First, some housekeeping. Despite the claim on the front of the box, this is not Mahler’s complete works. Die Drei Pintos is missing, even its Entr’acte, which is a pity because the opera is a lovely work written wholly in Mahler’s own (orchestral) style, now readily available in a handsome modern edition published by A-R. If EMI, never a particularly big “Mahler” label (perhaps because of its strong British bias), didn’t want to make a new recording it surely could have licensed the excellent Bertini complete recording from RCA. This also would have given some welcome attention to the conductor responsible for the best Mahler cycle on the label, one who otherwise isn’t represented at all in this collection. But more on that later.
Also, Mahler’s Bach Suite and transcriptions of Schubert and Beethoven quartets are not included; they surely should have been as they have entered the modern repertoire and enjoy some popularity. Let’s look briefly, then, at what you do get, and consider some possible alternatives.
Symphonies: No. 1 is Giulini/Chicago, a sober but interesting interpretation, less exciting than it might be, but a worthy example of the conductor’s art. Mackerras, though, or Litton would have been better choices, never mind the best option of all: Muti/Philadelphia. No. 2 is the Klemperer, a classic, and still one of the great ones. No. 3 is Rattle, one of the better performances in his cycle, but still hardly a match for Bertini. The choice of Horenstein for No. 4 represents one of this erratic conductor’s better Mahler recordings, and Margaret Price in the finale is lovely–but again, Previn and Pittsburgh (with Elly Ameling) are audibly superior in every respect. Tennstedt’s live Fifth was an inspired choice, an incredibly intense performance.
Barbirolli’s Mahler Sixth also represents a distinctive and worthy view of the work, and he has the inner movements in their trendy if less convincing new order: Andante before Scherzo. Rattle’s Seventh is utterly forgettable, and badly recorded to boot, but Tennstedt’s Eighth is one of the best, especially in the second movement (though Bertini is also fabulous in this work, so why have two performances by Tennstedt?). Bertini’s Ninth also would have been infinitely preferable to Barbirolli’s indifferently played, woodenly recorded, and expressively tepid Berlin performance. EMI even could have maintained its pro-British bias by selecting Pesek’s Liverpool version (on Virgin), a wonderful, underrated effort. Rattle rounds out the cycle with his generally excellent Berlin Tenth (Cooke version).
Turning to the songs, the Fischer-Dieskau/Furtwängler Wayfarer cycle and Baker/Barbirolli Rückert songs are classics. The Walter/Ferrier Kindertotenlieder is an acquired taste. Klemperer’s Das Lied (Ludwig/Wunderlich) is a classic, alongside Szell’s Des Knaben Wunderhorn (Schwarzkopf/Fischer-Dieskau). The early songs with piano all are well sung by a talented group of singers, and there’s a bonus disc consisting of the Rückert-Lieder sung in piano versions by Thomas Hampson (just okay), and a bazillion versions of “Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen”. Very poetic, but somewhat silly. Oh yes, Rattle’s Das Klagende Lied: good, but certainly not special, and not that well recorded for a modern version. Speaking of which, as you might expect, the engineering varies considerably. If you just want the symphonies in a box, Bertini remains the way to go. Of course, neither the conductor, orchestra (Cologne Radio), or engineering are British. They’re just better.
