It’s so good to see that new releases on SACD aren’t limited to standard repertoire, and this excellent performance of Franz Schmidt’s masterful Fourth Symphony remains competitive regardless of the format in which you listen. If Zubin Mehta’s classic recording with the Vienna Philharmonic remains nonpareil, this newcomer certainly isn’t far behind. The Netherlands Philharmonic may not match its Viennese colleagues in sheer weight of tone in the string sections, but Yakov Kreizberg’s swifter tempos and lighter textures don’t encourage direct competition. He still builds plenty of intensity into the Adagio’s wrenching climaxes, and the scherzo section culminates in a very satisfying collapse, the horns doing themselves proud. It’s a totally idiomatic performance, capped by a touchingly poetic coda.
The coupling seals the deal: there’s no other way to get all three excerpts from Notre Dame on a single disc, and the music itself is marvelously wrought, substantial, beautifully played, and instantly memorable. Pentatone’s sonics are rich and full, with impressive bass and plenty of inner clarity. In multichannel listening there is a clear “sweet spot”, outside of which the rear channels might seem too prominent but that in all other respects admirably projects the advantages of the new medium: enhanced depth and three-dimensionality, and a vivid sense of the hall acoustic. But most importantly, and all sonic considerations aside, this is a disc worth hearing on purely musical grounds, and on that basis alone I highly recommend it.
