It may sound like faint praise to describe this as a very efficient and very accurate performance but the care that Slatkin takes over such things as dynamic gradation, crisp rhythm and precise articulation deserves warm praise. So does the orchestral playing, which is in the luxury class: the St Louis horns, in particular, are marvellously athletic, and the unanimity of the strings in fast staccato passages is brilliantly vivid. You will be more aware in this performance than in many of how much of the first movement is quiet. More aware, also, of gradations of quietness: you can rely on Slatkin to differentiate between p and pp. The orchestral sound is on the whole rather lean, even dapper, which makes for real propulsive energy in the fast movements, without an ounce of fat to hold the music back or blur its outlines. A good sense of momentum, too: the first movement has an insistent forward impetus, though its timing reveals that nothing has been hurried.
At the other end of the adjectival spectrum it may also sound dismissive to describe this as a rather dispassionate reading. The huge emotions and terrible anxieties that both Karajan (DG) and Rattle (EMI) in their very different ways see as the essence of the work are less overt in Slatkin's account. The scherzo is more exciting (and dazzlingly played) than fearsome, the third movement has more elegance than poignancy and there are few shadows in the finale once the pensive, quietly expressive (but never desolate) introduction has passed. The eloquence of the first movement, too, is understated by Slatkin's crisp, staccato manner: his closest approach to tragedy is a certain earnest sobriety.
The recording is as clean as the playing; both orchestra and hall sound slightly small-scale (like the performance). The work sounds much bigger in Karajan's or Rattle's hands, the former bitterly and epically expressive, the latter a bit too free with his histrionics and his choices of tempo. Rattle's recording has rather a harsh edge to it at times, while DG's sound for Karajan is as massive as his conception of the symphony.'