In Saturday’s (6/19) Chicago Sun-Times, Andrew Patner writes, “ ‘I really don’t have much interest anymore in doing single symphonies by Beethoven,’ Bernard Haitink said last month, speaking from his home in Lucerne, Switzerland. ‘And while I recognize that it makes things bigger and seems more difficult, it’s really doing the whole set of nine that is so fascinating.’ Haitink brings his astonishingly clear and subtle survey of the full series of Beethoven’s symphonies with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra to a dramatic close this weekend at Orchestra Hall with the last of them, the great and still revolutionary Ninth, the so-called ‘Choral’ Symphony. And while he will continue to visit Chicago—he is slated to conclude the CSO’s next season with two weeks of concerts—these performances also bring to an end his four seasons as principal conductor here. … While we may have heard more emotional performances of the Ninth, none was as revealing as this one. None made you think more than this one.”
Posted June 21, 2010
