The Kronos Quartet: Nuevo.
Gustavo Santaolalla, David Harrington, Judith Sherman, producers; Leslie Ann Jones, main engineer; Gustavo Santaolalla, Anibal Kerpel and Harrington, mixers. Nonesuch 79649

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Sombreros off to this brilliant, wild, and endlessly amusing South of the Border tour that juxtaposes Latin pop excess with penetrating musical insights into love, politics, religion, and cultural psychosis. Ten years ago, after its Pieces of Africa compilation reached the top of both the classical and world music charts, the innovative San Francisco-based Kronos Quartet learned that "world music" projects could reach listeners not necessarily drawn to its esoteric new music fare. Thankfully, Kronos' eclecticism has never involved dumbing down—this commentary on 100 years of Mexican music consistently impresses with its sophistication. (Accolades do not extend to the packaging, which offers four pages of credits and 14 pages of poorly reproduced color photographs in lieu of detailed liner notes. Accessing www.kronosquartet.org/album-info/nuevo.jsp will supply the wealth of information you need to fully appreciate Kronos' achievement.)

Nuevo begins with Severiano Briseno's riotously inebriated "El Sinaloense." Not only is the track recorded at high rock-music levels, but its attempt to capture the brightness of the band that made this number famous employs distorted sonics resembling those heard from cracked radio speakers. Next, an oft-repeated inter-track transition of street noises segues directly into Osvaldo Golijov's fantasy on Agustin Lara's popular "Se Me Hizo Facil" (once recorded by Placido Domingo). Next comes Golijov's hilarious arrangement of "Mini Skirt," the 1968 hit by the king of space-age bachelor-pad music, Juan Garcia Esquivel. Forget about audiophile aesthetics here—imagine instead absurd synthetic stereo effects, multi-tracking mania, catcalls, and whistles.

Then, get ready for "El Llorar," with vocalists Alejandro Flores and Efren Vargas breaking into ridiculous falsetto as they lament their broken hearts; followed by Alberto Dominguez's "Perfidia," featuring one-armed street performer Carlos Garcia blowing the melody on the edge of an ivy leaf as 1001 massed strings milk the music for all it's worth.

Get the picture? There's some serious stuff here, such as Silvestre Revueltas' Sensemaya, inspired by an Afro-Cuban exorcism dance ritual, and arranged for string quartet and Mexican percussion ensemble. But much is riotous, overly sentimental, and irreverent. Mind-bending juxtapositions abound: Chavosuite, Ricardo Gallardo's outrageous arrangement of music from three popular Mexican TV comedies, segues into the otherworldly sounds of Ariel Guzik's electromagnetically triggered, quartz-crystal plasmaht instrument, followed by drug-trafficker gunshots. This disc is a trip!
- Jason Serinus

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From Gurrelieder's opening Rheingoldian arpeggios to the omnipresent Tristan chord, Wagner's influence is pervasive even if the increasingly transparent orchestration of the third and final part points to Schoenberg's own distinctive voice. But despite the luscious Wagnerian tonal palette and complex thematic development and transformation (compare the "Sunset" opening with the "Sunrise" Finale), the piece defies meaningful emotional involvement. Gurrelieder emphasizes the paradox of Schoenberg's genius versus the public's apathy toward his music—regardless of whether it is tonal or atonal. Simon Rattle conducted Gurrelieder in Philadelphia prior to recording it with the Berlin Philharmonic. The publicity surrounding the concerts was extensive, and the Academy of Music was filled with an expectant audience. However, I got the distinct impression that people were drawn more by the scope of the event than the music itself. Yes, they were intellectually interested in hearing this gargantuan curiosity, but there was no stampede to Tower Records following the concert.

Rattle's charisma is indisputable, but his conducting is already beginning to resemble the sound sculpting affectations that marred Herbert von Karajan's later years. Still, with Gurrelieder, his commitment is so complete that a great performance is almost inevitable, especially with an orchestra and soloists of this caliber. Karita Mattila and Thomas Moser sing the love music with passionate intensity and lyric beauty. Anne Sofie von Otter's "Song of the Wood Dove" alone makes this set indispensable. Rattle has stated that "Gurrelieder…is the most gigantic chamber music ever written and should be very transparent." His performance reflects this even more than Pierre Boulez, who conducts the orchestral music more aggressively. Rattle underplays the work's scoring excesses: he imbues some passages with a French Daphnis-like texture. "The Wild Hunt" will hardly terrorize you, or endanger your speakers.

