Mahler: Symphony No. 3 / Kindertotenlieder

Hybrid/SACD - playable on all compact disc players

2004 Grammy® Award winner for Best Classical Album!

"No conductor that I have heard has brought off every aspect of this huge symphony to my total satisfaction and I doubt ever will. Not even my favourites already mentioned have done that. So I'm happy to welcome this new recording into the catalogue and stress its pros rather than its cons. Here the balance sheet is more in credit than debit. The San Francisco Orchestra is on fine form throughout and they are recorded with depth and spread in a realistic sound picture that packs a punch when needed but can pare down to intimacy too. It must be said that they don't have the last few ounces of tone colour variation that mark out the greatest Mahler orchestras from the others, woodwind especially. Their brass section too is rather soulless, especially when playing all out. But that is often the case with American orchestras. Tilson Thomas recorded this work once before with the London Symphony Orchestra for CBS and was much better served by a band that seemed to know the nooks and crannies of the music more intimately. He was himself a little more "unbuttoned" then too and "unbuttoned" is what Mahler was in this symphony.

There is a bonus in this issue of the Kindertotenlieder sung by Michelle de Young. She delivers them with great imagination and drama; especially the final song where I have never heard the words "In Diesem Wetter" spat out with such venom. No one would buy this issue just for the song cycle but it's a splendid bonus from one of the best Mahler singers of the new generation who reflects all aspects of this great cycle with feeling and depth. I just wish I had liked her in the Third Symphony fourth movement a whole lot more."
(MusicWeb May 2003)