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Franz Schmidt: Complete Symphonies

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Paavo Järvi

Franz Schmidt: Complete Symphonies

Awards:

Järvi is an almost ideal interpreter of this composer, not only managing to bring transparency and luminosity to Schmidt’s often thickly textured orchestration, but also keeping a tight rein...

BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 20205 out of 5 stars

More reviews

Franz Schmidt: Complete Symphonies

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Paavo Järvi

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Awards:

Järvi is an almost ideal interpreter of this composer, not only managing to bring transparency and luminosity to Schmidt’s often thickly textured orchestration, but also keeping a tight rein...

BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 20205 out of 5 stars

More reviews

About

At a time when many of his contemporaries were exploring more fluid structures, Franz Schmidt while perhaps stretching tonal harmony to its limits, continued to embrace 19th-century form and achieved a highly personal synthesis of the diverse traditions of the Austro-German symphony. His language, rather than being wedded to a narrative of dissolution and tragedy is radiant and belligerently optimistic and reveals this scion of largely Hungarian forebears as the last great exponent of the style hongrois after Schubert, Liszt and Brahms.

His work having fallen from prominence, Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony's dazzling live performances of all four of his symphonies, and the famous Notre Dame Intermezzo, shine a new light on this fascinating oeuvre and also on an affable and genial soul, and reminds us of the constant need to reappraise and enrich our account of music during the first half of the 20th century.

Contents and tracklist

Schmidt, F: Symphony No. 1 in E major
Work length45:18
I. Sehr langsam - Sehr lebhaft
Track length12:41
II. Langsam
Track length11:23
III. Schnell und leicht
Track length10:46
IV. Lebhaft, doch nicht zu schnell
Track length10:28
Schmidt, F: Symphony No. 2 in E flat major
Work length45:35
I. Lebhaft
Track length14:33
II. Allegretto con variazioni. Einfach und zart
Track length17:40
III. Finale. Langsam
Track length13:22
Schmidt, F: Notre Dame
Work length4:40
Intermezzo
Track length4:40
Schmidt, F: Symphony No. 3 in A major
Work length40:27
I. Allegro molto moderato
Track length12:53
II. Adagio
Track length7:35
III. Scherzo. Allegro vivace
Track length7:58
IV. Lento - Allegro vivace
Track length12:01
Schmidt, F: Symphony No. 4 in C major
Work length44:32
I. Allegro molto moderato - Passionato
Track length14:27
II. Adagio - Piu lento - Adagio
Track length12:33
III. Molto Vivace
Track length7:12
IV. Tempo primo un poco sostenuto - Passionato - Tempo primo. Allegro molto moderato
Track length10:20

Spotlight on this release

Awards and reviews

Christmas 2020

Järvi is an almost ideal interpreter of this composer, not only managing to bring transparency and luminosity to Schmidt’s often thickly textured orchestration, but also keeping a tight rein on the structural direction of works that in lesser hands can seem to meander…Best of all is his deeply committed account of the Fourth...it proves to be a gripping musical experience from first bar to last.
5 out of 5 stars

Awards Issue 2020

At its best this is music of great power and harmonious adventurousness, beautifully crafted and patiently built up. At other times, admittedly, it can seem to lose its way…The achievement of Järvi and his orchestra, though, is in making it all seem necessary and inevitable: these are compelling, supremely persuasive performances that constantly underline the music’s great qualities

17th January 2021

By the standards of his peers his works may sound old-fashioned, but his melodic material and gift for orchestration, especially his writing for solo woodwinds, make these works worth exploring, especially in Järvi’s new Frankfurt set...The Frankfurt band — conducted with luminous transparency — bring a more Central European sound to the music than Neeme Järvi’s high-gloss Americans.
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