The 7th symphony has an interesting little marking, a quarter-note in a bracket next to the opening Adagio indication.

This symphony is thereafter quite detailed in its tempo markings, of which there are many and often quite subtle, using detailed italian descriptives. It is therefore interesting that the opening indication of Adagio (quarter note symbol) lasts without change until well after the trombone solo. There is a restatement of the opening scale (in a different key), followed by horn and viola syncopations, which mark the beginning of the transition to the scherzo.

Almost incredibly, this point in the piece is marked Un pochettino meno adagio.

Un pochettino!!!

This clearly indicates that everything that has lead up to this point is in Sibelius' mind a true quarter note adagio. Perhaps not slavishly metronomic, but a true Adagio nonetheless, and in my mind without much variation. If he wanted a perceptible tempo change, he probably would have written one, as the very detailed tempo markings that he uses afterwards suggest.

So my question is, has anyone ever heard a performance or recording where this is the case? I have unfortunately never heard this piece in performance, and I am about to set off on a journey through the 6 or 7 recordings of this piece that I own to see if anyone really sustains the opening Adagio as a true Adagio until that fatefull marking of Un pochettino meno Adagio.

I will keep a running list at the end of this post to show what I've found. Arenan, I would much appreciate if you could tell us how Segerstam does this.

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Simon Rattle - City of Birmingham - 1987

• Starts very slowly, almost devoid of pulse at the beginning. The chords following the scale "morph" into a faster tempo in the 8th bar, where the woodwind motifs take over.
  
• Interestingly, this is the opposite effect (Slow-Faster) to what Berglund does with Helskinki 1984 (Fast-Slower) (See below)
  
• Gradually the pulse shifts to halfnotes in the passage leading to the viola+cello chorale.
  
• The viola+cello chorale begins as a true quarter note Adagio.
  
• Imperceptibly, the tempo shifts to a half-note feel. A fine piece of conducting, but unfortunately the score doesn't call for it.
  
• The trombone solo passage is played throughout with quite a lot of rubato. He is probably conducting quarter notes, but very freely.
  
• Just before the pochettino, there is quite a lot of tempo fluctuation.
  
• Overall a very free and pulse-less feeling, too many different tempos and fluctuations for a passage that is marked as having one basic tempo, personally I find it misses the point entirely.

Paavo Berglund - Chamber Orchestra of Europe - 1997

• Very steady feeling of a quarter-note pulse through the first 20 bars.
  
• The viola cello chorale very perceptibly shifts to a faster tempo, most definitely conducted in 3. The tempo very slightly moves forward to the trombone solo.
  
• The trombone solo is a steady half-note pulse, that I would characterize as Moderato
  
• The passage after the trombone solo settles down a little bit, approximately to the tempo of the viola+cello chorale.
  
• Overall, although the chorale and trombone theme cannot be characterized as adhereing to an Adagio-quarter-note tempo, there is a strong sense of pulse in this recording, which I like.

Paavo Berglund - Helsinki Philharmonic - 1984

• Much faster opening than in the later recording, but still has a quarter-note feeling.
  
• Becomes suddenly much slower with the woodwinds motifs in the 8th bar. This slow tempo is maintained until the viola+cello chorale. Very "quarter-noty".
  
• Then the incredible happens. The viola+cello chorale is almost twice as fast as the music that preceeded it. A very "sing-song" half-note feeling. That said, the string playing is absolutely gorgeous.
  
• Upon the entry of the trombone, the tempo slows down a little, but still a definite half-note pulse. This tempo endures unchanged until the pochettino.
  
• So overall, two problems. First, the opening is too fast given that the 8th bar settles into a "real" quarter-note Adagio. And secondly, there is absolutely no reason to jump to a completely "new" tempo at the viola+cello chorale.

Colin Davis - Boston Symphony - 1975

• Note: my focus is on the tempos, not the questionable playing, dynamics, etc.
  
• Very steady quarter-note opening, loses momentum into bar 8 like Berglund and Helsinki.
  
• Although there is an unwanted ritardando just before the viola+cello chorale, the tempo at the beginning of the chorale perfectly maintains the quarter-note pulse that was established before, and does not speed up significantly through the whole section. Unfortunately, the playing is horrendous. Sound, vibrato, articulation, phrasing, are just plain ugly.
  
• The trombone solo section, although faster than the chorale, still maintains a quarter-note pulse.
  
• Although the tempos until the pochettino are quite consistent with themselves, the unbalanced playing mars any sense of internal cohesion this may have otherwise created.

Jukka-Pekka Saraste - Finnish Radio Symphony - 1993 (live)

• Opening is a little faster than the subsequent 8th bar wind motifs, but a very consistant quarter-note pulse is present throughout.
  
• The beginning of the viola+cello chorale is a little faster than what preceeded it, but maintains a quarter-note feeling.
  
• Very soon into the chorale, he accelerates to a half-note pulse similar to Berglund's Helsinki "Sing-Song", probably ending up even faster where the low-string pizzicato comes in.
  
