Which is the greatest orchestra in the world? Who is the greatest conductor? Everyone has their own ideas based on their different experiences, but what happens when you ask a panel of the world’s leading classical music critics?
Bachtrack did just that in 2015, a poll that provoked much discussion. Eight years and one pandemic later, we decided to repeat the exercise to see how the land lies. We asked 15 critics from 11 countries to nominate their top ten orchestras and conductors. Unlike last time, when some critics, particularly in North America, felt unable to participate due to not seeing many of the orchestral candidates live, the explosion in streaming has made it possible to watch performances from orchestras around the world at the click of a mouse.
While the vast majority of the panel ranked their nominations from 1 to 10, some felt unable to go quite that far and offered two lists of ten candidates, which were then given equal weighting when we collated the results. Critics participated on the understanding that individual voting was kept private. It’s worth noting that The New York Times does not permit its critics to participate in external polls such as this.
What qualifies as “greatness” when judging an orchestra or a conductor? We left the description deliberately vague, but asked a few of the panel for their criteria.
“In making my choices, I tried to imagine which orchestras and conductors I would want to go hear without having any idea in advance what they were doing,” writes Alex Ross of The New Yorker. “In that respect, imaginative programming counts as much as purely musical excellence.”
“Any symphony orchestra can call itself ‘great’. This is prescribed by the genre,” explains Dr Eleonore Büning (Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung), “but it can only become extraordinary if everyone listens to each other and breathes, thinks, feels, dreams and acts together. A symphony orchestra must develop swarm intelligence if it wants to find inner greatness.”
“A ‘great’ orchestra is more than a sum of technically outstanding musicians,” writes Walter Weidringer (Die Presse), “because it’s keen to maintain and uphold the traditions of its own collective personality of sound, possesses a smooth, homogenous tutti in any dynamics, the ability to adapt to different acoustics quickly, has strong personalities in key positions and, ideally, is proving this in a wide repertoire including opera, concert and chamber music as well.”
Christian Merlin (Le Figaro) explained that his decision was based on “a complex mixture of many components: historical roots and modernity, collective power and individual talents, specific sound and adaptability, all this combined with rigorous consistency as well as an open-minded artistic policy.”
Has there been a monumental shift in the orchestral rankings? In short, no. The top-ranking orchestra, by a comfortable margin, remains the same: the Berlin Philharmonic.
“It is both a technically and musically outstanding orchestra,” according to Weidringer, “probably the most ‘modern’ and versatile orchestra in the German speaking countries, very quick and eager to adapt to the ideas of different conductors.”
It was also the first major orchestra to run its own streaming service (founded in 2008) and its in-house record label is marketed as a luxury brand. The Digital Concert Hall ensures the Berlin Phil enjoys a major global presence, which can only have aided its chances in an international poll of critics when so much of its content is readily available online.
“I love a symphony orchestra that pushes its limits dynamically, rhythmically and stylistically,” writes Büning, “an orchestra that has a broad repertoire and seeks to expand it beyond the Beethoven-Brahms-Bruckner routine; which tests, invents and savours sensations of tone colour, in which every instrument has soloistic qualities; an orchestra that remains recognisably true to itself, even when it changes. That's exactly what I appreciate about the Berliner Philharmoniker.”
Berlin Phil orchestra board members Eva-Maria Tomasi and Stefan Dohr responded: “On behalf of the Berliner Philharmoniker, we would like to express our sincere thanks for this award and dedicate it to the three orchestras whose patrons we are: the National Youth Orchestra of Germany, the Kyiv Symphony Orchestra and the Youth Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine. Their very different commitment forms the essential foundation for classical music now and in the future.”
Unsurprisingly, Central European orchestras fared strongly: the Berlin Philharmonic was one of three German orchestras in our top ten, joined by the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (3rd) and Leipzig Gewandhaus (9th); the Budapest Festival Orchestra punched well above its weight at 8th; and the Vienna Philharmonic were the Berliners’ nearest challenger.