Brahms: Complete Orchestral Music

Kurt Masur’s burnished readings of Brahms’s orchestral music with the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, issued as a Limited Edition box with Original Jackets. Hardly less than with its founder, Felix Mendelssohn, the Leipzig Gewandhaus grew up with Brahms conducting and playing. For a sense of heritage, the orchestra boasts a Brahms tradition second to none. In the words of Kurt Masur, their Kapellmeister for over a quarter of a century, ‘if they play Brahms, you can say it’s still authentic’. Eloquence has compiled the Brahms recordings they made together between 1973 and 1981 for both the East-German Eterna label and Philips. Together they form the most comprehensive documentation yet issued of a musical relationship between composer, conductor and ensemble that was uniformly distinguished by deep understanding and affection. From the keyboard lion’s roaring of the First Piano Concerto to the rage and reconciliation of the Third Symphony and the mellow reflections of the Double Concerto, Masur and the Leipzigers present Brahms in the round. ‘Tradition is everything to the Gewandhaus,’ said Masur. ‘It’s what gives us our identity. It’s why we sound like ourselves and not like any other orchestra.’ The bedrock of that sound is a strong, unified string section with a density of timbre that supplies all the required weight for the post-Beethovenian drama of the First and Fourth symphonies. Masur maintained a narrow, brightly illuminated palette of wind tone-colours that lends a rudd

Tracks

1~1~Symphony No. 1 In C Minor, Op. 68
1~2~Variations On A Theme By Haydn, Op. 56A
2~1~Symphony No. 2 In D Major, Op. 73
2~2~Symphony No. 3 In F Major, Op. 90
3~1~Symphony No. 4 In E Minor, Op. 98
3~2~Akademische Festouvertüre, Op. 80
3~3~Tragische Ouvertüre, Op. 81
4~1~Violin Concerto In D Major, Op. 77
4~2~Salvatore Accardo, Violin
4~3~Concerto For VIolin, Cello And Orchestra In A Minor, Op. 102
4~4~Salvatore Accardo, Violin; Heinrich Schiff, Cello
5~1~Piano Concerto No. 1 In D Minor, Op. 15
5~2~Misha Dichter, Piano
6~1~Piano Concerto No. 2 In B Flat Major, Op. 83
6~2~Misha Dichter, Piano
7~1~Serenade No. 1 In D Major, Op. 11
7~2~Serenade No. 2 In A Major, Op. 16
8~1~Hungarian Dances Nos. 121

Details

Format: CD
Artist: Kurt Masur
Release Date: 16 August 2019
Genre: Classical Music
Label: ELOQUENCE / DECCA
Distributor: Universal Music