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Mahler - Symphony No.4 [Hybrid SACD, SACD]

Ivan Fischer & Budapest Festival Orchestra Audio CD
4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
Price: £13.11 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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Frequently Bought Together

Mahler - Symphony No.4 + Symphony No.1 in D minor, Titan + Mahler - Symphony No 2
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Product details

  • Audio CD (9 Mar 2009)
  • Please Note: Requires SACD-compatible hardware
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • Format: Hybrid SACD, SACD
  • Label: Channel Classics
  • ASIN: B001PBCZ92
  • Other Editions: MP3 Download
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 47,270 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Listen to Samples and Buy MP3s

Songs from this album are available to purchase as MP3s. Click on "Buy MP3" or view the MP3 Album.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Samples
Song Title Time Price
Listen  1. Symphony No. 4 in G Major: I. Bedächtig, nicht eilen17:00Album Only
Listen  2. Symphony No. 4 in G Major: II. In gemächlicher Bewegung, ohne Hast 9:35£0.89  Buy MP3 
Listen  3. Symphony No. 4 in G Major: III. Ruhevoll, poco adagio21:52Album Only
Listen  4. Symphony No. 4 in G Major: IV. Sehr behaglich 8:35£0.89  Buy MP3 


Product Description

Review

The sleeve-notes for Ivan Fischer's new recording of Mahler's Fourth contain a statement by Fischer that initially makes one's heart sink. Culminating in a 'lovely vision of paradise', the symphony, Fischer argues, shows Mahler taking us 'to his own inner child, to his dreams of angels, fairytales, angst and pure divine love'. Concerns that we're in for an hour of unremitting sentimentality are mercifully unfounded. Childhood, in Mahler, is viewed as both an idealised lost Eden and a place of primal trauma - and Fischer is as interested in the abysses that threaten to open round this music as he is in its surface calm. The combination of naive excitement and indefinable menace is strikingly sustained throughout, while the final vision of paradise, coolly voiced by Miah Persson, is at once funny, savage and unbearably sad. Fischer's insistence that the symphony should be treated as chamber music means this won't appeal to those who like a high-decibel count in Mahler, but the Budapest Festival Orchestra's playing is exceptional in its dark-hued subtlety. It's a provocative, iconoclastic performance, and highly recommended. Tim Ashley - Friday 13 March 09 Tim Ashley --The Guardian - 5 out of 5 stars

Product Description

CHN 26109; CHANNEL CLASSICS - Olanda; Classica Orchestrale

Customer Reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A CHILD'S PARADISE LOST 8 Sep 2010
By Klingsor Tristan TOP 1000 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
How much rehearsal time does Ivan Fischer get with his Budapest Festival Orchestra? I raise the question simply because his Mahler recordings show such infinite and loving attention to detail in these, the most detailed of scores.

His Mahler 4 is no exception. The little squeezes of crescendo/decrescendo on small phrases or even single notes are all carefully observed. So, too, the many little caesuras in the score as well as the variety of different emphasis markings - dots, sforzandi, little decrescendo marks. It all helps to characterise every phrase, every theme. His affection for the Mahlerian portamento/glissando, shown in previous recordings, is also here in abundance (though almost always only when marked in the score) and even extends to the voice in the last verse of the final movement.

This is not enough to make a great Mahler conductor, of course. But Fischer shows himself to be just that throughout the work. He always seems to make it sound so natural. The subtleties of tempo variation are a sheer delight. For example, just before the dash for the line at the end of the first movement there are no less than 10 modifications of tempo in as many bars - rit., subito a tempo, accelerando, rit.. molto rit., langsam, another rit., sehr zuruckhaltend (holding back a little), a tempo and poco a poco stringendo. Fischer moulds it all into a moving and naturally flowing whole.

