Search - Liszt - A Faust Symphony / Bernstein, Riegel, Boston Symphony on DVD

Leonard Bernstein at his best

Marc Haegeman | Gent, Belgium | 02/02/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Anybody familiar with Leonard Bernstein's recording of Franz Liszt's massive "A Faust Symphony" on Deutsche Grammophon knows what to expect from this DVD. This concert was filmed live in the Boston Symphony Hall around the same time as the studio sessions (July 1976), with exactly the same forces - the Boston Symphony Orchestra, tenor Kenneth Riegel, and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus. Throughout Bernstein obtains marvellous results from the Boston players - focused, intense, detailed and transparent, and moulding Liszt's romantically volatile inspiration to perfection. He is slower than most, leaving the delicate and poetic passages ample time to breathe without dragging, while the demonic side of the music is rendered nowhere as feverishly as here. Bernstein is moreover supreme in keeping the long movements together and brings the finale to an overwhelming climax of power and light. It is Liszt in all his excesses, but it is also Liszt standing between Berlioz and Wagner, and even further Mahler. Tenor Kenneth Riegel sings most engagingly.



The picture quality is typical of the period, with rather washed-out colours. The sound quality (in PCM stereo or artificial DTS 5.1) is correct but nowhere near as dynamic and warm as on the CD recording. Director Humphrey Burton provides an agreeable mix of Bernstein and the orchestra.



For a first-rate rendition of one of the greatest but rarely performed symphonic works of the 19th century by one of its strongest advocates, this DVD is a clear first choice."