The 71-year-old Finnish conductor Leif Segerstam makes his way cautiously to the stage these days. But once on the podium with the baton in his hand, he’s attacking Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony with alarming vigour and ferocity.
From the BBC Symphony Orchestra he drew a tone of remarkable amplitude in a craggy, big-boned reading that took no prisoners. By the time he got to the first climax just a few pages in, it seemed like apocalypse already. Had he shot his bolt too soon?
The mighty Scherzo continued in this vein, with a tendency for the undeniable vitality to become coarse. The outdoors feel of these movements — so different from the cathedrals of sound erected by more traditional interpreters — reached its apogee in the equally massive slow movement where Segerstam’s huge climax evoked a panoramic view from the mountain top. But in the Adagio especially the composer’s admonitory “nicht schleppend” (not dragging) was not heeded, with adverse effects on the shape and structure of the movement.
Doubts lingered in the finale where in spite of the startling immediacy, there remained a lumbering quality and a sense of halting progress.
A different side of Bruckner was revealed in the first half, when James O’Donnell conducted the BBC Singers in immaculate performances of four of the motets. This was the more familiar face of Bruckner the devout Catholic, though these accounts were faithful too to the inherent drama of the pieces.
The Bruckner were preceded by Bach’s motet Jesu, Meine Freude, more Lutheran in orientation. Here too O’Donnell, moonlighting from his day job at Westminster Abbey, secured exquisitely shaded readings that displayed the BBC Singers at their incomparable best.
Broadcast by BBC Radio 3, the concert is available on iPlayer.
