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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This is a disc to cherish, worth anyone's money., 3 Aug 2001
Bax' fifth symphony is by no means an easy work to grasp, but immensely rewarding on repeated hearing. In the process of getting to know this work, I found myself fast running out of superlatives. If I needed to single out one word to describe this masterpiece, it would be "compelling". It is a true symphonist who can hold you spellbound with only a handful of themes, and the thematic unity in this symphony is truly remarkable, even by Bax standards. It takes a while to realize that the same themes are recurring in very different guises, and that realization greatly added to my admiration of the masterly way Bax handles his material. A point in case is the finale, where the initial theme is heard in at least four different moods. Bare and menacing at the start, frantic in the busy development section, yearning and nostalgic after the big climax (a truly most magic and haunting section), and, finally, defiant and triumphal in the blazing coda. So cogent is Bax' symphonic argument that one feels a good sense of inevitability; this symphony could not have proceeded in any other way, and is all the more satisfying for that. Even if Bax had written nothing else, I still would not hesitate to rank him among the very greatest symphonic composers. The performance, then. There isn't anything I would want to be done differently, which is surely the greatest compliment one can give. The RSNO have come a long way since their wobbly days under Gibson and Jarvi, and can now hold their own amongs the very best of orchestras. David Lloyd Jones has the full measure of this music; his ongoing Bax cycle for Naxos has been earning constant praise. His reading is a model of consistency, neatly following the composer's train of thought, and he neither overdoes not underplays the big climaxes. The sound is near-perfect, an occasional rawness in brass tuttis not distracting but rather adding to the excitement. Bax' tome poems are not in the same league as the symphonies, being generally lighter and more meandering, and sometimes a bit too long for their content. Yet, there is much to enjoy, as in 'The tale the pine trees knew' which fills up this disc. It is dispatched with the same gusto as the symphony, and sports some delightful string playing. Perhaps it should have been programmed first on the CD, as it feels like a bit of an anticlimax after the symphony. But then, any work would.
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![Bax: Symphony No.2 [IMPORT]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/514YuwfY%2BJL._SL500_SS90_.jpg)
![Bax: Symphony No.2 [IMPORT]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/514YuwfY%2BJL._SL75_SS50_.jpg)
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