Eduard Tubin - Complete Symphonies Vol. 2 - Symphonies Nos. 3 and 6

Eduard TUBIN (1905-1982)

Complete Symphonies Vol.2

Symphony No.3

Symphony No.6

Estonian National Symphony Orchestra

Arvo Volmer

recorded at estonian Cincert Hall, Tallinn 8-9/2/1999 (Symphony No.3) 

and 5-6/11/1999 (Symphony No.6)

Arvo Volmer’s Tubin cycle continues with expansive performances of the Third and Sixth symphonies. No. 3, with its grand gestures in the first and last movements, benefits most from this approach. Volmer builds the great arc of the first movement gradually, allowing the score’s beautiful instrumental coloring to fully register. In fact, color and sonority are the hallmarks of the entire performance, especially the fanciful scherzo with its echoes of Roussel and, in Neeme Järvi’s fleeter version, Debussy. The finale of Volmer’s performance reveals the greatest contrast with Järvi’s, which has a quicker pulse and more incisive phrasing. For his part Volmer takes the Largo maestoso marking at face value, lending his rendition a certain magisterial quality.

Volmer takes a similar approach to the wartime Symphony No. 6, though with far less success, especially in the face of Järvi’s blistering Gothenberg performance. The central scherzo is the major point of contention–Järvi stirs up the music’s martial and demonic elements with a fury noticeably lacking in Volmer’s reading (the brass especially could do with more rawness and savagery). The outer movements also lack the fierce edge Järvi provides. Still, the Estonian Symphony’s full, luminous sonority (especially from the woodwinds) is a virtue all its own. Plus, Alba’s spacious, warm, and detailed sound has more presence and bloom than the BIS production from the mid 1980s. No, this is not a replacement for the Järvi recordings, but a supplemental and most welcome alternative view of Tubin’s masterful works.

Victor Carr Jr