マーラー: 交響曲 第5番

【パーヴォ・ヤルヴィ&トーンハレによるマーラーの交響曲全集始動!】
マーラーの交響曲にはこれまでに何度も取り組み、フランクフルト放送響とライヴ映像での全集(C-major)も完成させているパーヴォ・ヤルヴィですが、それから10年以上の時が経ち、本人が「適切な時間を待っていた」と語るセッションでの全集録音が、いよいよ始動しました。首席指揮者を務めるチューリヒ・トーンハレ管弦楽団をこの大きな企画の相棒に選び、第一弾として送り出されるのは第5番。第1番から第4番までの様々な試みを経て、作曲家本人の新たな展開と器楽のみによる交響曲の新境地を切り開いたこの作品は、まさに門出にふさわしいものと言えるでしょう。周到に準備された演奏、そして録音も万全なもの。パーヴォが描く細部にまでこだわったフレージングと長大な作品を堅固に組み上げる見事な構築力、トーンハレ管の緻密なアンサンブル、そしてこのオケが持つ独特の輝かしさと翳りが深いコントラストを刻み、作品を彫の深いものに仕上げてその巨大なスケールを引き立てています。ヴァイオリン両翼配置をはじめ、第3楽章のホルン・ソロを他のホルン・パートの逆サイドに立たせるなど、オーケストレーションの面白さやアイデアを引き立てる見通しの良い録音も特筆すべきものです。
ナクソス・ジャパン

Mahler lovers are directed toward a fascinating article by David Denby in the May 2025 Atlantic magazine, "How Leonard Bernstein Changed the Canon." Denby describes the Mahler encounter, or one might say confrontation, between Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic in 1966, with various interesting details such as the Jewish conductors requisite joshing with ex-Nazis, but the situation ended in Bernsteins favor, and it is hard now to hear Mahler without having Bernstein in mind, which is not to say that everyone accepts his heated ways. The conductors with a direct connection to Mahler, notably Bruno Walter, did not sound like Bernstein, and plenty deliver more restrained performances. Among them is Paavo Jarvi, here leading the Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich in Switzerland (where Mahlers Fifth did not even have its premiere until 1951). The album kicks off a new Mahler cycle from the conductor and orchestra, and curious buyers propelled it onto classical best-seller charts in the spring of 2025. The good news is that the orchestra punches well above its newly bulked-up weight, with superb work in a symphony that is challenging from start to finish. Horn soloist Ivo Gass gets and deserves his own credit in the graphics, and the strings in the Adagietto are transcendent. That is one of the sections in which Jarvis approach works well; another is the opening "Trauermarsch," where the explicitly requested funeral march mood calls for a somberness that the musicians provide. When one gets into the second movement, "Sturmisch bewegt," and especially the Scherzo, some may wish for the sort of overly stressed-out phrase endings that were among Bernsteins trademarks. Others may like it just the way it is. This is an ideal opportunity to find out what may be coming from Jarvi and company in the rest of the cycle, with fine sound from the Grosse Tonhalle in Zurich. ~ James Manheim