The sound of the remarkably quiet live recording complements Rattle's desire for instrumental clarity.1 The strings possess a subtle gauzy softness that creates its own Romantic ambience without significantly detracting from fine inner detail. Yet the recording lacks the brass power, spaciousness, and bass extension of EMI's amazing new Tosca. Both Rattle and the engineers probably contribute to the generally lightweight effect. You will never hear a more beautiful Gurrelieder, but the cost is a loss of dynamic and emotional impact. Then again, that may be inherent in the work itself, despite its massive performing forces.
- Arthur B. Lintgen

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A new studio release of a Wagner opera is always a noteworthy event—think of the logistics (and expense) involved in recording a three-hour work with a busy world-class conductor and soloists, plus a large orchestra and chorus. Happily, Teldec's new Tannhäuser can be counted a success. The cast includes some of the finest Wagner singers currently active. In the title role, Peter Seiffert manifests great flexibility: He's capable of both heroic declamation and expressive introspection. Waltraud Meier portrays a sensual Venus, and René Pape is a sonorous, dignified Landgrave. Jane Eaglen is most famous for the most strenuous Wagnerian soprano roles, Brünhilde and Isolde, and perhaps a more innocent Elisabeth would contrast better with Meier's Venus. But Eaglen scales her voice back quite effectively when required and her singing is noble, wise, and radiant—not unlike Helen Traubel, in her classic 1942 Met broadcast performance opposite Lauritz Melchior. If fantasizing, one might have wished for Bryn Terfel as Wolfram but casting Thomas Hampson is not exactly slumming, and his "Song to the Evening Star" is ravishing.

The biggest presence here is Barenboim, who uses the Dresden version of the score, except for the second scene of Act I (the extended dialogue between Tannhäuser and Venus), where he interpolates the post-Tristan Paris version. Barenboim lavishes care on every harmonic inflection and nuance of Wagner's orchestration. He does far more than merely accompany—he shapes the entire performance. In the complex conclusion to Act II, he's able to present the simultaneous eruptions of anger, remorse, grief, and hopefulness that occur after the protagonist reveals that he's still longing for the Venusberg. The last Act patiently unfolds, beautifully paced through Tannhäuser's salvation.

The recording is warm and easily contains the grandest moments while still offering loads of orchestral detail. This isn't an overly "theatrical" presentation, but voices are properly scaled and the returning Pilgrims in Act III move convincingly, from the middle-distance to the foreground. This Tannhäuser makes a nice complement to Sinopoli's 1988 (DG) account with Placido Domingo. That recording of the complete Paris version has the attraction of a more virginal-sounding Elisabeth in Cheryl Studer. But with Seiffert and Barenboim, Tannhäuser is surely redeemed by love and, as with many successful Wagner performances, so is the listener.
- Andrew Quint

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The stellar talents of Welsh bass-baritone Bryn Terfel have been obvious from the beginning of his career. Blessed with an affable stage presence, a gift for comedy, and a rich, flexible voice, he was always perfectly suited for the baritone leads in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte. Hints that he might eventually become a great Wagnerian came as early as 1992, when he made his Chicago Lyric Opera debut as Donner in Das Rheingold. His commanding performance as Jokanaan in Richard Strauss' Salome that same year led to an invitation to sing Wotan in the Ring. Terfel declined, but this new recording suggests that the time may be ripe for Wagner to figure more prominently in his repertoire.

In "Die Frist ist um" from Der fliegende Holländer, Terfel improves upon his 1996 recording with James Levine [DG 445 866]. Here, he begins the Dutchman's anguished account of his endless wanderings in a more reflective vein, building to an impassioned plea for release from his torment. Better still are the two Hans Sachs monologues from Die Meistersinger. Sachs is one of Wagner's most human and approachable creations, wonderfully realized here by Terfel, Abbado, and the Berlin Philharmonic. 

The Tannhäuser extract, "O du mein holder Abendstern," also updates his account with Levine. Terfel sang the role in 1997 at the Metropolitan Opera, and in this new version he inhabits the character of the steady, decent Wolfram, foil to the impetuous Tannhäuser, in a breathtaking way. In contrast to the ardent longing of his earlier version, Terfel now shows Wolfram's resigned acceptance that Elisabeth will never be his. The final item on the disc (that also includes two selections from Parsifal) is Wotan's farewell from Die Walküre, in which he bids adieu to Brünnhilde. Terfel has not sung the role in a theater production as yet, but this reading shows great promise. Stage performances would bring out more of Wotan's affection for his daughter and his regret at their final parting, but the steely quality required for his big scenes is already apparent.

