Bruckner Symphonies 1-9 Box Set. All of Bruckner’s symphonies performed at 4 different venues by the famous Staatskapelle Dresden conducted by the famous Christian Thielemann. Grade for the box: D+.
The musical performances of these symphonies are excellent as is the sound. If the price drops below, say, $80, this becomes competitive with CD boxes of these symphonies, which can be had for $40 to $60. The video aspects of the box would become irrelevant—just play the discs in pure audio mode.
But if you are interested in good video of classical music, all the titles in this box comprise a colossal disaster and utter waste of the human spirit. No one has even begun the task of making high-quality Blu-ray recordings by one orchestra of all the Bruckner symphonies.
We found evidence of DVDitis for all of the titles in this box. We did extensive reviews with screenshots of No. 3 (graded F+), No. 6 (graded D+), and No. 9 (graded B+). By reading these three reviews, you can decide if there is a special reason why you would spend time on these crippled video files. Our suggestion: wait for the industry to start making good videos of symphonic music. In the meantime, we have lots of wonderful recitals, chamber music, operas, and ballets to enjoy.
PS: Peter Quantrill reviewed this box at page 93 of the July 2021 Gramophone. After 8 long and almost unbearably erudite discussions of the musical performances and how the relate to past recording on LPs (I think), Quantrill says, “I am left wanting more.” Quantrill can’t explain it, but he didn’t enjoy the box. Why? In an entire page of text, there isn’t one word about the quality of the many hours of videos he saw. Could it be that the execrably bad video content of the symphony recordings killed them for Quantrill without him knowing it? They say that death by carbon monoxide is insidious because the gas is odorless, tasteless, and invisible. Could it be the person dying has no idea of what is happening to him?
The article states that Quantrill saw the 9 symphonies in Blu-ray (I don’t think they came out in DVD.) Maybe the nice resolution seduced him. He had no idea he was dying of DVDitis. Follow this link to see what I’m talking about.
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