The utter devastation and hopelessness conveyed by Teodor Currentzis’ recent Sony Classics recording of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No.6, “Pathétique,” was so shattering that I could not wait to hear what he and his MusicAererna orchestra of Perm, Russia would do with Mahler’s Symphony No.6 in a, “Tragic.” In fact, I was so eager to experience Currentzis’ first recording of Mahler’s music that I listened to the 24/96 download even before the physical CD becomes available on December 7. (The recording is currently streamable in 16/44.1 on Tidal, Idagio, and other services.)

Although my praise for Currentzis’s Tchaikovsky was met with criticism from some who decried its limited dynamic range, those considerations did not stop the album from winning the Japanese Recording Academy’s Gold Award. It also won a Diapason d’Or, earned 5-star reviews from The Times and NRC Handelsblad, was named best classical recording in Spiegel Online, made it to Gramophone‘s Top 3 list for “Orchestral Recording of the Year,” appeared on the New York Times Best Classical Music Recordings list for 2017, and will soon receive additional recognition from Stereophile.

While I did not dare measure the dynamic range of Currentzis’s Mahler, which was recorded at Moscow’s Dom Zvukozapisi (House of Audio Recording) by Giovanni Prosdocimi, I noted that the recording sounds a bit darker and less air-filled than Michael Tilson Thomas’ native-DSD recording of Mahler’s Sixth. Though I would not rule out the possibility of some dynamic compression, the soundstage is extremely wide and three-dimensional, and colors fairly saturated. Bass could be a bit stronger, but that’s true of many recordings of symphonic works.

Regardless, the interpretation brings life to Currentzis’s understanding of the symphony, which he expounds upon in the liner notes:

“Mahler’s music does not present a dichotomy between consolation and hopelessness. It is the hopelessness that gives consolation. …this is a symphony that offers catharsis through its finale. It is different to feeling destroyed, broken down, ruined at the end of his Ninth Symphony or Das Lied von der Erde.

“. . . The Sixth Symphony …ends in darkness, but it’s a sheltering darkness, one that peculiarly enough offers refuge . . . After this symphony you don’t feel destroyed. You are even more alive than before/ You are better than before. . .”

Even as the vigorous first movement marches straight ahead, as though nothing could possibly slow it down—Currentzis’s 24:56 finds a potent medium between Leonard Bernstein’s 21:23 express train extreme with the New York Philharmonic and Haitink’s recent 25:56 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra—it presents a curious mixture of dread and exhilaration. Even in the midst of tragedy, a certain optimism begins to emerge that reaches its culmination in the magical paradise that Mahler creates a little over halfway in. True, there are moments that feel like absolute war and a rush to arms, but Currentzis to move beyond them. The movement’s ending rewards us with one of those truly glorious Mahlerian washes of sound that defy description.

Currentzis places his 12:36 Scherzo—one of the fastest in my collection—next. (Some conductors play the Andante moderato as the second movement, and place the Scherzo third.) I found much of the Scherzo extremely enjoyable, even riotous.

The Adagio—one of Mahler’s truly great Adagios—bathes us in a glowing sense of peace. Orchestral sonorities are marvelous, the wealth of sound something to revel in. A touch of darkness may appear at movement’s end, but it seems almost beside the point. (In admittedly quick comparisons of several other performances of this movement, only Claudio Abbado’s with the Berlin Philharmonic succeeds in expressing Mahler’s underlying sadness.)

The fourth movement paints a somewhat serene landscape where ominous clouds hover over a pasture while cowbells ring with nonchalant innocence. The magical iridescence that blossoms in parts of this movement make its disturbing rumbling of cellos and sounds of alarm all the more disturbing. Imagine a beautiful landscape suddenly destroyed by bombs falling unexpectedly from the sky, and you’ll get a sense of the potential tragedy that lurks beneath the calm.

Even when the music grows dire, it is balanced by more wondrously radiant passages filled with mystical glory. Few of Mahler’s symphonic movements are blessed by sounds as otherworldly as these. Although the symphony’s ending is disconsolate, and marked by huge percussive explosions, its overall emotional and spiritual effect is somewhat akin to a sadomasochistic experience in which the agony of enslavement paves the way to ecstatic freedom.

If that’s a reality that you can acknowledge, even if solely on the mental plane, you simply must experience how Currentzis expresses it. Even Michael Tilson Thomas’s cathartic San Francisco Symphony performance of the Sixth, which took place right after we were all shaken to the core by the tragedy of 9/11, did not move me as much as this recording of Currentzis’ remarkably transcendent, virtually visionary interpretation of Mahler’s music.

Click Here: Cheap FIJI Rugby Jersey