Like many German conductors, Michael Gielen specializes in misery, which is not exactly Haydn’s defining quality. There’s enough of it in the Nelson Mass to pique Gielen’s interest in the opening Kyrie and the militant Benedictus, and Eva Lind is an excellent soprano soloist. But in the Gloria Gielen’s tempo turns mechanical, as if he’s bored with the piece, and good choral singing doesn’t make up for the prevailing dullness. In the “Drumroll” symphony we get a real improvised timpani solo to open, as in Harnoncourt’s performance, which surely is historically correct. But then Gielen races through the introduction in order to make some point about tempo relationships in the first movement, and having made it, we can only wonder why he bothered. It’s an expressive nullity, and though the rest of the work goes well enough technically, there’s little joy and bravura to the playing in the latter stages of the second movement, never mind the finale. While this is not horrible, it’s also not nearly good enough to justify purchase.
