Brahms: Symphonies Nos 3 and 4 – London Symphony Orchestra, Valery Gergiev
Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra bring to a close their celebrated Brahms cycle with the release of Symphonies Nos 3 and 4.
Brahms is often associated with the idea of abstract music, free of literary models or autobiography, but with the third the composer wrote in many ways his most personal symphony. Brahms composed his fourth and final symphony at a mountain retreat in 1884, about a year after the completion of the third, and his architectural musical skill is nowhere more evident. He combines baroque contrapuntal techniques with chromatic labyrinths, Hans von Bülow describing the effect as one of ‘being given a beating by two incredibly intelligent people’.