Bruckner - Symphony 7 [Pesek-Czech Philharmonic Orchestra] Bruckner's Seventh was the very first Bruckner Symphony i ever heard [Bohm / DG, and amazingly i just found this Bohm disc going cheap on Ebay, so i bought it, it will be good to re-visit his interpretation again], and naturally it was the one i started to know the best, now that has been eclipsed by the Fourth and Eighth, i must admit that the Seventh gets played maybe once a year, and i've already played this work this year in February [20th February 2011], it's good to listen to Pesek's interpretation today.
Libor Pesek is a Czech Conductor, now 77 years old, this disc was recorded back in 1986, Supraphon i take it are a sister company to Denon, and as a general rule are less inspired in their booklet covers than Denon, but this one is actually very good, a nice portrait of Pesek, lovely lighting, a nice idea to create a roughly 1 inch grey band on the left, and the lettering half covers over this and the green of the background foliage, a nice overall layout.
Pesek takes an hour to play this Symphony, i especially loved the fanfares at the end of the first and last movements, really thrilling, and a glorious grand finale to the end of the Symphony, it was the first movement which impressed me the most, opening with tremolo violins as a backdrop [0:00+], and singing cellos in the main tune [0:05-1:02], and then they swap places, the violins take up the tune, and now the cellos play the tremolo [1:02-1:48], but this time Bruckner colours things with the brass, what a superb opening, Bruckner surely knows how to set the stage with a stunning opening couple of minutes, also he has these half minute episodes, where he presents a nice little idea, for instance the sweet singing violins, with bubbly woodwind at the end [6:35-7:03], and an angry and stormy brass moment [10:45-11:18], nice brittle trumpets here, towards the end the strings develop a passionate yet agitated forte [14:32-14:51], and a little later the violins reach a treble zenith [15:21-15:43], and the ending as i suggested earlier, is very inspired [18:11-19:27], with a slow and gentle build up, especially by the woodwind, but the brass come in, with the horns starting things up, and all of the brass have a tremendous fanfare, with the strings / violins in high treble forte mode, with the trumpets having the last say, again nice and sharp and piercing.
Here's Eugen Jochum conducting the first movement on YouTube.
