Bernard Haitink is a sturdy Brahmsian with a keen sense of structure. His new version of the First Symphony is at its most inspired in the finale where, at 12'23'' (I’m thinking of the passage that stretches from bars 279 to 286), ff marcato triplets stagger towards a thunderous transformation of the big horn theme. Brahms marks no slowing down, and yet Haitink broadens the pulse – rather more convincingly, in fact, than he does on his earlier Concertgebouw recording. The effect suggests a rolling juggernaut drawing to a halt, although there’s in fact less than half-a-minute’s difference between the earlier and later performances of the finale. Elsewhere, however, the pace in Boston is considerably slower than it was in Amsterdam, and the overall mood, considerably more purposeful. The first movement lasts 14'28'' as opposed to 12'56'' before, the main difference being in the Allegro passages (the two versions of the opening Un poco sostenuto are merely nine seconds apart). Haitink tiers his string choirs with typical expertise, but at 0'31'' into the first movement’s Introduction (bar 8) there is a momentary dip in volume that sounds to me more like an editing hiccup than an interpretative quirk. No diminuendo is marked and there is no parallel ‘jolt’ in the Concertgebouw recording.
The Adagio is warm and genial (again, it is significantly broader than before), the third movement has plenty of body and the finale drives forwards inexorably – although the earlier recording is both freer in spirit and better drilled. Haitink makes edifying music of Nanie, where Schiller’s hymn ends “with an apostrophe to art, whose role it is to console the bereaved and to ensure immortality for the dead... ” (I quote JW’s sympathetic notes). My only complaint is that the ladies of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus sport a rather obtrusive level of vibrato, but otherwise things go well. In both recordings, the sound is full and forward, but given a choice between this new Brahms cycle and its analogue Amsterdam predecessor, I would be inclined to opt for the more ardent (and more ambient) earlier set.'