Allan Pettersson - Symphony No. 13 (Christian Lindberg)

Information

Composer: Allan Pettersson

• Symphony No. 13

Norrköping Symphony Orchestra

Christian Lindberg, conductor

Date: 2024

Label: BIS

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Review

The Thirteenth Symphony (1976) is the largest of Pettersson’s later symphonies, second only in size to No 9, completed just five years earlier. I first encountered it in the 1993 BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra broadcast conducted by Alun Francis ahead of the work’s only previous recording (one of the few broadcasts of one of this composer’s symphonies in the UK). I reviewed the resultant CD warmly as a ‘tremendous, full-blooded account’ then and as a performance it stands up very well now.

Fine as that is, this newcomer is manifestly superior. The Norrköping Symphony Orchestra articulate the music’s ‘soaring melodies and grippingly searing polyphony’ more convincingly still (not that the BBC Scottish players were in any way deficient) and Lindberg shapes the structure more compellingly, although there is little difference in overall duration. It is a matter of expressive interpretation rather than technicalities of performance. Lindberg seems to feel more keenly the work’s intense range of mood – the ferocity and depth of its emotion, the consolation that this engenders – and communicates this to his orchestra in masterly fashion. If anyone wonders what it is that conductors truly contribute to an orchestral performance, then this disc is glowing testimony to their importance.

The Norrköping Symphony Orchestra’s playing is superb, too, certainly matching their Scottish rivals. BIS’s rich, natural sound has more immediacy and depth than CPO’s. If you admire CPO’s disc, as I do, you will marvel at the additional richness this new recording brings out. A stunning account and the one to have.

— Guy Rickards

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Allan Pettersson (19 September 1911 – 20 June 1980) was a Swedish composer and violist. He is considered one of the 20th century's most important Swedish composers. He studied at the Swedish Royal Academy of Music, and later in Paris with René Leibowitz, Arthur Honegger, Olivier Messiaen and Darius Milhaud. Pettersson was best known as the creator of Barfotasånger, a collection of 24 songs for voice and piano set to his own lyrics. He also wrote 16 symphonies, choral and chamber music, and a number of orchestral pieces. His symphonies are often compared to Mahler's symphonic output.

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Christian Lindberg (born 15 February 1958) is a Swedish trombonist, conductor and composer. In the course of an exceptional career, Lindberg has single-handedly established the trombone as a solo instrument and was the first Swedish instrumentalist to perform with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO). Today he devotes most of his time to composing, with commissions from ensembles such as the CSO and the Rotterdam Philharmonic. Lindberg also has a flourishing conducting career. His acclaimed and wide-ranging discography on BIS includes more than 50 CDs.

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