• Trombone solo passage a little slower but definitely a half-note pulse here.
  
• The problem is underlined by the exit from the trombone section into the pochettino. The restatement of the opening scale is more than twice as fast as it was near the beginning.
  
• Purely in terms of the prescribed idea, this performance is an absolute disaster.

Herbert von Karajan - Berlin Philharmonic - 1968

• In
  

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  , Andrew B says: "slow, grand, but with a mastery of pulse of which Sibelius would surely have approved."
  
• So true. Up until the point to which I am comparing these recordings, Karajan truly displays mastery of pulse here, maintaining a steady quarter-note Adagio throughout.
  
• No need to break it down further, Karajan demonstrates that it is truly possible to do this without all the tempo changes that the above recordings make, with a beautiful result.
  
• That said, the rest of the recording suffers terribly from (1st of all) absolutely horrendous bassoon playing, and not just the closing chords, where it sounds as if the bassoon is playing B-flat. The bassoon's intonation and articulation are incredibly shoddy throughout, I can't imagine how on Earth this managed to go by uncorrected.
  
• Secondly, the brass are too rough in terms of articulation and sound (take for example the minore statement of the trombone theme). They disrupt the otherwise homogeneous sound that Karajan gets, which is odd, because it sounds as if he sets the brass this way on purpose.

... more to come ... I cannot for the life of me find my Vanska 6-7 recording, too much travelling around with it, I guess. I would be much obliged if anyone could help me by telling me of their recorded and live experiences with the opening Adagio of this work.

Very interesting, this. If your intention is hereby to encourage conductors to adhere to what Sibelius wrote, then I'm all in favour.

Obviously a good musician will bring an appropriate - but not exaggerated - degree of Sibelian rubato to the whole process. Overall, though, Sibelius knew what he was doing, and merely following the 'traditional' deviations from the score (not just this score!) surely reflects a sad lack of imagination on the part of the interpreter.

As you're comparing versions, here are two more points a little later in this symphony:

1) PRINTING ERROR!: One bar before G, the printed score omits the marking 'a tempo' which is CLEARLY in the manuscript. Here the a tempo naturally means slower than the poco affrettando a few bars earlier - as indeed some conductors do - for instance Barbirolli because the expression demands it (I don't believe for a moment that he had access to the manuscript) and Vänskä (as usual he had compared the score with the manuscript, and we also had a manuscript copy at the recording sessions).

2) BALANCE in the Allegro moderato section - 8 bars before Q and the analogous place a little later in the symphony: why, oh why do so many conductors drop the string dynamic from the marked ff to something like mp at this point? The flutes and bassoons will come through anyway - and will sound 'through' the strings rather than 'over' them (cf. indeed the trombone solo itself). The manuscript score has no drop in dynamics marked. Moreover, even in good orchestras there can be problems with wind intonation (Berlin Phil under Karajan / DG at this point…) and these are only made worse if the strings disappear in a puff of (cigar) smoke. My felicitations to the few conductors who do what Sibelius asked for!

My own experience of concert performances broadly reflects what we hear on the records. By the way, I agree about the raucous brass in the Davis/Boston account, but if you want a REAL laugh (something so laughably off-target that it becomes hugely desirable) then try to hear the Moscow Radio SO/Rozhdestvensky - the old mono recording, only on LP, rather than the stereo remake. I have nothing against the Russian brass tradition, but this particular trombonist sounds like an apoplectic wasp with two bottles of vodka inside him.

Andrew B wrote:

1) PRINTING ERROR!: One bar before G, the printed score omits the marking 'a tempo' which is CLEARLY in the manuscript. Here the a tempo naturally means slower than the poco affrettando a few bars earlier.

Thank you so much for this, Andrew B, I have always wondered why that bar is often played slower... Your explanation is quite definitive.

In terms of Rubato, I agree that a 5-6 minutes of this kind of music should obviously not be metronomic. However, the examples that I have given thus far drastically cross the line. In my opinion, since Sibelius is very specific about very subtle tempo changes later in the piece, I believe that a long opening marked Adagio should maintain the quarter-note pulse that he is asking for, certainly with allowances for rubato but not for altogether different tempos. I think this approach will give the opening a certain cohesion that will stand very strongly in retrospect after the tempos truly begin to change from the transition to the scherzo and onwards. One will remember that BLOCK of music and the tempo therein established, and the two returns of the trombone theme will be that much stronger for it.

I had a small shock a few days ago... could it be that I've missed the point entirely?

Soon after the string chorale begins, there is a marking of segue. Can you believe that I've never noticed it before? It is in small print and in my score, it is not in all the staves... but still, I simply can't believe that I haven't noticed it.

I admit that I am a little unclear as to what he means by segue, but could it be that he is calling for a poco a poco piu mosso effect, as is present in most recordings? If so, why then is the beginning of the transition after the trombone theme marked un pochettino meno adagio? If one were to "segue" in this sense, we would be far beyond "un pochettino" at that point and firmly into a proper Andante.

