Bruckner: Symphony No. 5 in Bloomington, MN

The bicentennial of
Anton Bruckner
's birth has produced new recordings from orchestras, great and small. The brass of the
Rotterdam Philharmonic
may not be those of
Christian Thielemann
's
Vienna Philharmonic
, but one might also argue that what listeners hear here would be closer to what
Mahler
heard on the podium of that group. The central attraction, in any event, is the work done here by conductor
Lahav Shani
, who had been at the helm of the orchestra for six years when this album appeared in 2024 and has developed the ability to shape what it does in detailed ways. In
Bruckner
Symphony No. 5 in B flat major
, just slightly quicker than average at an hour and 11 minutes, he takes one of the most notoriously complicated pieces of
's symphonic cycle and clarifies it a good deal. Perhaps his Scherzo needs a bit more venom, but hear the sprawling opening movement, just shy of 20 minutes long, and hear the subtlety of
Shani
's treatment of the immensely important second theme, beginning around three minutes in. It is a
Fifth
that reveals much on multiple hearings, and the clear acoustic offered by
Warner Classics
leaves little to be desired. ~ James Manheim