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LSO/Kreizberg, Barbican, London

Edward Seckerson
Monday 31 March 2003 00:00 BST
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There's a key moment in the first movement of Mahler's Second Symphony "Resurrection" where a remorseless sequence of disfiguring discords punches a hole through the infrastructure leaving us dazed and confused. There can be no going back. Mahler arrives at this moment of truth through one of his headlong accelerandos, only to halve the tempo momentously at the point of no return. It's a shock-tactic found in this and other Mahler symphonies and yet conductors – including Kakov Kreizberg, here making his LSO debut – undermine its impact with an unsolicited, unwritten easing of the tempo or ritardando. This eliminates the awkward gear-change. But Mahler wants us to crash the gears; the score tells us so, precisely. Not since Bernstein has anyone really taken him at his word.

The problem with Mahler performances today is that orchestras as technically proficient as the LSO are no longer stretched by the music's demands; the stress and strain, the roughness, the ugliness, the sheer effort of will is hugely compromised by 21st-century efficiency. Kreizberg's first movement glided with fabulous precision over every point of transition. This was not a bumpy ride to the hereafter. Vorsprung durch Technik. Even the rustic inner movements suggested a timely visit by the Groundforce team. Nobody got their hands dirty.

Even so, this piece will always ultimately overwhelm. For Kreizberg, the moment of truth came with the sounding of the "Dies Irae" deep and imposing in the LSO's fabulous trombones and tuba. Then the eight horns, bells raised, with their summons to the Judgement Hall. And two seismic percussion crescendos. This account of Mahler's finale was pretty sensational. Antiphonal offstage brass hung impressively in the air and that great moment – the entry of the LSO Chorus, so hushed and so expectant as to suggest quite literally the first breath of the afterlife – was judged to perfection. Never mind that the soprano Linda Mabbs's pitching was inclined to slip just below the silver lining. Her colleague, Katerina Dalayman, a little on the breathy side in the "Urlicht", came good for the final ascension which was glorious, extra brass flanking the hall to thrilling effect.

The question is: do you have to leave your Rolls-Royce on the other side of the pearly gates?

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