The sound is typical DG, with a compressed soundstage, particularly in the height department. The balance between singer and orchestra is sometimes off.  But the brilliance of Terfel's singing, and Wagner's marvelously dramatic orchestral invention, are plainly to be heard.
- John Higgins

Shostakovich: Symphony No. 4.
Philadelphia Orchestra, Myung-Whun Chung, conductor. Lennart Dehn, producer; Andrew Wedman, engineer. Deutsche Grammophon 447 759

Eugene Ormandy conducted the American premiere of Shostakovich's Fourth Symphony with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1963. Their subsequent recording is still arguably the best despite Ormandy's tendency to underplay brass and percussion. His tempos are perfect, and he captures the work's Mahlerian influences better than anyone. The wild fugal presto that climaxes the first movement contains some of the most astounding string ensemble work I have ever heard. Andre Previn's performance with Chicago is predictably leaner than Ormandy's, but is ultimately too low key. Mstislav Rostropovich and the National Symphony Orchestra cannot approach this level of virtuosity, but one must hear the brutal force of his view of any Shostakovich masterpiece, regardless of any deficiencies in execution.

Myung-Whun Chung surprisingly holds his own, primarily because of the Philadelphia Orchestra. There is no work in the symphonic literature quite like this sprawling symphony with its multitude of brilliant musical ideas struggling to assert themselves in free rhapsodic form. Ormandy and Previn hold it together in a way that confirms its symphonic pretensions. Chung is more episodic and detached, though he adds power by unleashing the brass and percussion to an extent that Ormandy would never permit. The principal problem is the critical finale. Chung does not effectively pace the brass climax and rigidly races forward, robbing the music of its crushing power. The work ends in impenetrable gloom, and Shostakovich typically leaves us guessing as to what it really means. In this remarkable final passage, Ormandy achieves a hushed intensity and rich sonority that perhaps only the Philadelphia Orchestra of this era could produce. Chung fails to penetrate the atmosphere of the magical coda.

The opening measures provide a good sonic test in that they contain the whole frequency range of Shostakovich's massive orchestra. The highs can be shrill, and bass is weak with Ormandy and Previn. On this DG disc, the high strings and winds are not harsh, and the bass drum is deep and tight. The massive space of Memorial Hall is clearly audible, but generally does not mask inner detail. However, when compared to Ormandy, the exotic percussion at the end of the second movement gets lost in the huge acoustic space. Still, DG has unexpectedly come close to solving the infamous problems associated with recording the Philadelphia Orchestra. The sound and the orchestra make this CD competitive despite the problems with Chung's conducting.
- ABL

The Grand Tradition lives! Here is an antidote for the contemporary tendency towards a uniform, technically efficient, generically expressive but musically sterile style fostered by making violin playing into a kind of athletic competition. Tenenbaum, with her into-the-string bowing and above-the-note vibrato (rather slower than the so-called "impulse vibrato"), produces a magnificent violin sound, albeit magnificent in a manner not often found today. And there is strong musical mind behind the playing. Her view of the Beethoven is unusual in that, for all the intrinsic strength of her playing, it is more intimate, less monumental, more dance-like than virtuosic, more akin to the Beethoven of the "Pastoral" Symphony than to the "Eroica." I found it exceptionally appealing and far more convincing than most contemporary accounts. The fascinating cadenzas that she plays are her own, and they bring us back to the days when violinists were often composers, and good ones, too. In the pseudo-Mozart (actually written by Marius Casadesus in the Twentieth Century) "Adelaide" Concerto, Tenenbaum, like Menuhin in his historic recording, makes the music more charming and intriguing than one might have thought possible.

The recording of the violin is very close. One hears fingers striking the fingerboard and occasional unintentional open-string soundings. But the truth to violin tone is superb on these close-up terms, easily as good a representation of Strad sound (in the Beethoven) as the supposedly "audiophile" (and good) sound on the Bein and Fushi "Miracle Makers" project recorded by Mark Levinson (review, Issue 125). The orchestral sound is clean and realistic if not quite as universally smooth as contemporary recordings tend to favor. The orchestra and conductor are clearly in sympathy with the soloists' aims. Richard Kapp contributes an essay to the liner notes that is far more interesting than the usual summary of standard information.

