: East Coast Brucknerathon came and went.

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Posted by Romy the Cat on 08-12-2011
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Since the September 3, the Bruckner birthday is coming California and Connecticut have announced their annual Bruckner Marathons:

West Coast Brucknerathon:

Overture in G minor: Asahina / New Japan Philharmonic (live, JVC, 1980)
Symphony No. 0: Asahina / Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra (live, Fontec, 1982)
Symphony No. 1: Abbado / Vienna Philharmonic (live, DG, 1997)
Symphony No. 2: Levin / Norrlands Opera Orchestra (Lindoro, rec. 2010, to be released)
Symphony No. 3: Jochum / Staatskapelle Dresden (EMI, 1977)
Symphony No. 4: Klemperer / Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (live, EMI, 1966)
Symphony No. 5: Karajan / Berlin Philharmonic (DG, 1976)
Symphony No. 6: Cambreling / SWR Symphony Orchestra (Glor, 1998)
Symphony No. 7: Sinopoli / Staatskapelle Dresden (DG, 1991)
Symphony No. 8: Skrowaczewski / Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra (live, Denon SACD, 2010)
Symphony No. 9: Luisi / Staatskapelle Dresden (live, Sony, 2007)

The West Coast Brucknerathon will be held on  Saturday, September 3, 2011 at  3267 Madison Street, Carlsbad, California, 92008

East Coast Brucknerathon:

Symphony No. 6: Heinz Bongartz / Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra (CD)
Symphony No.3: Hans Zender / SWR Symphony Orchestra (Archive)
Symphony No.7: Yakov Kreizberg / Vienna Symphony Orchestra (SACD) *In Memoriam*
Symphony No.4: Franz Konwitschny (VSO) or Eugen Jochum (BPO) (subject to vote)
Symphony No.1: Vaclav Neumann / Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra (CD)
Symphony D-minor: Asahina / Tokyo Metropolitan Orchestra (Fontec CD)
Symphony F-minor: Gennadi Rozhdestvensky / USSR Ministry of Culture Orchestra (CD)
Symphony No.2: Dean Dixon / Hessian Radio Symphony Orchestra (Archive)
Symphony No.8: Lovro von Matacic / NHK Symphony Orchestra (DVD)
Symphony No.5: Paavo Jaervi / European Youth Orchestra (DVD)
Symphony No.9: Stanislaw Skrowaczewski / Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra (Blu-Ray)
Symphony No.9 Finale: Gerd Schaller / Philharmonie Festiva

The East Coast Brucknerathon will be held in Connecticut and more information will be available at John F. Berky’s web site at:

http://www.abruckner.com

As now, I am planning to attend the East Coast, perhaps second day only.  See you there.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat
Posted by Romy the Cat on 09-11-2011
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I attend the East Coast Brucknerathon yesterday. I was a pleasant event. It was around 15-20 people. The listing environment was incredible. The guy who hosted the event, Ken Jacobsen, has built up fantastic listing setup with speaker integrated very organically into his large cathedral ceiling room. The eating, cooking and the deck facility are all in the sweat spot of playback and as playback plays the entire house, with many rooms well saturated with music. Very nice and very much alike with the lines that I was trying to accomplish in my home. Due to that Ken has phenomenal floor plan for type of acoustic system he use the result of filing house with sound is much better then in my house. Anyhow, contrary to my expectations the Sound generaly was fine and the Sound for House was VERY good.

The program was in way controversial.  I do not know what Yakov Kreizberg’s Bruckner did in there but the people in there do know Bruckner for sure. The Hans Zender ‘s Third with SWR Symphony Orchestra was truly sensational and I would never heard it if I did not go there.  The kids from European Youth Orchestra under Paavo Jaervi shoed of very exiting B5, it was truly fun to watch them. Stanislaw Skrowaczewski with Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra shall be a try show stopper. It was not. It was very good play but the in my estimation the magnitude of the Zender ‘s Third overshadowed anything.

There was play of the “recomposed” last movement of the 9th symphony by William Carragan.  Perhaps it was too late at night and after good 13 hours of Bruckner listing I was too stuffed up but I did not resonated with me. As I fell it lacked the underlying melodic eloquence that Bruckner’s last symphonies have. It his have some very nice pulsating form but I think it was not good enough to be Bruckner’s last movements of the 9th symphony. The argument that William Carragan brought that he used all Bruckner’s original plans and sketches I find not sustaining – it means that Bruckner composed weak movement. Well, not weak but rather good enough to be a final of second symphony but not good enough to be the final of the 9th. I still would like to hear it again, with cleaner mind, however…

Generally the folks in there were a bit overly assessed with the anal-retentive side of the Bruckner music. There was a lot of talk about versioning, difference between the versioning, the structural analyses and references where Bruckner use his own quotes from his other works. This all is important but hold absolutely no interest to me.

The entire format of event I would say was a bit along the same line – a bit overly structured. I much more enjoyed listening the greatest performances, hearing what the Brucknerathon participants think about them and to socializing with the folks in there about this own Bruckner listening events. 

I did pitch to folks out my idea of facilitate in Boston Bruckner listening events. I do not know where it would go from there and it was interesting to see their reaction – they do not really understand the concept as they had no experience with audio as the expressive language. There were in there two guys from Boston. One was a celebrated  internet idiot and I pretty much discard him and another was music professor from Worcester, Bruckner scholar. It would be very interesting to play “my version” of Bruckner to him and hear his observations if it possible to use audio expressionism to publicize Bruckner music.

Rgs, The Cat
 

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