I was awe-struck and jaw-dropped after the magnificent ending ... couldn't speak a word for 2 min .... Completely down on my knees. I am heathen, but that particular moment you feel like being embraced in God's boundless warmth.
I don't get such feelings in the equally famous, but stolid and square, performance by Klemperer. You see, that's the problem with many Austro-German conductors of the past generation. They tend to play everything slowly and in strict accordance with the score, without changes in tempo and dynamic. The end result is more often than never a passionless performance, in which everything is right in place, but when taken as a whole, it just doesn't spark.~~ Klemperer was an archetype. He is great in Beethoven and Brahms, but Mahler is different from the 2 B's and so must be taken differently. Mahler's is highly personal and eccentric music. You need someone with a touch of genius or individual charisma to handle him.
I don't get such feelings in the equally famous, but stolid and square, performance by Klemperer. You see, that's the problem with many Austro-German conductors of the past generation. They tend to play everything slowly and in strict accordance with the score, without changes in tempo and dynamic. The end result is more often than never a passionless performance, in which everything is right in place, but when taken as a whole, it just doesn't spark.~~ Klemperer was an archetype. He is great in Beethoven and Brahms, but Mahler is different from the 2 B's and so must be taken differently. Mahler's is highly personal and eccentric music. You need someone with a touch of genius or individual charisma to handle him.