Roth: Bruckner – Symphony no.4. 1874 Version (24/96 FLAC)

Composer: Anton Bruckner
Orchestra: Gürzenich-Orchester Köln
Conductor: François-Xavier Roth
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Myrios
Catalogue: MYR032
Release: 2023
Size: 2.35 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes

Symphony No. 4 in Eb Major ‘Romantic’ 1874 Version
01. I. Allegro
02. II. Andante quasi allegretto
03. III. Sehr schnell
04. IV. Allegro moderato

After the tremendous success of the 7th Symphony, François-Xavier Roth and the Gürzenich-Orchester Köln continue their Bruckner complete symphonies cycle. The „Romantic“, as Anton Bruckner himself entitles his 4th Symphony, was composed in 1874 in the midst of a period of personal defeat. And he immediately doubted his work, describing some parts as „unplayable“ and finding „the instrumentation here and there overloaded and too turbulent“. It was only years later, after numerous revisions, that the Fourth was premiered and Bruckner achieved the success he had longed for with the public of the time.

In this recording, François-Xavier Roth opts for the original version from 1874 and shows the untamed fantasy of the work and its Romanticism in the sense of a fascinating intellectual period in which poets such as Novalis focused on the nocturnal aspects of reason, and in which art was regarded as essentially unfinished, involved in the process of becoming. Particularly in this first version, Bruckner’s 4th Symphony presents itself as such: as a “neverending approximation”.