Schubert: Symphonies Nos. 8 & 9

Spoken Word (Composer), Franz [Vienna] Schubert (Composer), Georg Tintner (Conductor), Nova Scotia Symphony (Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Orchestra: Nova Scotia Symphony
• Conductor: Georg Tintner
• Composer: Spoken Word, Franz [Vienna] Schubert
• Audio CD (June 17, 2003)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Naxos
• ASIN: B00009NHC2
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #925,108 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Tintner Memorial Edition CD.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Unimpressive..., June 2, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Schubert: Symphonies Nos. 8 & 9 (Audio CD)

Surely the vaults must have better recording of this relationship then the one we have been served. For example Bohm in Berlin can be purchased at 6 dollars and ninety nine cents US and you will get not only a great orchestra but better recorded sound.

Something goes wrong with this performance into the development section..for some really strange reason the balances in the first movement seem very unusual, tonally the reading has no ambient sound and therefore the beautiful ring we come to expect on a professionally engineered record in not there!

As to tempi I find very little inspired with the handling of the themes...it is a bit like the orchetra is on beta blockers or maybe even worse sleeping....go to Solti in Vienna or even Herbert K with anyone....

Kerstez is still my favorite in this area of Romantic repetoire.

3 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Provincial Performances, August 8, 2003

By 

J Scott Morrison (Middlebury VT, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Schubert: Symphonies Nos. 8 & 9 (Audio CD)

I was very disappointed in the first volume of Naxos's projected 12-volume 'Tintner Memorial Edition,' most of which will be recorded with Symphony Nova Scotia, the last group he conducted before his death in 1999. That volume contained three late Mozart symphonies and although the interpretations were fairly mainstream and even expert in conception, Tintner was let down by the provincial playing of his orchestra. I indicated in my review of that issue that I would be eager to hear subsequent releases in the series, hoping that the quality would improve. Alas, this second volume--live performances of the two pieces from 1990 and 1988 respectively--is no better than the first.

One problem, of course, is that the contents of the CD--Schubert's Unfinished Symphony (No. 8) and the Great C-Major Symphony (No. 9)--have been recorded innumerable times in the past and often extremely well. There are too many fine available recordings to enumerate them, although I would single out the incandescent performance of the C-Major Symphony by the Vienna Philharmonic under Georg Solti, whom some might think an unlikely Schubert interpreter. It is coupled with a fine Wagner 'Siegfried Idyll' on Polygram ...P>The problems here are the same as in the previous issue. There's no simpler way to say it: at the time of these recordings this orchestra was third-rate. The horns and brass in particular are often out of tune and their style is, in a word, coarse. The strings and winds, although better, have problems with articulation, tuning, phrasing and ensemble. The horrendously difficult (and tiring) violin triplets in the fourth movement of the 9th are either rushed or crushed much of the time, although fortunately they are often covered by the playing of the winds and brass. At the beginning of the Unfinished (after the monitory low string motto) the rushing sotto voce strings bode well for four measures before the wind theme enters out of tune. Oh my. And although there are some patches of lovely playing, just as in the Mozart disc, there are so many unforeseen bits of unruly playing as to make these performances unacceptable.

The first band on the CD contains four minutes of charming comments by Maestro Tintner about Schubert. This is not enough to make purchase of this disc worthwhile, even at its budget price.

TT=79.41

Scott Morrison