The golden sunset -- Haitink's Bruckner 9 with the LSO.

Bernard Haitink first recorded Bruckner 9 with the Concertgebouw Orchestra back in 1965 and then again in 1981. A video recording of a performance of this pairing was made in March 2009. Now comes Haitink's only official recording of this symphony with an orchestra other than the Concertgebouw, recorded live on 17 and 21 March 2013. 

It brings much expectation from me as I very much like his recordings made in the last few years which exhibit such wisdom that appears to elude him in his earlier attempts, especially the Ninth.

All Bruckner recordings so far from the LSO Live label

Haitink's Bruckner has a satisfying sense of cohesion. So in a sense there is little that happens in this Bruckner’s Ninth that isn't thoroughly predictable from the start, particularly from such a venerable Brucknerian, but the recording is illuminated with such inner glow, warmth and sagacity that, I suppose, every lover of Bruckner’s music will treasure the experience through and through. Such is the magic that the understanding of life and death becomes internalized in the Brucknerian idiom, thanks to Haitink the octogenarian via the London Symphony Orchestra whose playing is indescribably beautiful. 

It is a performance that makes other more "savory" interpretations appear either too caramelised or too hysterical. The respect to death that Haitink shows is palpable throughout, more so in the Adagio which is very moving in its own right. On the other hand, he is against any extraneous attempt to complete Bruckner's unfinished Finale: "You have to respect life, but you also have to respect death". 

He is right, because this performance makes any attempts to complete the Finale unfortunately subliminally superfluous.

This disc becomes one of my favourite Bruckner 9 recordings.