Sibelius: Tone Poems [CD]

If you want your Sibelius performed by specialists, this is a disc for you. Not only has the Lahti Symphony Orchestra won awards for its complete set of the entire orchestral output of Sibelius, it mainly performs in the wooden Sibelius Hall, whose specially calibrated acoustics are no doubt so calibrated as to favour the unique orchestral sound of that master. Nobody ever made the orchestra sound the way Sibelius makes it sound, and the way he makes it sound is the way it sounds for us here.

Not everything by Sibelius has this special sound, but even The Dryad and up to a point the Dance Intermezzo that was published alongside it in a kind of multibuy give me more of the special Sibelius effect than I am used to from them. In the other works it is just a matter of fidelity to the way they are written, and the fidelity is absolute here. For convenient reference, this disc comprises seven compositions, presented in their order of composition. Four are among the major tone-poems, En Saga, Pohjola's Daughter, Night Ride and Sunrise, and The Oceanides. The remaining three are among what I might call Sibelius's orchestral Moments Musicaux, The Dryad and the second Dance Intermezzo just mentioned, plus The Bard.

It is not just the orchestral tone that strikes me as being echt Sibelius, it is the sense that Vanska and the orchestra have for his idiom. They have no objection to working up a bit of excitement where that is called for, notably in the later stages of En Saga. However in general Sibelius and a sense of rush are not natural soulmates, and I think you will find the right sense of dignity and proportion here. You will also detect a real, and very authentic, sense of awe in the intense hush here and there, right at the end of En Saga for instance, but it gives rise to what may be a slight problem too. The problem is simply that for the quietest parts to be audible at all without strain you may have to boost the volume to a higher level than you want for the loud sequences. This bothered me most in the wonderful Night Ride, where the sul ponticello violin effect came near to being lost. It may be that this is how other listeners like it, so for present purposes I shall only mention my own reservation but not take the matter into account in awarding a star-rating.

That, I suppose, is the `review'. In the words of a once-famous broadcaster `If you have been, thanks for listening.' However there is another particular aspect of this composer that interests me and may interest you too, and it is the extent of the pictorial element in his tone poems. If you think this a vital aspect of his work, then you will expect to find it adequately interpreted. Myself, I think Sibelius's tone-poems are musical abstracts, I find correspondingly little pictorial effect in these performances, and that is the way I think it should be. Music inevitably suggests non-musical aspects here and there, it is all a matter of whether they are intended or incidental. Sibelius did not help with hints that are a tissue of contradictions and begged questions, and I believe that for him the music was what came first and the `hints' were passing fancies. It is a bit like seeing shapes in clouds - they are not very exact and they don't last long.

The very title `Night Ride and Sunrise' seems to me like an ill-fitting suit that the composer has slung around a musical body that is outstandingly strong, shapely and individual when considered for what it really is. Tone-poems have to have names, but I can't understand what makes the `sunrise' section any `overt portrayal of nature', as the liner-note writer has it. I can recognise a musical sunrise in Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe or in Also Sprach Zarathustra, but here? No way. I could even hear an unintended sunrise in the return of the main theme in Brahms's third symphony, but not in ten minutes' worth of very varied music that largely tones down as it goes along. Again it is quite natural to think of a long lonely gallop in that strange violin figuration, but to make it into a night ride that ignores the weird start, the occasional interruptions and the transformation of the dotted violin rhythm into even notes on the woodwind is reminiscent of a car mechanic who thinks he has put the engine back together but has several parts left over and unaccounted for.

Given this basic difference of interpretation, the liner note is thoughtful and helpful in other ways. As well as English, you will find not only German and French versions but one in Finnish, and I should think so too. To complete the upmarket feel of the production there is even a reading list, short but in enough languages to keep you going for a year or two if you are serious about getting through it. Myself, I shall stick with the music and my own understanding, such as it is, of that. To any prospective purchasers, whether veterans in Sibelius or complete newcomers, I can recommend this disc practically without reservation.