The gap between the release and availability of products at Warner makes it difficult to comment on them. This was the case for our record of the year, Marie-Nicole Lemieux singing the summer nights by Berlioz. However, we must point out this box set dedicated to a great chef who is too little known. The grouping of EMI and Finlandia CDs by Paavo Berglund (1929-2012) reserves the box for “addicts”, because there are no less than three Sibelius cycles, increasingly refined: from Bournemouth in the 1970s to Chamber Orchestra of Europe (icy!) from the 1990s, through Helsinki in the 1980s. Bournemouth is the warmest, although Helsinki is the best executed. But this box is an opportunity to remember Berglund, also a distinguished accompanist, in Shostakovich, where he remains a major performer, notably in Symphonies nbone 6 And 11and in Vaughan Williams (Symphonies nbone 4 And 6). Other superb recordings: his Griegs, his My country with the Dresden Staatskapelle, the continuation of the Golden Roosterthere 5e by Nielsen.
To watch on video