Negative Positive
Title: Is this what Rattle really means?
Review: Simon Rattle has avoided Schubert's music for twenty years, and having put a toe in the water, he's outdone by a masterpiece. It's hard to believe such finicky, over-pointed phrasing is really sincere. Maybe Rattle's trying to bring Schubert into the canon of clipped, shallow period Beethoven. Whatever the intention, this is charmless conducting and playing, without an ounce of relaxation or joyful high spirits. Absent those qualities--so perfecttly captured by Beehcam's recordings of the early symphonies--it's pointless to fiddle while Schubert burns. Many other conductors have given us memorable Ninths--my favorites are Bernstein on Sony, Klemperer on EMI, and Sinopoli on DG--but this is far from adding to the list.
Is the review positive or negative? 