| Claudio Abbado has a long association with Mahler’s Ninth, going back to his first (somewhat forgotten) recording with the Vienna Philharmonic in 1987; this performance, recorded at the Lucerne Festival in 2010, brings to four the commercially available recordings he has conducted (but there are finer Berlin Philharmonic performances from the Proms in 1994 and the Mahlerfest in 1995 though not easily available). Despite this pedigree, there is nothing especially distinctive about Abbado’s Mahler Ninth – he lacks the sheer risk-taking in this work of a Bernstein, the monumental tension of a Karajan or the unfettered grimness, even rawness, of a Klemperer. There has been a tendency in the past for Abbado’s Mahler – in general – to lack atmosphere and authenticity (especially in the orchestral sound) and one would not necessarily turn to an Abbado performance for any sense of struggle – death in a work like the Ninth. In short, one very much gets the conductor’s view of Mahler rather the composer’s. On the other hand, Abbado’s performances of Mahler’s Ninth have tended towards extraordinary clarity in dynamics; orchestral detail, in particular, is ultra defined, almost as if it is being deliberately underscored. An awareness of balance is classical in construct; Abbado’s Ninth often reminds us more of Milton, rather than Bernstein’s Byronic assumption. The central movements in Abbado’s hands have always had a certain visceral quality, however; the outer movements a sumptuous string sound that threatens to (and occasionally does) suffocate the woodwind and brass. This Lucerne Festival Orchestra performance is little different in this respect; and yet the performance goes further than even Abbado has managed (perhaps micro-managed) with this symphony in the past. And the results are spectacular. There are two reasons for this. The first is the ambience of the recording which captures every detail, no matter how small, in superb sound. The second is the quite astonishing playing of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. It isn’t just the quality of the playing (which is often miraculously accurate) it’s the life that these extraordinary musicians give to the notes they play. Take, for example, the opening of the Andante comodo. The hesitancy of this motif has never sounded so human, so vulnerable, in my experience; but contrast this with its return in the development – announced on trombones – and the effect is all the more graphic because it is so explosive. Abbado has never sounded so unleashed in Mahler as he does here (though you’d hardly know it from looking at the economy of his conducting). Similarly, his view of the second movement Ländler has changed too. It is now more distorted than ever, aided mostly by an orchestra that plays as if it is possessed. That comes across even more sharply in the Rondo-Burleske, which is incendiary, and taken at a blistering tempo. Yet the articulation of the strings at the movement’s conclusion is as acerbic as it is refined. Indeed, from the tempo subito onwards the sense of drive is palpable, the orchestra sounding like an unstoppable tsunami. Some will surely find the accuracy of the playing at odds with the sense of struggle this movement’s manic violence conveys; but it is hard not to be persuaded by Abbado’s view that the movement is an unsettling combination of Baroque classicism and hell-raising dissonance. It is the only movement in which Abbado and Bernstein have any semblance of similarity in this symphony. The measure of any great Mahler Ninth, however, rests in the concluding adagio. Abbado is notably slower with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra than he is in any of his earlier recordings of the work – some two minutes slower. It is still not a blood, sweat and death drenched reading of the movement, though; Abbado has always eschewed the Bernstein approach here. Like his performance of the opening andante it belies time – and that is to this recording’s advantage. What makes this Lucerne performance so special is the rich, deep playing of the strings and a first horn (Bruno Schneider) of uncommon accuracy and sensitivity (listen to him at 12’42’’ just fade into complete and utter magical silence). There have been hints of this orchestra’s fabulous string sound throughout the work – the first movement and the Rondo-Burleke, where the adagio is predicted amidst the chaos of its swirling dissonance, but it still comes as a surprise to hear their depth of sound. Nowhere is this more pronounced or better articulated than in the build up to the adagio’s climax at 15’06’’ – ‘cellos and basses simply blackened, the horns at 16’19’’ descending their notes in unison and the second violins playing at 16’45’’ as if they were a single instrument. It’s probably as well done as you will ever hear it. But Abbado tops this with a ppp of Furtwängler-like inaudibility to conclude the movement. It’s a fitting end to a movement that doesn’t drain the emotions but does leave one in awe, an equally valid emotion for this greatest of symphonies. And that awe really comes down to the conductor and, especially, his orchestra. There is no question in this writer’s view that this is the best played Mahler Ninth one can currently hear; there is astonishing detail in the playing I’ve never heard anywhere else (and unusually this is an orchestra which looks at its conductor, often much of the time). Although he has eschewed opera for some time Abbado brings an operatic sense of detail to this symphony. Any countless number of woodwind solos, brass solos and string solos (especially Wolfram Christ’s viola and Kolja Blacher’s violin) are imbued with the genius of making an instrument sound like a voice. Together it is like a great chorus rather than an orchestra. But it goes beyond this. The whole orchestra play their notes as if this were an opera for instruments. This is not a performance of Mahler’s Ninth to supercede Bernstein, Karajan or Klemperer; it joins them, even if it surpasses them in at least one respect. The Lucerne Festival Orchestra is a phenomenon today, just as it was under Toscanini. And a note on the DVD itself. Sound and picture quality are superb, though I have only been able to listen to this DVD in PCM Stereo. The alternative, bonus, scene of Abbado conducting the first movement is from the perspective of the first violins. It is interesting, though Abbado has never been the most demonstrative of conductors so its value may be limited for those expecting something special.
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