Martyn Brabbins deserves credit for playing Hindemith utterly without that clunky, Teutonic heaviness that can make so many performances of this music (including many of the composer’s own) so unappetizing. The finale of Mathis der Maler, in particular, has plenty of forward momentum, which also describes the second movement of the Concert Music and the outer movements of the Symphonic Metamorphosis. However, this is not entirely an unmixed blessing.
That finale of the Concert Music, for example, could have done with a stronger rhythmic emphasis. At times Brabbins seems to be skating across the surface. The opening of the finale of Mathis completely lacks menace, with the final chorale bereft of any feeling of culmination. Part of the problem stems from the fact that the playing, while note-accurate, is remarkably faceless. The polyphonic central development of Mathis’ first movement, for example, needs to sound far more emphatic. Why don’t the trumpets cut through the texture in the their big solo in the Symphonic Metamorphosis’ opening allegro?
Despite warm recorded sound, the interpretations just don’t have the character that the music demands. If you compare these performances to those by Bernstein, or Blomstedt, or (in Mathis and the Concert Music) Steinberg/Boston, you will notice immediately what is missing. Also, the program isn’t terribly imaginative given the amount of under-recorded Hindemith. Efficient, then, but not much more.
