Symphony No. 3 [Hybrid SACD, SACD]

This is a very fine disc. Simone Young is a conductor of startling capacity and the Hamburg Phiharmonic is, on the evidence of this and the other Bruckner discs in this series (for example Bruckner - Symphony No 2, a remarkably good orchestra - especially considering that the discs are taken from live performances.

This 1873 Version of Bruckner 3 is the one that was never played or published in Bruckner's lifetime. It owes its preservation to the fact that Bruckner presented a score to Wagner when the latter accepted the dedication of the work, and this document has been preserved in the archives at Bayreuth. Current critical fashion prefers this over the 1878 Version (first performance - utter fiasco!) and the 1889 Version (first successful performance). The reasons for this are in the very informative booklet note (and for simple information about the versions of this work see my review of Georg Tintner's performance at Bruckner - Symphony No. 3 (1873 Original Version, ed. Nowak).

Professor Young scores over Jonathan Nott's recording on Tudor Symph. Nr.3 d-moll because of the richness of the recorded sound, which is at a much higher level, and because of the sensitivity of her conducting. She welds this work into a convincicing whole by a very thoughtful approach to each of the thematic components as they emerge, and a good example of this is at 13.04 and following in the first movement, where the lound music here is very grand indeed and considerably slower than I have ever heard it before. It works remarkably well. She pushes the music on in the exciting moments and relaxes into gorgeously phrased gentle "lyric periods" (Gesangsperioden) throughout the entire work. Though she takes 68 minutes to Nott's 63, she is much more capable of presenting the music as an organic whole made up of a myriad of parts - a little like a Gothic Cathedral.

The effect of all of this is that when the final triumphant statement at the end of the finale fades away, there is a wornderful sense of fulfilment.

I used to have my doubts about this Original Concept Version of 1873 but Young's performance has entirely converted me. This is THE recording of Bruckner 3 to buy.