Sibelius: Night Ride and Sunrise, Op. 55 (Nächtlicher Ritt und Sonnenaufgang, Öinen ratsastus ja auringonnousu)

“top-notch performances” Fanfare

“As on this partnership's previous Sibelius anthology (see page 1076) the New Zealand SO respond with conspicuous poise and application for their Finnish chief. Inkinen's readings, too, show a real feeling for the idiom: phrases are shaped – and textures sifted – with fastidiousness and imagination, and he brings an abundant recreative flair and cogent grip to the task in hand, not least in Night Ride and Sunrise, whose elusive structure he binds together with a sure-footed skill that belies his tender years.
Moreover, Inkinen's luminous account of the suite from Belshazzar's Feast will have you questioning why such an appealing and highly evocative score is so seldom performed.
Elsewhere, rarities such as Pan and Echo and The Dryad emerge with a dewy freshness and ear-pricking sophistication that prompt a radical reappraisal. Inkinen even manages to breathe new life into the Op 44 diptych from the 1903 incidental music for Kuolema (the ubiquitous 'Valse triste' and bleakly beautiful 'Scene with Cranes'), and his alchemy extends to the two altogether more mundane numbers that Sibelius added for a 1911 revival of the play.
A disc, then, guaranteed to give pretty much unbridled pleasure. Naxos's sound combines helpful transparency with plenty of ambient glow.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“…Pietari Inkinen is a young conductor with confidence and talent to spare. Inkinen's readings… show a real feeling for the idiom: phrases are shaped - and textures sifted - with fastidiousness and imagination… Inkinen's luminous account of the suite from Belshazzar's Feast will have you questioning why such an appealing and highly evocative score is so seldom performed... rarities such as Pan and Echo and The Dryad emerge with a dewy freshness and ear-pricking sophistication that prompt a radical reappraisal. A disc... guaranteed to give pretty much unbridled pleasure.” Gramophone Magazine, February 2009

“played with splendid idiomatic feeling...First-class recording completes the listener's pleasure in an anthology that is worth every penny of its modest cost.” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition

“Ashkenazy makes a superb job of Finlandia, which boasts some of the most vibrant, powerful brass sounds on disc.
More than 30 years separate En Saga and Tapiola, yet both works are quintessential Sibelius.
The latter is often praised for the way Sibelius avoided 'exotic' instruments, preferring instead to draw new and inhuman sounds from the more standard ones; and the former is, in many ways, just as striking in the way the orchestration evokes wind, strange lights, vast expanses and solitude. Both works suggest a dream-like journey: En Saga non-specific, though derived from Nordic legend; Tapiola more of an airborne nightmare in, above and around the mighty giants of the Northern forests inhabited by the Green Man of the Kalevala, the forest god Tapio (the final amen of slow, bright major chords brings a blessed release!). Ashkenazy's judgement of long-term pacing is very acute; the silences and shadows are as potent here as the wildest hurricane. And Decca's sound allows you to visualise both the wood and the trees; every detail of Sibelius's sound world is caught with uncanny presence, yet the overall orchestral image is coherent and natural.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“I think the star performance is that of the Sixth Symphony - so elusive, so easy to ruin by over-interpreting. I was fascinated by what seemed like a hint of Russian flavouring in the string chants of the coda - well why not?” Gramophone Magazine

“Eschewing Romantic byways, Boult projects the music with cogency and a forcefulness bordering on the brusque. While smooth progress from one episode to the next is de rigueur, he is particularly successful at conveying the elemental power of the Prelude to The Tempest...” Gramophone Magazine, December 2009

“The playing is unfailingly beautiful and idiomatic.” Classics Today

“Anyone who has already encountered the Lahti/Vänskä partnership in Sibelius will know to expect performances of great vitality and freshness. And the expectation is fully met – perhaps even surpassed; in these tone poems he simply allows his profound grasp of musical inner workings to dictate the course of events. The trenchant Lahti strings, the ecstatically floating woodwind and the rasping brass all play their part. But while their contributions are gripping in their own right, they're the more impressive for being so precisely placed at the service of the music's larger-scale unfolding.
Each of the longer works feels as though composer and performers alike have imagined them in one huge mental breath. Vänskä knows exactly when and how much to hold back, when to push on, and, crucially, when simply to stand back and let the music tick over to the beat of some higher rhythm. The same sense of inevitability informs the more compact masterpieces – The Dryad and the extraordinarily cryptic The Bard. Only the Dance-Intermezzo, companion piece to The Dryad, is in any way negligible.
All the other tone poems have been recorded many times over, but rarely with such a consistent feeling of idiomatic rightness. (Vänskä himself has recorded the 1892 original version of En Saga as well – coupled with the original Fifth Symphony on a Gramophone Award-winning set, reviewed under Symphony No 5 – and a fascinating contrast it makes with the more compact 1902 revision offered here.) BIS's recording is of demonstration quality. An outstanding release.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Vänskä and his orchestra are utterly at home with the scores, but never routine or matter of fact. From the poignant harp chords that begin The Bard to the restless Night Ride and Sunrise every gesture counts, and every sound is beautifully caught...this latest offering from BIS is brilliant, one of the best recordings of Sibelius I've heard for a long time.” John Armstrong, bbc.co.uk, 20th November 2002