Composer: Richard Strauss
Orchestra: Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Vladimir Jurowski
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Pentatone
Catalogue: PTC5186802
Release: 2021
Size: 1.64 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
Eine Alpensinfonie, Op. 64
01. Night
02. Sunrise
03. The Ascent
04. Entry into the Forest
05. Wandering by the Brook
06. At the Waterfall
07. Apparition
08. On Flowering Meadows
09. On the Alpine Pasture
10 .Through Thickets and Undergrowth on the Wrong Path
11. On the Glacier
12. Dangerous Moments
13. On the Summit
14. Vision
15. Mists Rise
16. The Sun Gradually Becomes Obscured
17. Elegy
18. Calm Before the Storm
19. Thunder and Tempest, Descent
20. Sunset
21. Quiet Settles
22. Night
Musical ode to sublime nature. Vladimir Jurowski and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester continue their journey through the heights of German late-Romantic repertoire with a recording of Richard Strauss’s Eine Alpensinfonie. The Alpine Symphony was inspired by the composer’s experiences during a mountain trail, and is an audience favourite thanks to its picturesque, idyllic charm and powerfully evocative score.
To Jurowski, the attraction of this piece lies not so much in the picturesque, but rather in Strauss’s Nietzschean embrace of living in the now and the transformative power of being in complete harmony with sublime nature. In that respect, this album shares a kinship not only with Jurowski’s previous recording of Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra (2017), but equally with his recording of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (2020), in which he also recognizes a composer coming to terms with the mortality of man while celebrating the immortal nature of Life. Seen in this light, Strauss’s Alpine Symphony becomes much more than just an exquisitely scored postcard.