A German orchestra reaches back for its best
mainFrom the Lebrecht Album of the Week:
… the Czech conductor Jakob Hrusa has restored something of the original sonority, allowing the brass to go slightly sour without going out of tune and the strings to sound a little more laidback…..
Read on here.
And here.
Why though spread it across two discs? To be able to charge more?
Hrusa and his Banberg forces gave an excellent performance of Mahler 3 in Paris last February.
Maestro Hrusa is a superb conductor. I heard him lead a fresh & revelatory Dvorak 8 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2014. (Unfortunately, I fear he’ll never guest conduct in Philadelphia again. Such a pity!)
Can you have a moratorium on the word “revelatory”.Tomassini would be lost without it.
“We” not “you”
The Philharmonica Hungarica based in Marl, Germany had somewhat similar origins–though in this case musicians fleeing the Soviets. During the Cold War, West Germany heavily subsidized it for propaganda purposes. Sadly, it did not survive the reduction of orchestras made during the unification process, especially since it’s Cold War functions were no longer relevant.
I’m a big fan of Jakob Hrusa after seeing him conduct in Ottawa. I hope he comes back to conduct somewhere in my part of the world sometime – anywhere between Ottawa and Boston would be fine.