In some circles Hans Knappertsbusch has the reputation of a great Brucknerian, but you certainly couldn’t prove it by this dreadful performance of the Symphony No. 8. The things that are wrong here are voluminous, but I’ll highlight the most pertinent flaws. First, Knappertsbusch uses not the Haas nor even the Nowak edition, but a version by Joseph Schalk, that notorious Wagnerizer of Bruckner’s original scores. In this case his meddling seems limited to spurious instrumental doublings and other textural “fill-ins”, as well as further cuts in the finale (including a rewrite of the transitional woodwind passage just before the finale’s coda). Schalk may have tinkered with the dynamics too, though I suspect this is attributable to Knappertsbusch’s “inspired” and off-the-cuff (he didn’t believe in rehearsals) revelations.
What, for example, is gained by turning Bruckner’s carefully constructed tutti climaxes into long diminuendos, as he does at the end of the first movement, and even more horrifically in the adagio’s great passage? Add to this Knappertsbusch’s odd concept of orchestral balance (inner voices given undue prominence, important leading lines obscured at transitional points) and you have some very strange Bruckner indeed. Perhaps if the orchestral playing had been better (the Munich Philharmonic slops through this performance with ragged ensemble and tentative intonation), you could argue that this was an individual and visionary interpretation, but I strongly doubt it. With Bruckner Eighth’s around by Jochum, Wand, Maazel, Karajan, and Schuricht you won’t be needing this one.
Knappertsbusch’s reputation for being a great Wagner conductor is upheld by this radiant performance of the Lohengrin prelude, played shockingly well by the same orchestra. Siegfried Idyll is so warmly and beautifully phrased that I’m willing to overlook the occasionally mis-tuned horns. Things start to slip, I’m afraid, in the Parsifal prelude, with the muted brass fanfares reintroducing Knappertsbusch’s upside-down idea of what a climax should be. So much for pulling the fat out of the fire. The remastered Westminster recordings (from 1962-63) offer limited dynamic range and (in the Bruckner) a sound that is not a model of clarity.
