This French Sony release contains one of Rudolf Kempe’s few unalloyed successes in the German classical repertoire. The reason isn’t hard to fathom: great performances of this sprawling symphony require a keen ear for instrumental balance allied to scrupulous rhythmic precision and a strong sense of forward momentum. In other words, the virtues that make Kempe’s Richard Strauss recordings so satisfying are equally in operation here.
Kempe opens the symphony broadly, and makes a good, old-fashioned accelerando into the first movement’s allegro–and from there it’s smooth sailing. He shapes the slow movement’s repetitious structure effortlessly. His scherzo benefits from an irresistible lilt–and note the transparency and character of the canonic wind entries at the opening! The finale breezes by as if on wings, with admirably clean string triplets and enough energy to carry without letup straight through the coda. The only drawback lies in some excessively brash tone color from the trumpets and trombones, a touch of crudeness. In fact, the performance bears a striking resemblance to Böhm’s raw but exciting Dresden version (DG).
And speaking of Dresden, Kempe’s recording of Metamorphosen with that city’s incomparable Staatskapelle (for EMI) enjoys slightly finer string playing, but otherwise this is essentially the same interpretation as that celebrated one, and both the Schubert and Strauss performances are vividly recorded. This disc will be welcomed by this conductor’s many fans, and it certainly holds its own with the finer versions of each work currently available.
