Bruckner died before completing his Ninth Symphony, whose three finished movements comprise one of music's most tantalising fragments. While Bernard Haitink, who conducted this performance by the Vienna Philharmonic, feels that the various attempts to complete the piece from the composer's sketches are not for him, his interpretation of the work as a torso achieves a stature that few performances of any masterpiece attain.

Haitink's mastery of Bruckner's style both at a local level and in overview remains extraordinary. His judgment of tempi conveys a natural lyricism, rising to grandeur without rhetoric. The first movement's huge diversity was held together in one constantly evolving structure, focused in its attention to detail and yet proceeding in a single sustained arc. The dark gremlins at work in the scherzo were depicted with malign energy, while the quicksilver motion of the contrasting central trio was almost balletically graceful. In the vast Adagio that brings the piece to its provisional conclusion, Haitink maintained the music's visionary elevation and brought it to rest on a closing chord that seemed to touch the eternal.

The orchestral playing was remarkable throughout, with vital string tone, a purposive unanimity from the brass and a palette of colours that was rich and complex. There were few blemishes, though rather more in the accompaniment to Beethoven's Fourth Piano Concerto in the first half, with Murray Perahia the soloist. Nevertheless, this was another memorable reading, owing to the lucid warmth of his tone and his ability to dovetail with the orchestra in some immaculately realised handovers. Perahia, too, showed a heightened sensitivity to detail, especially in the disturbing climax of the slow movement's brief cadenza and in the genial episodes of the rondo finale.

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