Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 4 & 8 features the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bernard Haitink. It is available at NativeDSD in Stereo and 5 Channel Surround Sound DSD 64.

Coming between two of Beethoven’s most famous symphonies the Fourth Symphony can seem a relatively lightweight and cheerful work. Written for Count Franz von Oppersdorff, who wanted a symphony similar in vein to the Second Symphony it is a brusque and enjoyable work.

Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony sees him in playful mood. Featuring humorous twists and turns and relatively brief movements, including the shortest movement of any of his symphonies, it is a lighthearted work.

The Fourth Symphony is probably Beethoven’s least well-known, a situation which no doubt owes much to its position sandwiched between the Third (the ’Eroica’) – at that time the largest and most complex symphony ever composed – and the viscerally powerful and uplifting Fifth. Beside these two great forward steps in symphonic thinking, the brusque Fourth can seem dwarfed, its relatively lightweight frame and predominantly cheerful nature apparently offering no equivalent to either their massive presences or their mighty extra-musical messages.

But it is a thoroughly Beethovenian work nevertheless, taut with muscular strength, propelled with unstoppable momentum, and shot through with its composer’s unmistakable stylistic fingerprints. Produced in the same year as the Violin Concerto, the Fourth Piano Concerto and the three ’Razumovsky’ string quartets, it purrs with the mature assurance of Beethoven’s so-called ’middle-period’ compositions, and, like several of those, is among his most lovable and appealing creations.

London Symphony Orchestra
Bernard Haitink, Conductor