I’ve only heard the conductor Kirill Petrenko live once. It was August 24, 2019. He was conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker in a free open air concert in front of the Brandburg Gate. They were playing Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, including the final chorus from Schiller’s “Ode to Joy”. An open air concert offers the danger of ending as a “Gone With The Wind” event with terrible accoustics. To my surprise, the sound was astonishingly good.
The orchestra’s new conductor, succeeding Sir Simon Rattle, delivered a great performance with his inspired orchestra. My hopes are very high that Kirill Petrenko will be able to reach or even surpass the level of the unforgettable Claudio Abbado.
In a CD and Blu-Ray box (Amazon.com, Amazon.de; MP3 download: Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.fr, Amazon.de) released in September 2020, Kirill Petrenko and the Berlin Philharmonic present classical music works by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky 1840-1893), Franz Schmidt (1874-1939) and Rudi Stephan (1887-1915).
In the liner notes to this first extended box showcasing recordings by the Berliner Philharmoniker and their new chief conductor, Kirill Petrenko writes that this edition offers a snapshot of the initial spark of their collaboration. Indeed, the recordings date from 2012 to 2019.
In the booklet, Kirill Petrenko explains that Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 was the first piece they performed together after his appointment. They worked with much nervousness and almost explosive tension, which can be felt in the recording, according to the conductor himself.
Incidentally, listening to Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, there are a few, repeated notes which sound exactly like the John Denver composition “Annie’s Song”. A quick check with Wikipedia shows that I am not the first to notice.
 look inside |
Great Symphonies Transcribed For Piano Solo Volume 1. Perfect – A’ Hinge”. Great Symphonies Transcribed for Piano Solo, Tchaikovsky: Symphonies Nos. 4, 5, and 6. Classical. Solo part. With Standard notation. Carl Fischer Music #PL1213. Published by Carl Fischer Music (CF.PL1213). |
Regarding Franz Schmidt’s Fourth Symphony, Kirill Petrenko writes that he has known this composition since his student days in Vienna. It is one of his favorite works and among those unjustly seldom performed. Kirill Petrenko describes Franz Schmidt as an antipode to Gustav Mahler and, like Tchaikovsky’s, his music has a highly personal aspect. It is akin to a farewell symphony, almost an instrumental requiem. The beginning and end is marked by a trumpet solo, which the Austro-Hungarian Franz Schmidt described as a “last music to take along into the next world”. At the time of composition (1932-1933), the composer was reeling from a cruel blow: he had just buried his daughter, who had died aged 30 a few days after the birth of her own child.
I would describe Franz Schmidt’s Symphony No. 4 in C major in simple terms as follows: the first movement, entitled “Allegro molto moderato”, is larely elegiac; the second movement, “Adagio”, is indeed adagio as well as dramatic; the third movement, “Molto vivace”, is animated, lively, gay and positive; the fourth movement, “Allegro molto moderato, un poco sostenuto”, is as the first movement elegiac, pointing to another world, with a quiet ending.
Rudi Stephan is another another composer Kirill Petrenko considers very important but far too little known and appreciated. He died as a soldier in the First World War, aged just 28. He was influenced by the so-called Munich School, but developed his own approach to classical music. His “Music for Orchestra” composed in 1912 comes in one movement, offers an introspective beginning as well as a grandiose final apotheosis, drenched in bright major.
Kirill Petrenko mentions that Ludwig van Beethoven’s works are vital to the Berliner Philharmoniker, especially in his jubilee year, the 250th aniversary of his birth (this was written in 2020). He stresses that the Ninth Symphony (8th + 9th Symphony Music Scores/Sheet Music) contains everything great and menacing in human nature. If ever we wanted to convey to distant worlds an honest portrait of mankind, this would have to be the work we submit. It embraces the the demonic and the aggressive as well as deeply felt love, both the humanistic and distructive nature of man in extremis. The conductor stresses that it was absolutely clear to him that he could not begin his time as artistic director of the Berliner Philharmoniker any other way than with this piece.
This box is valuable not just because it documents the early collaboration between Kirill Petrenko and the Berliner Philharmoniker through decent recordings of famous works by Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, but also because most of us can discover valuable compositions by the largely unknown Schmidt and Stephan.
Berliner Philharmoniker, Kirill Petrenko: Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Schmidt, Stephan. Berliner Philharmoniker Recordings, September 2020. 5 Audio CD, 2 Blu-Ray and with 7-Day Digital Concert Hall Voucher. Order the box from Amazon.com, Amazon.de. MP3 download of this classical music recordings from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.fr, Amazon.de.
Photo of the Philharmony and the Chamber Music Hall (Philarmonie and Kammermusiksaal). Photo copyright © Heribert Schindler/Berliner Philharmoniker.
The photo on top as well as here again shows Kirill Petrenko conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker in the concert opening the new season, playing Schubert’s “Great” Symphony in C-major, the last symphony Schubert composed . Photo copyright © Stephan Rabold/Berliner Philharmoniker.
For a better reading, quotations and partial quotations from the CD and Blu-Ray liner notes are not put between quotation marks in this review.
CD and Blu-Ray review about Kirill Petrenko and the Berlin Philharmonic added on September 10, 2021 at 15:50 Swiss time. More details added on September 11, 2021 at 00:30 Swiss time.
