Having long since proved himself a superior oboist, Heinz Holliger is now well...

[...] wenn Patricia Kopatchinskaja mit dabei ist, dann erhält die Bezeichnung Fantasie erst ihre wahre Bedeutung: Ein Feuerwerk an Ideen – manche spektakulär, manche nur Nuancen – lebendig, rhythmisch aufsässig präsentiert oder in lässiger Nonchalance gibt dieser Musik improvisatorischen Charakter.

Japanische Rezension siehe PDF!

Arndt Cobbers: 2. Schumann, Sämtliche Sinfonische Werke Vol. 5; Kopatchinskaja, Lonquich, WDR Sinfonieorchester, Holliger (Audite): Das als problematisch geltende Spätwerk in fesselnden Interpretationen.

The work for four horns stands out, if only for the novelty of its scoring, and Holliger’s performance – with a fabulously secure quartet of soloists – luxuriates in the sonorities it generates, while in the two works with piano, the soloist Alexander Lonquich finds moments of poetic beauty in the lyrical interludes.

Senza dubbio è un Cd piuttosto singolare, che, vista la proposta di brani ben poco conosciuti, ha i tratti delle incisioni “di riempimento” (necessarie in ogni integrale che si rispetti), ma non per questo è una proposta meno interessante, anzi gli accostamenti sono davvero suggestivi, e chiariscono ancor meglio alcune peculiarità del complesso pensiero schumanniano.

Maar het "pièce de résistance" van deze cd is toch het Konzertstück voor vier hoorns, dat door de eigenaardige bezetting niet vaak wordt gespeeld. Maar wat een geweldig stuk ... wat een vrolijkheid... en wat een speelplezier... hier kom je helemaal van bij...

This is Volume 6 of Audite’s Complete Symphonic Works edition and contains Schumann’s earliest and latest pieces for orchestra, including all his overtures. As with his hero, Beethoven, Schumann’s overtures are better known than any of the stage or operatic music they precede. And, like Beethoven, Schumann had a gift for writing exciting, memorable overtures.

Beethoven’s influence is also obvious in the only non-overture here, the unfinished Zwickau Symphony of 1833; this is Schumann’s third and final revision of the first movement, so it lacks the slow intro of John Gardiner’s 1998 recording (DG 457591). Gardiner’s orchestra has 40 strings where Holliger’s has 60, plus Holliger’s accents are tempered and his pace relaxed, so I heard for the first time the influence of Louis Spohr—another hero of the young Schumann—in the wilting chromaticism of the s tring figures.

Before the two-movement symphony, Holliger raises the curtain on the concert with the mature sonata-form Manfred Overture. In it we hear Holliger’s approach to all the overtures: warm, genial, and flowing. He lets the dramatic tension build up slowly, free of histrionics, with subtle orchestral flexibility to broaden tempos for grand climaxes and lyrical passages. The violins are split left and right as they were in Schumann’s time and they play cleanly, without vibrato, and this clarifies Schumann’s allegedly thick and clumsy orchestrations. There’s no mention anywhere of period instruments or gut strings, so I assume they’re modern, but at 60 strong they don’t sound shrill, nor do they indulge any supposed historic practice like swelling on long notes.

The sound quality matches interpretation: warm, full, and detailed, especially the surround-sound recording, right now available only as a download from Audite’s website (mentioned on the back of the digipak). The improvement in three-dimensional depth and presence is unmistakable in the five overtures recorded in 2010 but subtle in the symphony and Manfred recorded in 2015. Considering the high quality of both performance and surround-sound recording, I hope Audite issues a boxed set of this complete series on SACD (or Blu-Ray).

The booklet is informative, recounting the circumstances of each piece’s composition. This is an attractive and rewarding survey of Schumann’s overtures and makes me want to hear the other volumes in the series.

Die Musiker des WDR Sinfonieorchesters finden aufgrund des feinnervigen und auf Schumann spezialisierten Dirigats von Heinz Holliger für jedes Werk den entsprechenden Ton, was diese CD besonders farbenreich und vielseitig werden lässt.

Der vielseitige Musiker Heinz Holliger ist als Dirigent ein kenntnisreicher Schumann-Exeget, der zusammen mit dem Maßstäbe setzenden WDR-Orchester alles zum Leuchten, Glühen und Brillieren bringt, was der Komponist anstrebte: einfach schöne Musik aus dem Geist der pulsierenden und aktuellen Romantik, ungebrochen, aber nachhaltig reflektiert.