Customer Reviews

Franz Berwald: Symphonies Nos. 1-4

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Franz Berwald tried haltingly to launch a compositional career in the unsupportive Sweden of the muid-19th-century. Though he experienced some success in continental Europe in the 1840s, he had to support himself through several day jobs, including managing a factory in the far north of Sweden and a medical venture, while haltingly advancing his musical career through concerts and opera performances. The current recording is a double-disc set which includes all four of Berwald's symphonies, written in the early 1840s. They show Berwald to be seemingly incapable of writing music that isn't interesting. There are numerous attractive, captivating themes and unorthodox organizational devices within and between movements. It's overall very worthwhile music that I recommend if you haven't had the pleasure of getting to know it.

That said, I don't recommend this performance by the Jena Philharmonic led by the American conductor David Montgomery. The Jena Philharmonic doesn't qualify as even a second-rate orchestra based on this recording. While the wind playing is ok, the strings sound thin, with recurring intonation problems. Even more problematically, I found the interpretation undeveloped. It's really more of a run-through or a reading than a polished actual interpretation. An example is the soft end of the Andante from the Symphony no. 2 (the "Capricieuse" - disc 1 track 6), where the performers almost stop playing instead of shaping the work with a diminuendo. I compared it to the Naxos versions done by the Helsingborg Symphony led by Okko Kamu, which is also an inexpensive set. The Helsingborg orchestra is hardly on the tip of anyone's tongue when it comes to preeminent orchestras, but -- hey -- they perform with polish and present a musical approach to Berwald. The aforementioned Andante from the "Capricieuse" is very well-done, with more clearly defined phrases, more breathing space and just more feeling. So the comparison is just comprehensively in favor of the Naxos instead of the Montgomery/Jena.

Sonics are good. But not a recommended disc.