Bruckner: Symphony No. 3 in D minor ‘Wagner Symphony'

2010

“Though you might wonder at the idea of the Salzburg Mozarteum Orchestra playing Bruckner, they have been doing so for many years.
Joseph Schröcksnadel's history of the orchestra reproduces a poster from July 1928 advertising a performance of the Fifth Symphony conducted by Bernhard Paumgartner in the Cathedral Square. In 2004 Ivor Bolton took over as music director, and judging by this excellent 2007 Bruckner Third, it would seem that he has made a difference.
The deftness and buoyancy with which the opening string ostinatos are realised indicate qualities of grace and manoeuvrability that more than make up for the fact that the orchestra will never command the weight or fire-power of, say, Böhm's Vienna Philharmonic, an ensemble that also brings to the third- and fourth-movement dance subjects a properly Austrian tread.
There have been outstanding versions of this 1889 version from Wand, Karajan, Böhm (the latter currently available as a two-CD set that also includes a fabulous Fourth – see above) and others besides. However, with few, if any, of these surviving as single-CD releases, this admirable new Oehms CD might be said to have the market at its mercy.”

August 2009

“The deftness and buoyancy with which the opening string ostinatos are realised indicate qualities of grace and manoeuvrability that more than make up for the fact that the orchestra will never command the weight or fire-power of, say, Böhm's Vienna Philharmonic...”