Interact & Reviews / Reviews

David H Spence
While not featuring the utter paragon of tonal refinement, there was much to be gained from this Prom. The amount of literature spanned started to be enough to stretch any orchestra. Strings for the Mahler were a bit thin, and principal trumpet proved a bit substandard; any serious caveats ended right there. Pacing was generally speaking on the brisk side. One thought, except for the special broadening of pace and beautifully felt introspection for the Kindertotenlieder quote in the second movement, of the music of Part One of this decisively clear-headed, a bit riskily clear-textured, Mahler Fifth as seeing past, overcoming the tragedy all around. Specifics of phrasing were a little less than at the highest level, especially apparent in the two middle sections of the first movement, but thereafter things gradually got more focussed and improved somewhat.

The Scherzo had a very pleasing Vienniese lilt and ease to just about the entirety of it, with a few subito changes of tempo occurring as naturally as though they could have been written in, not to mention fine horn solo/obbligato. Tempo fluctuations, as marked for the Adagietto, were as beautifully managed as I have ever heard. At quite a flowing pace, this was among the most songful of Adagietto's I have heard yet.

The finale started, like much else earlier in the performance at relative low voltage, but maintaining utter simplicity throughout. By halfway through it, the exuberance of all the playing was infectious. Stenz beautifully highlighted the allargando halfway through the final chorale and dashed remaining coda off with great dash and exhilaration.

Stockhausen's Punkte - what a find for those who thought that Gruppen was his first orchestral masterpiece - with its swills, nooks, crannies, black holes, amorphous scrims of thin vapor above, deep rumblings beneath, and finally touches of melisma and other gesture to reassure us that a human voice was indeed at work in all this, made gripping listening and afterthought to the Mahler. All timbral, coloristic, and to an extent expressive potentials of just about every voice in the orchestra, combination thereof became just about fully, but always quite judiciously exploited.

For the third half of the concert, for which I regrettably missed the Good Friday Spell (Parsifal) encore, we had Schubert and Beethoven. Least successful of the four Schubert transcriptions was the slightly too antiphonally choppy setting of Staendchen, with for sake of personal stamp alone, excessively syrupy postlude by David Matthews. His brother's Nacht und Traume, and the best sung of the lot by Kirchslager, worked much better. Manfred Trojahn's orchestral setting, with vocal line exposing weak low notes for the singer, of Bei dir allein, was my favorite of the four.

Leonore No.3 got at once, a muscular, visceral, gripping account, but all beautifully weighted, proportioned, quite expressive - not lacking in expansiveness at the most still, tense, deeply introspective moments therein. Nothing of what had transpired earlier seemed to have been the least bit much, as affirming as this was. If not a conductor of the most refined orchestral sensibilities throughout, Stenz is someone, only musically speaking, with clear, healthy theatrical sense. What an auspicious debut for the Gurzenich at the Proms this most certainly was.

Bryan Walker
I listened to the Mahler 5 today on the BBC Radio 3 afternoon repeat of the concert.I'm sorry, i didn't enjoy the conductor's interpretation at all and I wasn't too impressed with the orchestra either. Give me Rattle, Solti or Chailly anytime.

Peter Fender
OK so they aren't as polished as some of the 'top' orchestras but what I liked a lot about them was that you could really tell that they were having a great time! They were playing for us, and I think that was what the audience responded to. Shame it didn't come over on the radio. (Not sure how you can make a comment like that about a conductor from 14 minutes on the radio Ian ... as a conductor myself I reckon he'd do just fine on Maestro!) Fantastic programming too. Bring them back next year.

Christopher Bayne
Mahler no 5 is a wonderful work and the performance was well paced but not memorable. How lucky we are to have so many wonderful British orchestras performing at the "Proms" . This orchestra from Germany was good, but, dare I say it, not in the same league as many of ours.

Raymond Cox
What a fine and memorable performance of Mahler's Fifth - clear, unified and revealing what must be years of experience by this orchestra with this music. The conducter let the music speak for itself and it never dragged. In fact a seamless, natural flow pervaded the whole thing and it was satisfyingly detached from musical indulgencies. (If one didn't know Boulez's approach to Mahler might have sprung to mind.) I hope they're invited back again.

Suraj
Great!

Ian
After 14 minutes I have just pressed the 'off' switch. This is Mahler turning in his grave. Incredible that such a poor orchestra is allowed to perform anywhere, let alone at the Proms. Strings poor, brass worse, conductor would not have got past round one in 'Maestro'. I have many recordings of this symphony and not one of them is as poor as this.