A violinist friend of mine listening to the Beethoven "blind" guessed it was Ida Haendel. If you follow violinists, you know what that means: It means that Tenenbaum sounds the way a violinist ought to sound—real tone and real expression, not something that came off an assembly line. Tenenbaum may not have the absolute last bit of almost supernatural technical polish of a Hahn or a Mullova, but her magnificent sound and musical vision sweeps one away. And the violin recording is reference quality. (Next year I hope I sound like this; I'm trying.) Essential.
- Robert E. Greene

A month before this disc's issue, an envelope filled with jigsaw puzzle pieces arrived in my mailbox, as if to say, "Listen up, this one's special."

In many ways, Harmonia Mundi's hype is justified. The most striking factor about this recording is its sound, a virtually ideal marriage between six a cappella male voices and the resonance afforded by St. Osdag Church in Neustadt-Mandelsloh, Germany. The voices are clear and full, resounding in a natural acoustic with a focus and richness absent from other Early Music recordings presently vying for attention. Imagine the sonic equivalent of the perfect chocolate syrup—rich and flavorful without an iota of stickiness—on a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and you'll have a sense of how delicious this sounds.

Baritone Paul Hillier, who directs the Bloomington, Indiana-based Theater of Voices, explains that the album's title refers to the near-miraculous survival of fragmented manuscripts, often incomplete, as well as to Christianity's fragmentation into different churches. The program comprises 21 selections from the Western Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christian traditions, dating from the 13th to 17th Centuries. Most are short, and their composers unknown. The works are grouped by country of origin—Italy, Greece, Russia, England and France—which makes for rewarding comparisons and contrasts.

One of the most striking selections, the Italian Matteo da Perugia's "Ave sancta mundi salus/Agnus Dei," offers modern-sounding harmonies that reflect a freedom later forbidden by the Catholic Church. Equally fascinating is the French Perotin's eleven-minute "Vicerunt omnes V Notus fecit Dominus," distinguished by its trance-like repetition.

Voices are full and sonorous, intonation perfect. However, there's an insistent tension and relentlessness to these performances, a sameness of volume and sound that ultimately enervates. Sometimes, as in the unison chants interspersed in the anonymous English "Salve sancta parens/Salve mater/Salve lux/Salve sine spina," the men offer a sanctity and flow absent from the spirited polyphonic sections. But all too often, they fail to trust and sink into the music's deeply rooted faith; instead, they push it along. One need only turn to Paul Van Nevel's Huelgas Ensemble recording of the same short Perugia work (Sony), or to that Ensemble's extremely beautiful, just-released Le Chant de Virgile (Harmonia Mundi) to find the grounded spirituality and softness missing from the Theater of Voices in its current incarnation.
- JS

I  first reviewed the Prokofiev recordings, which date from 1959 and an enterprising little label called Urania, in TAS 34 when they were reissued on a Varese Sarabande CD [VC 81091, NLA]. Rehearing them, superbly remastered by Kevin Gray for Cisco, I experienced pleasure, then relief—mostly that I didn't embarrass myself 18 years ago when I recommended they be placed on HP's "Baker's Dozen." He declined and he was right, though not by much. The reproduction is still "transparent and almost stunningly immediate," with weighty and astonishingly detailed bass. While the soundstage has breadth, I no longer find it "deep" or the imaging "holographic"; and I'm now more aware of the multimiking, which dries out the atmosphere and spotlights certain instruments, such as trumpet, triangle, and harp (which appears panpotted right in front of the cellos). Musically, the program is a complete winner. For a long time it was the only recording of Prokofiev's delightful, mischievous Waltz Suite, it's also, fortunately, a good one. The now disbanded Kansas City Philharmonic makes up in verve and enthusiasm what it lacks in tone and refinement—the violins still sound thin and undernourished, the trumpet pinched and sometimes raw. The Gypsy Fantasy, an even better piece, is also better played, and recorded with less spotlighting. But reservations be damned, there's an infectious, enduring—dare I say, "timeless"—vitality about these recordings, sonically and musically, that really does disarm criticism. Still enthusiastically recommended.

