This new Creation, taped, like all Bruggen’s recent recordings, at a public concert, certainly has its points. But too often my enjoyment was decisively marred by the balance. The orchestral bass is consistently overprominent, sometimes absurdly so, as in the grave, string-accompanied recitative in Part 1, “Seid fruchtbar alle” (where the double-basses play with clinically exaggerated staccato), or the solemn opening of the work’s climactic number, the duet for Adam and Eve with chorus in Part 3. More serious still is the distant, ill-defined choral sound. From what I can hear the Gulbenkian Chorus are an able, youthful-sounding body, if rather wanting in muscle-power among the tenors. But they are always competing on unequal terms with the orchestral strings. Their fugal entries are often obscured, and they cannot create the anticipated sense of exaltation at, say, the climax of “Die Himmel erzahlen”, where we should be thrillingly aware of Haydn pushing the tenors and basses into their highest register.
In this particular chorus Bruggen’s very smart initial tempo leaves him little room for manoeuvre at the piu allegro (1'48''); and several other numbers struck me as too brisk for comfort: the soprano solo with chorus in Part 1, “Mit Staunen sieht das Wunderwerk”; the evocation of Morning that opens Part 3; or the two duets for Adam and Eve, the first of which is also subjected to disconcerting unmarked ritardandos. But if Bruggen’s reading as a whole can lack repose and wonderment, many of the big numbers are spirited and purposefully shaped, with a good lift to the rhythms. And the orchestral playing throughout is assured and characterful – listen, for instance, to the glassy chill of the violins in Chaos (whose breadth of tempo is untypical of this performance), or the alluring woodwind in the soprano’s avian aria in Part 2 and the trio “Zu dir, O Herr, blickt alles Heil”, with its Zauberflote echoes.
Of the soloists Luba Orgonasova has a darker, weightier timbre and a more imperious manner than I find ideal in this work, though she is surprisingly flexible in coloratura, phrases persuasively and softens her tone nicely for the closing stages of her two arias. As with the smooth, elegant tenor, John Mark Ainsley, at his best in the description of the first moonrise, her German is not quite idiomatic. Eike Wilm Schulte has ample tonal body but, like several other basses in this work, too often sings loudly and lumpily, barking out notes individually and aspirating his runs. The closing D major section of “Rollend in schaumenden Wellen” is determinedly unpoetic, with the dreamy melisma on “Thal” (3'07'') used as an excuse for vocal bicep-flexing. Unlike Haydn himself, Bruggen opts for different soloists as Adam and Eve. Per Vollestad is an incisive, if dryish-voiced Adam who, like Schulte, is too often reluctant to sing legato; Joan Rodgers, on the other hand, provides the loveliest, most involving singing of the entire performance.
For all its intermittent attractions, then, Bruggen’s performance is hardly a front runner in a crowded field. Among period-instrument versions the fresh, inspiriting, up-tempo readings by Bruno Weil and the more massive-scaled Hogwood have preferable soloists and an incontestably superior sound balance. Modern-instrument recordings that capture most fully the primal awe and sublime, joyous innocence of Haydn’s vision include Dorati, Marriner and Karajan, 1966 vintage and featuring the incomparable Fritz Wunderlich.'