Search - Gustav Mahler, Dmitry Shostakovich, Gidon Kremer :: Mahler: Symphony No. 10; Shostakovich: Symphony No. 14

Mahler arranged for strings? A bad idea

Santa Fe Listener | Santa Fe, NM USA | 11/22/2007

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Gidon Kremer long ago established a reputation for being a great violinist on the one hand and a condcutor with eccentric notions on the other. His Kremerata chamber orchestra has gone where few care to follow at times, and this is one of those times. He has had the idea of arranging the tragic Adagio from Mahler's Sym. #1o for a small body of strings, eliminating the depth and range of the composer's brilliant orchestration for full ensemble. I can't fathom why Kremer felt this was an attractive option -- the results are spare whenever the music is soft and screechy when it is loud. The overall effect is miniaturized and ersatz, to borrow an apt word from the Gramophone's review.



In the Shostakovich 14th, recorded live, Kremer plays first violin and conducts. The result is energetic, but this is a complex enough work to require a full-time conductor, and once again the string body sounds thin. The two vocal soloists are accomplished, however, and Kremer himself is good at Shostakovich -- better in this work than in the Mahler. Still, I fail to see the point of the whole exercise."

Mahler and Shostakovich Symphonies. Kremerized

the unamusicologist | 06/03/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Contrary to the review by Santa Fe Listener, this recording does use the percussion that Shostakovich calls for in the 14th Symphony. The version is the composer's own (and original). That's one less strike against the recording.



These performances, however, are not for everyone. This is not a first choice for either the Mahler or Shostakovich. It is best approached as as a document of Kremer's interpretive outlook."

Death becomes them

A. Bjelland | NYC | 02/07/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Recorded in 2001 (Mahler) and 2004 (Shostakovich), this 2007 ECM release provides a wonderful insight into Gidon Kremer's perspective on two composers who are clearly close to his heart. The performances are both fascinating, and the Kremerata Baltica give their not-inconsiderable all in both works.



First, the Mahler. I wasn't sure what to expect here, and the description on the outer disc case didn't help since it makes it seem like this is just another performance of the regular Adagio from Mahler's Tenth - the only movement of the five movement work that the composer actually completed (save for some minor editing) prior to his death. However, upon opening the CD booklet, one finds this additional information: "adapted for strings by Hans Stadimair and Kremerata Baltica." Apparently Herr Stadimair arranged the movement for his Munich Chamber Orchestra in 1971, a few years after the Cooke "Performing Version" had started to bring the work greater appreciation as being more than just Mahler's "unfinished" symphony. After hearing various attempts at expanding Mahler's sketches into a performable condition (I've heard recordings of Cooke I-III, Carpenter, Wheeler IV, Mazzetti I & II, and Barshai), it may be strange to encounter it, and the first movement especially, in a performance by just 20 string musicians. However, on its own terms, the Stadimair/Kremerata version works exceedingly well, and I would be curious to see how a strings-only version of the remaining movements might sound. Granted, the overwhelming, earth-shuddering moments of the original and the mighty, dissonant build-up to the long-held trumpet tones don't have quite the impact they do when performed by a full Mahler-sized orchestra! However, when transcribed for strings - and recorded with such clear and distinct stereo-placement as the ECM technicians have brought to this recording - one hears new textures and counterpoints that weren't quite so evident in the fuller orchestration(s) (and, hearing the trumpet's high-pitched, siren-like call transcribed for violins, I have to wonder whether Smetana's "From My Life" String Quartet No. 1 was an influence on Mahler's swan song?). The performance is dramatic and intense, and the Kremerata strings (with Gidon Kremer directing from the first violin stand, no less!) bring a chamber-music quality to the quieter sections (the work begins with a viola solo, after all), and create the impression of a much larger ensemble when the textures fill out and the dissonance increases. Another reviewer has complained that the strings sounded "screechy," and though I have reason to believe that reviewer may not have actually listened to the performance very attentively (he seems to have totally missed the percussion in the Shostakovich coupling), I found the recorded sound and the transcription to be very natural.



Gidon Kremer's previous recordings of Mahler have, as far as I know, been limited to the Piano Quartet fragment. With Shostakovich, on the other hand, we have a little more to go on: Kremer's performances and recordings of the composer's chamber works and concertos - as well as his participation in a chamber arrangement of the 15th Symphony and the Kremerata's involvement in more recent transformations of Shostakovich's Violin and Viola Sonatas into concertante works - show that Shostakovich is a composer he enjoys performing. With twenty-two string players (and Kremer once again conducting from the first violin spot) and three more playing percussion and celesta, the sound may not be quite as full in the purely instrumental passages as it is on some other recordings. However, with so much of this work scored with chamber-like simplicity in order to balance the two vocal soloists, the end result is very good overall. Hearing the opening of the work immediately after the "fuller" sound of the Mahler makes one even more aware of the simpler textures, the many string solos and the intimate nature of the work. The vocal soloists are very good throughout, and Fedor Kuznetsov brings an excellent depth to the bass part. I'm still partial to the recordings by Jansons (EMI), Jarvi (DG), Turovsky (Chandos) and Barshai (Brilliant), but I would recommend this one as a runner-up to the others. Pacing is good for the most part, but the performance is sometimes just a little too neat and slick. The percussion could be a little more prominent and spiky (those tolling bells more resonant and foreboding), and the strings could sound a little grittier at times, though the overall recorded sound is clear and the vocal soloists are never drowned out by the instrumental ensemble (though, perhaps there are moments when they should be - or almost be).



Of course the reason for the coupling - two composers near the end of their careers and their lives, writing works while preoccupied with death and their own imminent, final farewells - makes the coupling apt and pretty darned unique. Kremer and his ensemble perform admirably, and I'm curious to know if they actually programmed these works together during their festival or tour performances. Throw in something by Schnittke, or perhaps Mahler's arrangement of Schubert's "Death and the Maiden" Quartet, and you have a pretty intense and thought-provoking concert - albeit not one you might want to return to all that frequently. Nonetheless, recommended."