The sonics on the Mozart/Witt disc are more realistic. Indeed, the Mozart—originally a Hammer Records release, dating from 1976 and using just a pair of mikes—offers one of the most natural perspectives I've heard on an orchestra, here the New Hampshire Festival Orchestra, rumored to consist of New York and Boston professionals on their summer gig. The performance crackles and scintillates. The "Jena" Symphony, another Urania original from 1959, is both better played and better sounding than the Prokofiev, though the music is almost of no consequence. It was once attributed to Beethoven, whose name was scribbled on the manuscript. But on the worst day of his life, Beethoven never wrote anything so pedestrian, formulaic, and harmonically threadbare.

Cisco's surfaces on both LPs are the dead quietest I've heard in ages.
- Paul Seydor

For all: Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Fritz Reiner, conductor. Richard Mohr, producer; Lewis Layton, engineer; Hiromichi Takiguchi, mastering engineer.

The obsessive hunt for original RCA "Shaded Dog" Living Stereo LPs has long been a defining anal-retentive characteristic of audiophilia. I've managed to escape extreme manifestations of the malady despite spending hours in dusty searches through thrift shop and flea market record bins before regaining a semblance of sanity. The chase has now ended: JVC's remarkable XRCD2 remasterings of the licensed tapes are generally superior to the original LPs with which I've been able to compare them. The Shaded Dogs now bark more clearly and more musically than ever. As of this writing, 18 of the RCA Living Stereos are available on JVC CD, including such favorites as the Reiner Pictures at an Exhibition and Bartók Concerto for Orchestra, with four more due this summer.

In the case of Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra, it took seconds to prefer the JVC to my copy of LSC 2609, which was bass-challenged, relatively muted in dynamics, and featured a shrink-wrapped Introduction and muddled strings in the second section, where clarity is all.

In Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade, A-B'd against the Chesky LP reissue, the JVC won again, but by a whisker. The clarity of the harp behind the violin's sweet solo in the first movement, internal wind balances, greater hall ambiance, and firmer bass tipped the scales. By greater or lesser margins, the JVCs trumped several other original and reissue LPs and CDs with which I compared them. And if you're curious, they make RCA's own Living Stereo reissue CD series sound seriously undernourished. After a session with these JVCs, listening to run-of-the-mill CDs becomes a trial.

None of this would matter if sound was the only criteria, but unlike most audiophile specialty recordings, the RCAs contained outstanding performances that deserve glorious engineering. That 1960 Reiner Scheherazade, for example, is up there with Beecham's as the best ever recorded. Sidney Harth's violin solos, seductive as they are, don't quite match those of Beecham's sultry protagonist, Steven Staryk, nor does Reiner equal Beecham's languorous warmth. But Reiner's version does come very close on both counts and his orchestra conveys more of the piece's power and virtuosity. If you need a tiebreaker, the Mohr-Layton sonics supply it.

A similar conclusion applies to Reiner's 1962 Also Sprach Zarathustra when measured against Rudolf Kempe's 1971 EMI Dresden recording. I'd never want to be without the exquisite warmth of Kempe's strings or his structural mastery. But RCA's sound allows far more of the score to emerge for Reiner and his Chicagoans, whose visceral percussion, cooler but more powerful brass and brilliant strings, with their shinier sheen, raise the excitement quotient to a higher level. Here, and in the Scheherazade, the JVCs' newfound bass energy lends more warmth to the orchestra and thus belies the stereotype of Reiner as a "cold" conductor.

Of course, not all Shaded Dogs marry outstanding sound to great performances. Reiner's 1957 Dvorák New World Symphony always struck me as a flop. But JVC's refurbished sonics moved it up from third-tier to second-tier, still no match for the great Ancerl/Czech Philharmonic recording, among others. The basic problem: Reiner doesn't catch fire until halfway through the Largo when the brass-led orchestra steps out and rouses the proceedings from their hibernation. After that, it takes off and the finale is a brilliant blaze of sound tapering into one of the most marvelous diminuendos you'll ever hear. No question that the newly revealed orchestral details boost its stock, but Reiner's sleepy first half makes this a New World yet to awaken. Still, here's proof that improved sound makes a big difference by shining a more flattering light on lesser performances.