In his essay in the accompanying notes, Fischer talks about the chamber orchestra feel of the whole symphony and of `the lightness of the whole orchestra'. This certainly comes through in the playing. Which is not to say that he eschews the darkness and angst of the piece: this is perhaps a Child's Paradise Lost.
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Superlative Mahler 4 in great sound 19 April 2009
By Colin Fortune VINE™ VOICE
Format:Audio CD
This is one of the most ravishing Mahler discs that I have heard for some time. The playing of the orchestra is stunning and the balances favour some wonderful wind and brass detail whilst delivering the full impact of the whole orchestra when required. Fischer is ia sensitive interpreter, rounding the phrases in the music most pleasingly with a bracing first two movements.

The third (adagio) movement is played so well on this recording that Fischer makes it sound like the greatest movement Mahler ever wrote! It encapsulates all the joy and pain of life as it moves towards the huge "Gates of Heaven" climax just before it drifts into the final movement. This is remarkably good playing and conducting.

And then... Well we have the song finale with Miah Persson as a charming and very clear soprano soloist. For me the trouble was that the third movement was so overwhelmingly good that this charming movement, almost like an intermezzo, was something of an anticlimax. To be fair you could claim that this is a problem with the unusual structure of the symphony as much as anything else and this could indeed be the case. But Fischer's conducting also sounds just a little matter of fact at this point with a fairly speedy overall tempo that is just a little unyielding in approach. This may be an over-critical reaction but if it is, it is because of the comparison with the wonderful intensity of the other movements, particularly the Adagio.

Despite this (slight) criticism I believe that this is a disc full of delightful insights from Fischer and his Budapest Festival Orchestra and that this disc will provide great satisfaction. Recommended.
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4.0 out of 5 stars Best Mahler Symphony 21 May 2013
By JPF
Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase
This recording of Mahler's 4th is a better quality than I expected - I would like to know how high
on the popularity charts it stands.
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars An exceptional prformance 12 Jun 2011
By Big D
Format:Audio CD
The BFO and Fischer triumph once again. I don't remember during my life hearing a better performance of this work. This is for me very close to perfection - I think that I heard two notes in the first violins where I wasn't completely happy with their portamento, but otherwise... I have no reservations about Miah Persson's singing; it fitted the conception of the performance like a glove. Listen and prepare for enchantment!
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars stunning 14 Feb 2011
Format:Audio CD
I'm having a Mahler phase, listening to various recordings of his symphonies. This one is quite excellent along with the earlier CR recording of symphony 2. There are heaps of new releases almost by the week from the big labels, but this Mahler series is the one to watch. Highly recommended
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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful recording!!! 29 Sep 2010
Format:Audio CD
"There is a unique purity and transparency in Mahler's 4th Symphony. The enchanting sleigh bells take us to his inner child, to his dreams of angels, fairy tales, angst and pure, divine love. This child-like symphony needed a different orchestra: no dark tuba, no heavy trombones, no large arsenal of massive brass. A chamber orchestra in fact, where the clarinets act as mock trumpets, the solo violin tunes his strings sharper in order to scare us and the lightness of the whole orchestra lifts us up to his lovely, childish vision of paradise." (Iván Fischer)

Other versions recommended on CD and DVD:

1) George Szell, Sony CD.
2) Leonard Bernstein, Deutsche Grammophon DVD.
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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A superb Fourth from Fischer 30 Oct 2009
Format:Audio CD
First of all, the technical quality of this recording is first-class. Every nuance of Mahler's delightful score can be heard, without undue emphasis to any of it. Just listen to the accompaniment to "Death's Fiddle" in the second movement, or the gurgling trio sections! The Fourth is basically a chamber symphony, with very few really loud climaxes: there are really only two, one in the middle of the first movement and the other near the end of the third. Ivan Fischer never tries to exaggerate any of the dynamics but just presents the music simply, as Mahler might have wished. That does not mean there is a lack of emotion, on the contrary, this is a very moving performance. Miah Persson seems well-cast as the child-like soprano in the last movement, which I too have always found a bit of an anticlimax after what has gone before. (But maybe Heaven is...) Fischer maintains the tension even in the slowest part at the beginning of the third movement, which is more "molto" than "poco" adagio here.

Klemperer's version is still my favourite, but this must come next.
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