Symphonies [Blu-ray]

Schumann like never before
Paavo Järvi and his Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen have set an exalted benchmark for the art of today's Beethoven interpretation with their recordings of the nine symphonies in 2010. Now they are back on DVD, this time in perfect audio and video on Blu-ray, with a recording of the four Schumann symphonies that includes a 98-minute concert film, "Schumann at Pier 2". The Blu-ray disk has an amazing total running time of 271 minutes, with a 27-minute lightweight bonus on the "making" of the Schumann project and some touristy stuff on the city-state of Bremen thrown in. Those of us familiar with Järvi's Beethoven project have been impatiently looking forward to the Schumann recordings with high hopes, and the finished product exceeds all expectations indeed. This is Schumann like you never heard him before. The recording venue (no date given), a former dock warehouse and now a "popular" events center in Bremerhaven, is nicely done up, lighting is fairly discreet (better...

A generous account of the four symphonies which currently leads the visual field
This set of the four symphonies was made in 2012 with the view of presenting Schumann in a new light as a result of deep and penetrating discussion and rehearsal. The orchestra chosen for this project is a chamber orchestra made up of musicians who value their own solo careers. The orchestra is self-governing and is used to having considerable input to their performances. In this way they form a collaboration with their conductors. This has certain similarities with Abbado's relationship with the Lucerne festival orchestra for example. The orchestra itself is about 50 strong and thus is of an appropriate size for Schumann. This is a modern chamber orchestra and there is no attempt to reproduce the sound world attempted by the 'authentic' movement such as with the Gardiner CD set for example.

There are a number of bonus films included with this set and these set out to enlarge on this approach to Schumann and the use of the venue etc. To do this there is an emphasis placed...

Pleasant Video Schumann
I admit to a weakness regarding Schumann Symphonies, already having some nine sets in my CD collection. This one is reasonably well played and conducted, but offers little to the collector in terms of revelatory conducting, or visual attractiveness. The industrial venue provides little feast for the eyes, and the camera is not always where you would want it to be at the time. In addition, the sound has a rather homogenized quality, that loses detail and lacks full presence. It's all decent enough, but better to stick to some of the great CD recordings.

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