JVC's deluxe packaging includes a booklet explaining in very general terms the XRCD2 custom mastering and manufacturing processes to which they attribute the astonishing excellence of the sound. It comes down to state-of-the-art equipment, careful monitoring of each step in the process, and listening comparisons with the master tape. It wouldn't surprise me though, if equalization was used as well. No matter. Reissue mastering of Hiromichi Takiguchi and the "supervision" of Kazuie Sugimoto are credited, and therefore deserve our heartfelt thanks for bringing these shaded dogs into the sunlight.
- Dan Davis

As the "Classical Crisis" grinds on, the major labels slashing or eliminating their serious music budgets, orchestras are forced to seek new strategies of recording and marketing. The London Symphony Orchestra responded by creating LSO Live, its house label, which, as the name suggests, issues concert performances: Not broadcast or archival material, but recent performances from its regular subscription concerts in its home venue, the Barbican Centre, in superb high-density (176.4kHz) digital sound, produced by James Mallinson, engineered by Tony Faulkner, and retailing for $10 per disc.¹

The label has been going strong for almost two years in England, its initial releases greeted with popular and critical success. The five albums covered here constitute the label's domestic debut— Harmonia Mundi USA the importer—with five more coming soon and another eight announced, but not yet available.

It is scarcely an exaggeration to say that Sir Colin Davis's Philips recordings of Berlioz in the Sixties and early Seventies with the London Symphony did for that composer's reputation what Bernstein did for Mahler's. Before then, only the Symphonie fantastique and a couple of overtures were part of the standard repertoire. Davis changed all that. So it is altogether fitting that several of LSO Live's first releases should be drawn from the "Berlioz Odyssey" of the orchestra's 2000 season, when Davis revisited works he championed over three decades ago. 

Was revisiting necessary? The Philips recordings remain in the catalog, still sounding fine, the performances brilliant as ever. But much as we enjoy our favorite music, we don't want to hear it in the same performances over and over, however great they may be. And Davis has surely earned the privilege of committing his latest thoughts to disc, nowhere more so than in the magnificent new Les Troyens [LSO 0010], the deserving winner of this year's Grammy for "Best Classical Album." Good as the Philips is, LSO Live's is even better, beginning with Faulkner's awesome, state-of-the-art reproduction. Davis makes Berlioz' sprawling, four act epic move as if in one sweeping arc of dramatic energy. Subtleties, nuances, details are played for all they're worth—in the love duet, Michelle de Young's Didon and Ben Heppner's Enee every bit the match for Philips' Josephine Veasey and Jon Vickers—but it is the conductor's masterly shaping of ensemble upon scene upon act that eclipses all rivals. Davis always gets the special translucence of Berlioz' orchestration magically right: clear, light, and airy, ravishingly delicate yet ablaze with color and, when required, power. The virtuosity of the orchestra and its volunteer chorus is breathtaking.

This latest Symphonie fantastique [LSO 0007] is Davis' fourth recording. The first, also with the LSO, dating from 40 years ago and still available, catches the conductor at peak intoxication with this most intoxicating of symphonies. The two intervening recordings, with other orchestras, and this new one find him a little slower and mellower, albeit lavishing more attention upon the score's often-underplayed lyricism. It remains a reading to be reckoned with, but his first remains my favorite of the four. No such reservations becloud the new Romeo et Juliette [LSO 0003]. You could toss a coin over its interpretive merits vis-à-vis Davis/Philips: The earlier fleeter of foot, more urgent yet washed in pastels; the latter painted in more vivid colors yet warmer and more expansive, the balance tipped decisively in its favor by the greater transparency, body, and dynamic range of the recorded sound.

Until La Damnation de Faust and Beatrice et Benedict are available here, we have Dvorák's New World [LSO 0001], a symphony with which the LSO enjoys a charmed relationship, its recordings under Rowicki, Kertész, and Ormandy among the most consistently recommended. Davis' middle-of-the-road reading, superbly played and recorded, lacks the ultimate in vitality and conviction. Not so his second go-round with the Elgar First [LSO 0017], a bold, visionary performance of Klemperian granite and transcendent power. The hymnlike main theme of the opening movement is essayed with an unforced grandeur and nobility that are resolved through struggle into the last movement's radiant climax, suggesting the "massive hope in the future" that was the only program Elgar allowed for the work.

If these recordings accurately reflect the current state of the LSO—nothing indicates they don't—then London's concertgoers are a blessed lot indeed. And thanks to LSO Live, it is now a blessing music lovers the world over can share.
- PS

1.  The San Francisco Symphony's recently inaugurated Mahler cycle, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, represents the first attempt by an American orchestra at a similar strategy.