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60 of 61 found the following review helpful:
 Great recordings, great price, skinny packagingFeb 01, 2002
By John Grabowski
Despite recommendations that pop up occasionally for more obscure cycles of the Sibelius symphonies, I find this to be, as a whole, the most fulfilling set. Davis and the BSO play and are recorded beautifully. The early symphonies, though not my favorites, here fare better than they often do because Davis doesn't make them sound like chilly Tchaikovsky. The Fourth gets a terrific reading, both appropriately bleak and, in the slow movement, lyrical and beautiful. Throughout we're aware that Davis isn't *pushing* to make a point...he brings out the music's qualities effortlessly and organically, with a quiet and subtle logic from movement to movement. The Fifth really allows the Boston Symphony to show off its superb colors, and we realize, in the right hands, this is one of the most beautiful, if not *the* most beautiful, in the United States. Davis manages sounds that are thick and plummy where needed (the tympani, for example) but also lean and crystaline where needed (string and often woodwind groupings, for example). He has a sound conception that I feel is ideal for Sibelius.
At the price, this is a steal. Although Davis has remade these works recently with the LSO on RCA, this is the cycle to get. The later recordings are less shaped, less focused, and the Londoners don't play as beautifully, nor are they as well-recorded. And at less than half the price for the same amount of music, this set is the best for your wallet too. A desert-island compilation.
70 of 83 found the following review helpful:
"Finland, Finland. The Country Where I'd Quite Like To Be"Jun 20, 2002
By Joseph Kimsey
"Fareastnibelung"
I'm ashamed to say this, but until recently I have avoided Sibelius like the plague. I'm even more ashamed to say this: I avoided him because certain classical music writers/scholars misled me into thinking that his melodic invention was second-rate, his orchestration flabby, and the majority of his works pedestrian. This is all before I even heard a note of the man's music. I'll never make that mistake again! Considering that it has been fashionable to take critical swipes at Beethoven (!) for the last 50 years, it's quite obvious that classical music critics can never be fully trusted. If that were the case, I never would have approached Wagner, Charles Ives, or Anton Webern.I concur with several reviewers in stating that the overall sound of these recordings is excellent. Davis' conducting is very solid & stately. The Boston Symphonic sings this music with such frozen intensity that Symphony #4 can be almost overwhelmingly moving. Personally, I have never noticed any really intrusive noises during Symphony #5. I find that first movement incredible, though. Symphony #2 is more approachable (conventional) with its sprightly-yet-majestic opening movement. Things become darker in the second movement, while the third is somewhat manic and segues directly into a Tchaikovskian last movement. Sibelius' music, for me, epitomizes the nation of his birth: lonely, cold, seemingly unsophisticated to those who don't bother scratching the surface; there are little of the Mozart or Verdi flourishes and warmth that define what "classical" music is all about for most casual orchestral music listeners. Subjectively speaking, however, I much prefer the hardy, profound and expansive terrain of composers like Sibelius or Beethoven to the elegant salons of Verdi or Chopin.
41 of 48 found the following review helpful:
An Introduction to SibeliusDec 03, 2005
By Robin Friedman
The seven symphonies of Jean Sibelius (1865 -- 1957) are among the most impressive musical achievements of the Twentieth Century. His music fell into obscurity briefly at around the time of his death but fortunately has been restored to its rightful place. Few Twentieth Century composers have been so influential.
Colin Davis is a master of Sibelius' music, and his first cycle of the symphonies with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, available on two "duo" CD sets on Phillips, is available at a budget price. Sibelius's symphonies reward a "completist" approach. There are only seven, and the listener can follow the set in order and learn how Sibelius developed from a composer heavily influenced by late romanticism, including Tchaikovsky, Bruckner, and Wagner, to a modernist composer with a difficult, complex voice. For those wanting a guide, I recommend Michael Steinberg's book "The Symphony" (1995). Steinberg obviously loves Sibelius, and he discusses each of his symphonies in a clear, nontechnical way.
This CD includes Sibelius' first, second, fourth, and fifth symphonies which are probably his best-known and most accessible. The four-movement symphony no 1 in E minor opus 39 dates from 1899 when the composer was in his early 30s. Listen to the long, melancholy clarinet solo which opens this symphony. The second movement is lyrical and romantic, uncharacteristic of the later Sibelius, with a lush horn solo. The third movement is a brusque scherzo with a slow fragmented trio which points to Sibelius' later style. The finale builds to a great climax and then the music seems to come apart. It fades away at the end.
