Carl Reinecke’s Symphony No. 1 (1858) is seldom performed, so it’s useful to have Alfred Walter’s fine recording with the Rhenish Philharmonic available at budget price. Orchestral playing is highly proficient throughout as Walter leads a vigorous and lucid account distinguished by many agreeable touches of individuality, especially from the orchestra’s excellent woodwind section. The symphony typifies the early German Romantic genre and shows the distinct influence of Mendelssohn. In outline, it’s entirely classical, with a strongly melodic sonata-form first movement followed by a rondo Andante comprising five main sections. This latter movement contains the best moments in the piece, and Walter obtains some fine playing here, with warmly rounded string tone and elegantly plaintive wind solos. Next comes the Scherzo, complete with a rustic-sounding Grieg-like trio section and a competent if not terribly exciting finale, filled with lively, underdeveloped ideas.
The fillers, music from Reinecke’s five-act opera King Manfred (1866), provide the program’s best music. The overture is superb, striking in its orchestral virtuosity (shades of Weber here) and interspersed with several eloquently lyrical sections, notably for horn and cello. The prelude to Act 5 is intensely poetic and suggestive of early Wagner. Walter and the Rhenish Philharmonic give accomplished performances of each, and despite the earnest predictability of the first symphony, it’s constructed strongly enough to make it worth an occasional hearing.
