Franz Lachner Symphony No.3

[Holger]

By the way, when I listened to this symphony for the first time a few weeks ago only and actually after most of this discussion had already taken place (the pile of new CDs on my desk is large, so there is usually some delay), I thought that the relative sameness of the symphony's movements and music in general which was pointed out in one of the above contributions might also be related to the fact that the slow movement is taken rather briskly. Now reading about the metronome issues this seems to be confirmed up to some degree.

By the way, some members who are capable of reading German might also be interested in the following review:
http://www.klassik-heute.de/4daction/www_medien_einzeln?id=22625

[eschiss1]

my own first impression was that the first two movements were very impressive, the third movement- it would be good to hear it taken closer to the given metronome mark, now people mention, though still, inventive enough and the finale seemed in its -- balletic? - character - actually, more different than disappointing, to these ears. (Definitely not "the same" as the first three movements in its manner. Or style of accompaniment, at that )
I felt more impressed/pleased/looking forward to hearing-again-etc. etc. (by) the symphony than seems to be the takeaway overall here. Reminds me of another quite good D minor symphony with a very strong first movement, Onslow's 2nd (which to me seemed more "Germanic" than "French", though I understand Fifield not covering it in his recent book of course )

[Alan Howe]

We still don't know how John came up with the unrealistic 34 minutes for the length of the slow movt.

No, quite. But it would appear that the cpo recording of the slow movement is complete and uncut. It's hard to see how this can be gainsaid given the evidence that has been adduced.

[eschiss1]

Two possibilities come to mind:
John's recording has a much slower tempo, either because it seemed right to him, or he misread the quaver as a 16th-note
or:
he had access to a manuscript score/urtext/... substantially different... (and/or used Franz's brother's (Vinzenz's) reduced 1837-published score- published therefore before the 1840 full score and not wholly unauthorized I'd think...!- which may be different in important ways. I haven't compared the two. May be the slow movement has repeats in the V Lachner reduction. Or a different tempo. Hrm.!!... Will check that later...)

Interested to know too...

[Alan Howe]

We badly need John to come back to us about this...

[John H White]

Well, I did reply but, somehow it didn't get through. Maybe I pressed a wrong button. Roughly what I said was that movements 1,2,&.4 were just about the same as my version but that the 3rd movement , although all the notes were the same, appeared to be played about two and a half times as fast as that from my version sticking to the published metronome mark of quaver = 38. I think both versions have their merits, but I still have a sneaking regard for my slower version, as it seems to bring out the occasional timpani solo   
     I trust that this reply will get through.
        Cheers,
            John.

[Alan Howe]

Sorry, John, but I'm no wiser. How can your rendering of the 3rd movement be 2½ times slower than the cpo? I thought we had established that the latter is only about two minutes faster than the stated tempo marking? If so, then your rendering must be twice as long as it should be. Sounds like there's an error somewhere...

[eschiss1]

"published metronome mark of quaver = 38"
Erm, No!!
38 != 88... 88 is what the composer wrote, or at least what Diabelli engraved in the fs. (it could be dotted eighth=88 but I think that dot is a splotch.))

[Mark Thomas]

Aha, that would go a long way towards explaining it, although not quite 2½ times.

[Alan Howe]

Aha indeed!

[Holger]

Moreover, as Savoir_Faire pointed out above, we should not forget that the CPO recording is somewhat faster than quaver = 88, more like quaver = 100 or so. This pretty well corresponds with a factor of approximately 2½.

[Alan Howe]

Quite. So the equation is 2½ x 38 = 95 ≈ 100.

Problem solved, then?

[JeremyMHolmes]

Indeed!

FWIW I agree with Eric - looking at Page 133 of the score on IMSLP, and enlarging the screen, it seems clear (to me at least) that the metronome marking is quaver=88 not quaver=38, ignoring the egregious dots which Eric rightly dismisses as splodges.

[Alan Howe]

Having looked myself, it's clear that quaver=88 is correct.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Should have gone to Specsavers!