I also wonder if segue could mean simile but if so, "simile" to what?

If anyone could help me with this, I would be most appreciative, as sadly, I'm not sure I can conduct this piece confidently without finally solving this little tempo mystery.

Fear not, you haven't missed the point.

The 'segue' [='continue in the same manner'] refers only to the phrasing - for the first four bars the violas and cellos have legato lines above their notes, which stop at the 'segue'. In my score at least there is one 'segue' for violas, one for cellos (between the staves so referring to both divisi parts respectively).

This discussion has proved a little to technical for me but I thought that you might be interested in a remark that Sibelius made to the English conductor Basil Cameron, October 1949, 'When performing this symphony it is very important that the beginning and the end are conducted very adagio'.--kullervopete.

That's true, but when writing to Cameron I suspect he was referring more to the expression and articulation than the tempo itself. The metronome markings he supplied in 1943 (though I don't think anybody pretends that these are definitive) were as follows:

Adagio - crotchet 76

'From D gradually forwards to the following tempo' Un pochettino meno Adagio (p.12) minim=76

Poco affrettando (p.13) minim = 84

6/4 (page 20) dotted minim = 104

'Gradually to the following tempo' Vivacissimo (page 23) dotted minim = 152

Adagio (p.30) minim = 56

Allegro molto moderato (p.40) dotted minim = 76

Allegro moderato (p.42) dotted minim = 84

Vivace (p.59) dotted minim = 126

Presto (p.64) dotted minim = 160

Adagio (p.68 ) minim = 56

(Hope I copied those right!)
Overall these sound rather convincing to me. The biggest surprise is how fast he recommended taking the beginning end ending. Maybe the metronome markings encouraged conductors to overdo it, and his remark to Cameron was intended to counterbalance this?

Andrew B, thank you for this chart, and quite frankly, I am quite happy that I did not know this before I conducted the piece for the first time in April 07.

My entire interpretation was based on the idea that Adagio is Adagio, and that when he writes Adagio in different places, he wants the same tempo.

Secondly, as I mention above, I took Un pochettino meno Adagio to mean "Just a slight bit faster", and not to mean "Twice as Fast". I am of course not arguing with Sibelius' instructions, but that said, based on his instructions, my performance was "wrong". And all the while, I was so happy at the time to achieve (almost) identical quarternote (crotchet) Adagios every time the marking occured...

Given Sibelius' instructions, I'm not sure I can ever conduct this piece again, not for a long, long time, anyway.

'Composers of today generally dont seem to know how a real Adagio should sound. It becomes increasingly clear to me that it must be very hard properly to perform my Symphonies. I didn't previously understand that'.--Sibelius to Santeri Levas [1942]
Andrew B has given us metronome markings that Sibelius often asked his publishers to put into the score for the benefit of ill-informed conductors. But we should remember that Sib only did this as a last resort. To quote the master again 'One can't put everything into the notes--A great conductor gets inside the work and feels the innermost endeavours of the composer. He must be able to read between the notes. If anyone doesn't understand that, metronome marks won't help him much'.
My respectful advice to maestro Kurki would be to perform this great Symphony as and when he can, use Sibelius's metronome and expession marks as a rough guide but be true to the composer as you see it. Remember that Sibelius made another telling remark with regard to his music, 'Their is more than one way of expressing the truth'.--kullervopete.

Kullervopete is right. Metronome marks can never be more than guides as there are so many variables - orchestra size, acoustic and so on. On the other hand they do give a good insight into the relationships between tempi and in the case of the Seventh Symphony they fit in pretty well with the interpretative tradition that has grown up.

Sibelius's remarks to Levas and Cameron are so typical of him when discussing his own music - they purport to be informative but in fact are anything but! I don't have the original language to hand but I would point out that at no point does Sibelius actually say how he thinks an Adagio should sound. We assume, or infer, that he means 'slower than you expect' but he doesn't actually say that at all.

I believe that in most cases the metronome markings were requested by the publishers, not volunteered by Sibelius. This reduces their value insofar that he is more likely to have sat down and thought: 'how fast should these passages be?' rather than thinking the matter through at leisure.

And Kurki, please do conduct it again soon! (and post it on the forum?)

And finally, this is post No. 1000 (I think!)

Just as a side note, I'm pretty sure Petri Sakari with the Iceland Symphony do a pretty consistent adagio at the beginning, but, then again, seeing as I don't have a score it'll be a bit awkward for me...

The opening scale (I'm comparing it to Berglund's Helsinki PO recording) starts out a bit slower, and stays at the same tempo for the duration. Actually, the tempo is pretty consistent until after the trombone theme's first entrance, with some slight rubato here and there.

Oh, and the string chorale is a bit slower as well, but from what I've gleaned of this thread it's rather consistent with the score thus far... I hope this wasn't a worthless post.