Bruckner, A.: Symphony No. 3 (1873 Version)

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In the category of "Bruckner symphony most mutilated by subsequent revisions," the prize goes to his Third, which he revised twice. From the 1873 original, Bruckner dropped recapitulations, tightened developments, eliminated quotations, and overall shortened the work by more than 400 bars. Whether Bruckner's revisions improved the Third is as yet undecided because until recently, most performances of the Third used the second revision of 1889 as their source. In the past decade, however, several conductors have taken up the original 1873 Third, among them Eliahu Inbal and Kent Nagano. This 2004 recording by Jonathon Nott and the Bamberger Sinfonieorchester doesn't have the evangelical fervor of Inbal or the passionate intensity of Nagano. What it has instead is the honest conviction that the original Third needs no special advocacy to succeed because the work is convincing in and of itself. And, amazingly enough, they're right: for all its enormous length, its gargantuan themes, its primordial rhythms, and its inordinate number of pauses, Nott and the Bamberger's original Third presents Bruckner's cohesive view of the natural and spiritual world as embodied in music of astounding originality and tremendous integrity. Nott is an exciting but disciplined conductor and he elicits a performance of power and sensitivity from the Bamberger band. Anyone who reveres the revised Third will want to hear Nott and the Bamberger's original Third. Tudor's super audio disc is warm and honest, but a bit raw at the climaxes.
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