Brahms Steinberg
Posted by Terence on April 10, 2022, 6:27 pm
I have perhaps 30 or 40 Brahms symphony cycles, and as many recordings if not more of individual ones. For all their ubiquity, good cycles, or great ones, are rare. There are few I would recommend as an entirety, though Karajan comes close, though the sound is now not to my taste. Wand and Jochums's London are next but the new Steinberg, reviewed by Mark Sebastian Jordan is about the finest I've ever heard, and from an unlikely source. There are more glamorous conductors but none better. Even the recording, though half a century old, is good; astringent but not glaring, and the balance of strings with the rest of the orchestra, usually problematic, is here just right. The music is alive, not pudgy and ennervated. Thank you for bringing this to my attention; any Brahmsian should really look into this.
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