Thomas Sanderling
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Review
Shostakovich: Violin Concerto No 2; Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto CD review – superb playing
Glowing May 2024 Review
“In the 9th Symphony Concert of the Erfurt Philharmonic Orchestra, guest conductor Thomas Sanderling hit exactly this internalized tone in the overture “Calm of the Sea and Happy Voyage”. His baton moved barely noticeably, while a mysterious, nebulous mood prevailed in the Erfurt theater...
Sanderling’s reading of this seascape was fragile and enigmatic...
The concert ended with Schumann’s Fourth Symphony, Maestro Sanderling once again showed his ormidable sense of form and control of sound. Concentrated strings, filigree wood and majestically blowing brass provided the necessary degree of compactness in the coordinated interplay of this tricky, constantly drifting symphony.”
— Thüringer Allgemeine Zeitung
Veijo Murtomäki writing in Helsingin Sanomat, the leading Finnish daily, on October 12, 2013
Thrilling Shostakovich
Helsinki almost became the scene of the premiere of a score by Dmitri Shostakovich that had been missing for 70 years. Amid the horrors of war, Shostakovich wrote his cycle of six songs, Op. 62 (1942) – settings of English poems in Russian translation – for bass and piano. He later arranged it for orchestra (1943) and, when this got lost, made a version for chamber orchestra (1971).
The orchestral version, only recently discovered, was thrilling. It sounded sensitive and strong, military and macabre. In other words, a clear improvement on the chamber version, especially as Thomas Sanderling, who had already internalised his Shostakovich at an early age, succeeded in extracting extreme shades from the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra.
The poems had been restored to their original British versions, with which baritone Gerald Finley gave an impressive performance. The composer’s arrangement of Annie Laurie was totally authentic and pleasing.
Sanderling did a grand job with the Symphony No. 4 (1878/80) by Anton Bruckner: the HPO sounded as if it had been born again. After a lucky start, we got some imposing, devout, characterful and rich German romanticism.
