Lahti Symphony Orchestra

“To hear Osmo Vänskä conducting Jean Sibelius is to change one's view of the music.” Financial Times

“The BIS recording is excellent, with state-of-the-art sound, and Vanska's performance has impressive power and atmosphere; he keeps the music moving and casts a strong spell.” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition

“Ilya Gringolts is an outstanding young Russian violinist; with this Paganini programme he began his recording career at the deep end. He's able to surmount the ferocious technical demands, and has, too, a notably rich, beautiful, unforced tone.
In the unaccompanied Nel cor più non mi sento Variations, he seems rather careful – missing the passionate directness that some bring to this piece. But Gringolts's more expansive and delicate account is equally valid, the theme, with its freely expressive ornamentation, especially appealing. The other shorter items work well, too, in particular the elegant Cantabile – originally for violin and guitar. Only La campanella is a bit disappointing: one feels the need for a more vigorous approach, and despite the finesse of the playing it's difficult not to regret the absence of the orchestra.
The First Concerto benefits from a truly outstanding accompaniment, performed (and recorded) with a wonderful sense of space and balance.
Even the bass drum and cymbal parts are played with sensitivity – what can sound like a crudely overloaded score emerges here full of colour and grandeur. With such fine orchestral sonority, one might wonder what the concerto would sound like in its original key. Paganini played it in E flat, by tuning his strings a semitone higher, and wrote the orchestral parts in the higher key; his aim was to produce a more brilliant, penetrating sound. Present- day soloists, understandably, prefer the standard tuning for such a demanding work.
Gringolts plays with sweetness or brilliance as required, though perhaps the first movement didn't need so many extreme tempo changes and perhaps the Adagio should have had a more dramatic tone, to match the darkly romantic orchestration. But the finale is terrific, with all the verve and high spirits you could want.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Sibelius supplied four numbers for the February 1898 Helsinki premiere of Adolf Paul's historical drama King Christian II – the ' Minuet', 'The Fool's Song', 'Elegy' and 'Musette' – and these eventually took their place in the five-movement concert suite alongside the 'Nocturne', 'Serenade' and 'Ballade' which the composer completed the same summer. The street music of the 'Musette' is simply delightful in its original garb without added strings, and in both the 'Serenade' and 'Ballade' Vänskä uncovers strong thematic and stylistic links with the almost exactly contemporaneous First Symphony. The defiant quality these fine artists bring to 'The Fool's Song' ( eloquently delivered by Raimo Laukka) is also very likeable. Music-making of refreshing perception and meticulous sensitivity similarly illuminates this first complete recording of Sibelius's original incidental music for a 1905 production of Maeterlinck's symbolist play (the venue was again Helsinki's Swedish Theatre).
There are 10 numbers in all.
The performance of the Karelia Suite in its original scoring (which acts as a splendid curtain- raiser here) has been compiled from Vänskä's complete recording of the original Karelia music. Both outer movements have a real sense of pageantry about them (Vänskä directs with exhilaratingly clean-limbed swagger), though there are certain reservations about his occasional predilection for exaggerated and affected pianopianissimos.
Thus, at around 3'30" in the central 'Ballade' (track 2), the dynamic level drops almost below the threshold of audibility and has you rushing to boost the volume control ( Vänskä repeats this trick twice in the King ChristianII 'Elegy', and towards the end of the final number in Pelléas). For optimum results, therefore, playback needs to be higher than many listeners may think reasonable. That said, the engineering is quite spectacularly truthful throughout and there's no doubt that this is an unusually absorbing collection.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“The Lahti orchestra bring total dedication to these great scores, and Osmo Vänskä is a Sibelian of substance. With this account of the Sixth and Seventh he brings his survey to a triumphant conclusion. Indeed this is every bit as impressive as the First and Fourth. To the Sixth Symphony he brings total concentration: a serene slow movement but a very fast Scherzo and tautly held-together finale. The Seventh is finely conceived and paced and though the Lahti orchestra aren't the equal of the Finnish RSO for Saraste or the Helsinki PO for Berglund (both conductors fine Sibelians), directed by Vänksä they give the more compelling and convincing performances. The Tapiola is thrilling: atmospheric and powerfully built up and though it doesn't displace Karajan, Koussevitzky or Beecham, it's a measure of its splendour and power – and the terror it evokes – that it invites only the most exalted comparisons. In the Sixth Symphony one wouldn't want to be without either Sir Colin Davis, the Beecham or any of the Karajan versions, and for the Seventh the roll-call must certainly include Koussevitzky's seminal account, as well as both Sir Colin's Boston and LSO accounts.
This is an impressive issue.The recorded sound is in the first flight, and there are excellent notes by Andrew Barnett.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“This is a disc which will be of great interest to Sibelians. The original score of the Karelia music was discovered in the conductor Kajanus's library after his death in 1933 and his widow returned it to Sibelius three years later. The music extended to eight tableaux which portrayed various episodes in Karelian history. In the 1940s Sibelius destroyed the score, about which he had had second thoughts since its premiere in 1893, sparing only the overture, the movements familiar from the suite and the first number, 'A Karelian Home – News of War'.
Fortunately for posterity, a set of orchestral parts came to light, albeit incomplete, and were put into shape by Kalevi Kuoso. It was these that the composer Kalevi Aho used in preparing the edition on which this recording is based.
In all there are some 40 minutes of music, over half of which is new. Those familiar with the 'Ballade' from the Op 11 Suite will no doubt be slightly disconcerted to hear the familiar cor anglais melody taken by a baritone and will find the piece too long in its original form. The opening of the fifth tableau, 'Pontus de la Gardie at the gates of Käkisalmi [Kexholm Castle] in 1580', is highly effective and leads into the famous 'Alla marcia'. It's fascinating to hear what the piece is like, and what Sibelius was prepared to lose. Listening to this reaffirms and illumines both the sureness of his artistic judgement and the vitality of his creative imagination. Sibelius's incidental music to Kuolema, the play by his brother-in-law, Arvid Järnefelt, dates from 1903. The most familiar music from it is the Valse triste, which Sibelius revised the following year, adding flute, clarinet, horns and timpani and making it altogether more sophisticated harmonically and melodically.
Osmo Vänskä and his Lahti players prove reliable and responsive guides in this atmospheric music and it's hard to imagine their performances being improved on. Wide-ranging and expertly balanced recorded sound.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010