Customer Reviews

Mendelssohn: Complete String Symphonies [SACD]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

With more than four hours of high quality stereo on the one disc, this is a set and forget recording that will fill an entire evening. The playing is good. The only criticism is that it's in danger of presenting too much of a good thing. There's not a lot of variety between the string symphonies and they blur one into the other after a while. Contrast this with the matching BIS Mendelssohn Complete Concertos on one SACD where the contrasts between the instrumentation of each work prevents the collection from merging into a high-toned aural wallpaper. This disc is good, but if you were only thinking of getting one of the two I'd advise the Complete Concertos, for starters at least. As someone who hasn't gone down the surround sound path, I look forward to more of these generous stereo compilations.

Don't be misled by the fact that these string symphonies were composed by Mendelssohn between the ages of eleven and fifteen. There is nothing to suggest in listening that these are the creations of an immature mind. The counterpoint, which Mendelssohn, a devoted student of Bach, uses so expertly in the symphonic voicing, is something that Mozart didn't include until late in the game. And no offense to our Mozart, but his early symphonies don't come close to these! In fact, you could make an argument that Mendelssohn's tepid fifth symphony lacks something of the passion and inventiveness of these twelve gems from his youth.

Now, the best way to get these symphonies if you lack an SACD player is to purchase a download. I'm a huge fan of purchasing downloads from Amazon, particularly with its cloudplayer and competitive pricing. For a long while these recordings were only available for download from the original separate releases on Amazon, but then in July of 2011, they added this complete set for just <gasp> 8.99. The quality of the performances and sheer amount of music for that price is uncanny. You have to hear these youthful compositions to truly understand Mendelssohn's art and genius.

What is wrong with the first reviewer? Obviously you don't want this set if you don't have an SACD player, but who complains about getting four hours of music in great sound for $20-25???? BIS is giving incredible value for money here.

Anyone who loves the genuine aesthetic of the music of Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and of the 19th Century must recoil in dismay upon auditioning the release by BIS Records of all of the composer's early "string symphonies" (those that predate the standard 5 numbered symphonies)! What tormentedly misguided interpretations! These performers (Lev Markiz, leading the Nieuw Sinfonietta Amsterdam) arouse a similar distaste that one encounters on hearing the Hanover Band's stylistically execrable and hence defective recordings of the Beethoven overtures, which takes an approach to Beethoven akin to Markiz' way of plowing through Mendelssohn. These deluded zealots play Mendelssohn's earliest achivements at writing symphonies with a near-total absence of legato that makes no sense even in Baroque music, and of which the absence makes for sheer butchery in 19th century music, the child Mendelssohn's included.

All that spiky chugging and hacking, mincingly poking and churning through this music leaves the listener appalled at the cruel pointlessness of the resulting sheer lack of musicality. Presumably, these zealots assume that all this "crisp" articulation sounds impressibly brilliant, but, really, there is no element of virtuosity that is any major component of these delectably domestic works, regarding proper emphasis in interpretation, as opposed to the youthful Mendelssohn's virtuosic skill itself in composition at the boyish age at which he produced them. Hence, the flashy and soulessly mechanistic approach of Markiz and his players, hours of it, at tempi that for the most part are so breathlessly rapid as to trivialise the music, is just plain silly and irrelevant.

If one loves Mendelssohn, rather than acquire BIS Records' set only to endure the musical equivalent of heart-burn from the ire to which listening to this frontal assault on Mendelssohn's string symphonies gives rise, order one of the other more musically sound and sane recordings of these works that Amazon.ca makes available to acquire a more truly musical set of these modest, but delectably and sweetly adorable, works, as played with real musicianship by other musicians of more informed sensibility. Even retaining Markiz' recording after having purchased it is only for the sake of the rarely included uncompleted 13th string symphony (one movement only) and for the alternative versions (with and without winds) of no. 8 (included often enough, anyway, in the case of no. 8, on other recorded sets of these works), but those musicological considerations are the only factors which save this set from a fast act of weeding out from a discerning listener's collection. Amazon.com and other national Amazon WWW sites can serve the buyer better with another choice for this repertoire, to help its customers to live happily with Mendelssohn, properly played with respect and genuine musicianship!

Not a bad interpretation per se, but it is one of those SACD disks from BIS that is in fact 3 CDs printed on a SACD. Since this can only be played on SACD players (and still over 20$), it is actually a bad deal.