Recorded during the early 1980's, this 2-Disc set of all four Brahms symphonies, still remains one of the best accounts of these impressive works. Günter Wand does not try to change the natural flow of the music by looking for stuff within the music that isn't there to begin with. He simply lets the music speak for itself, after all it does have beautiful things to express, by his perfect sense of pacing, momentum, gravitas when implied, and most of all deep lyricism.

The recorded sound lacks a bit of bloom compared to more recent accounts, but not enough to lessen the quality of this most masterful of renditions. Wand's traversal of the Bruckner symphonies has always been regarded as a reference set, and I believe the same to be true of his Brahms recordings.

Jean-Yves Duperron