Review by Peter November 14, 2006 (5 of 5 found this review helpful)
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Berwald Symphonies 3 and 4 - RPO Bolton
These are very good performances, with excellent playing from the RPO, of these still underrated works. I'd love to hear them live. Whilst I'm pleased to add this disc to my collection, I feel that some of the wittiness of these works doesn't communicate quite as well as Ehrling achieves in his well-respected set for Bis, and my favourite Berwald disc remains the BPO with Markevich (DG mono) which fizzes with energy, as do Ehrling's complete symphonies, my second favourite, which benefit from just the right tempi and very good recording quality.
Compared with Neeme Jarvi's excellent set on DG, Bolton's tempi feel far too slow, and much listening to various sets of these wonderful symphonies has led me think after all these years that Jarvi pushes ahead just too much. The Goodman set on Hyperion is also quite successful and well recorded, but Ehrling remains for me now the best overall choice for all four symphonies. Alas, these are not available on SACD. I can also recommend Kamu's recordings on Naxos as an alternative to Ehrling's as they, too, are played with great insight into Berwald's sound world. Again, these are available on CD only.
In stereo the recording quality is very good if very much multi-miked, with excellent string sound (top to bottom); the phasing is correct and the time between tracks is more normal than reported about previous releases in this series. However, there is rather less depth to the soundstage here than in the fine Bis recording mentioned above, but at jpc's price this should be very tempting to anyone wanting to dip their toe in the water. For those who've never heard Berwald, you might think prototype-Nielsen/Schumann with a sense of humour. Whether this disc cuts the mustard as the only example of Berwald's music is debatable.
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