COMPOSERS: Sibelius
LABELS: Decca
WORKS: Finlandia; Karelia Suite; Luonnotar; Tapiola; En Saga
PERFORMER: Elisabeth Söderström (soprano); Philharmonia Orchestra/Vladimir Ashkenazy
CATALOGUE NO: 430 757-2 DDD (1981/83/86)
These are splendid performances. Finlandia and Karelia are magnificently recorded, with rasping brass, crisp timpani and supple cor anglais breathing air into the central ballade. Dying phrases are beautifully honed – there is magic afoot. Elisabeth Söderström sings the neglected, Yeatsian Luonnotar irreproachably, the Magyar inflections of Finnish curiously echoing Bartók. Tapiola, akin to the wastelands of Sibelius’s Fourth Symphony, is a brute to shape. Ashkenazy’s grunts imply a tussle, but these alert musicians supply all he seeks. Roderic Dunnett
Sibelius: Finlandia; Karelia Suite; Luonnotar; Tapiola; En Saga
These are splendid performances. Finlandia and Karelia are magnificently recorded, with rasping brass, crisp timpani and supple cor anglais breathing air into the central ballade. Dying phrases are beautifully honed – there is magic afoot. Elisabeth Söderström sings the neglected, Yeatsian Luonnotar irreproachably, the Magyar inflections of Finnish curiously echoing Bartók. Tapiola, akin to the wastelands of Sibelius’s Fourth Symphony, is a brute to shape. Ashkenazy’s grunts imply a tussle, but these alert musicians supply all he seeks. Roderic Dunnett
Our rating
5
Published: January 20, 2012 at 2:36 pm