Posted by Barry Guerrero on November 23, 19102 at 05:21:13:

In Reply to: Mahler simfonys discs posted by Mr.Armewakis on July 29, 19102 at 06:30:05:

From a purely musical standpoint, and from the issue of being "idiomatic", I rate Solti's CSO Mahler as ranging from extremely mediocre, to positively atrocious. I consider his Chicago M2 and M3 to be among the very worst Mahler recordings ever made. To be fair, his 8th was technically good, and musically fair. That was the highlight of his Mahler in Chicago. The 6th is decent. However, Bernstein's first NYPO M6 has exactly the same timings, and I think that it's both musically better, and more idiomatic. Solti's CSO 7th was pretty good for the first four movements. The finale, however, was an absolutely train wreck. In all seriousness, I really almost start laughing when ever I listen to it. The timpanist can't play the rolls during his opening flourish, and the rest is downhill from there. The 4th was OK, but Kiri Te Kanawa was put to better use on Ozawa's BSO M4 for Philips. Solti's CSO M1 was decent as well, but his earlier LSO was even better. The exact same thing can be said in the case of the 9th symphony. Personally, I wouldn't bother.

Barry Guerrero

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