This recording is dominated
by the steely brilliance of the Philadelphia
strings, or more specifically its violins.
This orchestra has always been celebrated
for the power and sumptuousness of its
strings, though I have found this to
be a mixed blessing. The dominance of
string tone can cause important detail
elsewhere to be lost, and the insistent
glitter can be tiring on the ear. I
suspect recording engineers have sometimes
been seduced by the fame of these strings
into over-emphasising that section of
the orchestra, and that may well have
been the case here.
All of which is a pity,
because these are distinguished performances,
conducted by a man who was reaching
maturity as an interpreter, at a time
when he had recently been put in charge
of the New York Met. And of course he
was a student of none other than George
Szell, who was without peer in this
music.
Enjoyable, then, and
good to be reminded once more of what
a terrific piece the Second Symphony
is – much finer than the Fourth, which,
for all its formal originality is for
me a rather dull, monochrome sort of
work. Not surprisingly, the Fourth is
actually the earlier work, having
been composed in 1841. The Second followed
in 1846, though he did revise the Fourth,
finishing it in its final form in 1853.
The Second Symphony
has a motto theme, which turns up in
three of the four movements, and is
simply a rising fifth in the trumpets.
Its function isn’t particularly clear;
after its announcement at the very start,
it turns up at climactic points in the
first movement, scherzo and finale.
It does, I suppose, act as a kind of
signal that matters are reaching a head
and that the end is in sight.
The scherzo is famous,
or notorious perhaps, in the sense that
it is quite extraordinarily difficult
to play, with a fiendish moto perpetuo
in the strings, interrupted by the two
trios. (Incidentally this may be in
part why this lovely symphony gets strangely
few performances). The Philadelphia
string section does come into its own
here; this is really thrilling, with
the sudden cranking up of the tempo
in the coda (not requested by
the composer!) exerting a kind of ‘G-force’,
as one can experience in a seriously
fast car when the foot goes flat down
on the floor.
The heart of the work,
as the brief but reasonably informative
notes tell us, is the Adagio espressivo.
It really is one of the finest and most
beautiful things Schumann wrote, with
a sustained eloquence that brings some
magical moments as well as some heady
climaxes. If by any chance you don’t
know this movement, please give it a
try.
As I’ve said above,
the Fourth is, for me, a less loveable
work, though it does have one strikingly
original moment, which is the slow introduction
to the finale, with its solemn key-changes
and stirring brass chorales. Throughout
both works, Levine shows a sure sense
of the phrasing and architecture of
the music, and, given the reservations
about the recorded string sound above,
his players respond superbly.
Gwyn Parry-Jones
Philadelphia Orchestra/James Levine 
