MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: In memoriam: Michael Gielen: Mahler: Symphony No. 6 [recorded 1971 & 2013]

MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: In memoriam: Michael Gielen: Mahler: Symphony No. 6 [recorded 1971 & 2013] cover $60.00 Low Stock add to cart

GUSTAV MAHLER
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: In memoriam: Michael Gielen: Mahler: Symphony No. 6 [recorded 1971 & 2013]
SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg, Michael Gielen, Michael Gielen (conductor)

[ Hanssler / 3 CD Box Set ]

Release Date: Friday 9 August 2019

Recorded 42 years apart, these two performances of Mahlers Sixth Symphony are highly contrasted in terms of tempo, sense of structure and interpretation. It is certainly appropriate to commemorate Michael Gielen with these two recordings of the work he performed most often recordings that represent the opposite poles of Gielens Mahler interpretations. For the first time ever on disc, this edition includes the 1971 recording of Mahlers Symphony No. 6 in its original sound quality.

"[2013 performance] This isn't a slow march to nowhere. Once you adjust, you find yourself hearing Mahler's music as Celibidache might
have conducted it. An extreme treatment matches extreme music. I was fascinated, frankly, and the excellent playing from the SWR Symphony, along with impeccable studio-quality sound, adds to the spell. Not only the final crack of doom but many passages along the way are shattering." Fanfare

"There is no shortage of poise or brilliance about the playing [in the 1986 performance], over and above the expected level of dedication which lends the performance a palpable sense of occasion...The 2013 concert is something else…Gielen holds the finale together with the kind of unfolding logic we might more readily associate with the Unfinished Symphony." Gramophone

"The first, from 1971, is shimmering, vigorous and pretty good - but the second, from 2013, is the real deal: so slow, dark and heavy that it feels, by the end, truly like horror in sound." New York Times

Tracks:

Mahler: Symphony No. 6 in A minor 'Tragic'
rec. 1971

Mahler: Symphony No. 6 in A minor 'Tragic'
rec. 2013

Interview Excerpt: Was Mahler Religious?