The symphony no 2 in D major, opus 43 is a triumphant, victory work in four movements Listen to the soft, repeated chords with which the work begins. They form the basis for the entire symphony as Sibelius creates ambiguities -- shifting from using his opening material as a harmonic backdrop to using it as the theme. The music develops from fragmentary themes as Sibelius embroiders them into a large-scale integrated work. The second movement features horns, bassoons, and rushing strings and includes marked changes in tempo and mood. In the third movement, listen to the nine repeated notes on the oboe with which the trio begins. The famous finale is based upon two stirring themes, the second of which eventually predominates and forms the basis for the inspiring, triumphant close. This is a deservedly loved symphony in the heroic mode.
Sibelius' symphony no 4, opus 63 dates from 1911 and is one of the composer's most difficult and enigmatic scores. It is Sibelius at his most personal, dark, alone, and somber. In this work, Sibelius experiements with tonality. He makes great use of the whole-tone scale, as did Debussy and of an attendant interval consisting of three whole steps called the tritone. This gives the music an unstable, questioning character. Steinberg writes: "aloneness, a sense of the contrast between human and superhuman scale, the impact of enormously concentrated experience -- these are perhaps the images that, unbidden, lodged in Sibelius's mind as he conceived and began to fix the musical gestures of his unsettling masterwork." The symphony is predominantly slow and somber and challenging. Listen to the sad song of the third movement and to the bells (chimes) in the finale of this work. Sibelius' fourth symphony, together with his sixth and seventh symphonies on the other part of this compiliation, are each highly modernistic, unique compositions that grow with time.
The final work on this compilation if the symphony no. 5 in E-flat major, opus 82. Sibelius revised this symphony extensively, and the final version dates from 1919. The key of e-flat major often is used for heroic, broad-scaled music (think of Beethoven's Eroica symphony and Emperor concerto) and, with his own developing sense of restraint and ambiguity, Sibelius so uses it here. The work is generally described as in three movements (some listeners hear the first movement as two movements, joined together without a pause) which are closely integrated. The long first movement builds and builds from basically short, fragmentary material, includes a quick scherzo, which some people consider as the second movement. In any event, the material is tied together and integrated magesterially, concluding the opening section of the symphony. The second movement is a theme and variations in which a woodwind chorale sings througout as the backdrop to a short figure in the strings. The third movement takes materials presented as background in the second movement and makes it the basis for a rolling and repeated chorus in the french horns presented early in the finale. The finale of Sibelius' fifth develops to a stunning climax punctuated by the famous six large and irregularly spaced chords with which it concludes. I find this symphony similar to Sibelius' second, but in a more complex, original, and modernistic voice.
I think Sibelius has entered that relatively small class of composers that every lover of music should get to know. There is no better way of hearing Sibelius than in this CD and its companion CD by Colin Davis.
Robin Friedman
35 of 42 found the following review helpful:
Master SymphonistJan 27, 2000
By stravinskyfanatic
This 2 CD set (along with the 2nd set by Davis and Boston) is outstanding! Sibelius has taken the symphony to a new level. From the romantic 1st and 2nd, to the dark 4th, to the heroic 5th, each one is a masterpiece of originality. His orchestration and thematic material is quite unique, while the development and form are without parallel. These works are accessible and fun to listen to, but also have incredible depth and intelligence. Invest in Sibelius symphonies, I promise you won't be disappointed.
18 of 21 found the following review helpful:
 Good set, but not essentialJan 05, 2008
By Personne
Sibelius occupies an interesting place in music history. His music was more an extension of the 19th century than it was music of his own time. But even from that vantage point, it has considerable merit. Music of the late/post-Romantic period was often bloated (in the case of Mahler--sometimes hysterical). Sibelius on the other hand, was taut and not indulgent in the least. There is plenty of sinew here, and very little fat. For that reason, Sibelius should be appreciated by anyone with a love for good music.
Now, about this set (I'll speak about the entire set). It comes from a difficult period in the history of the Boston Symphony. These were the early years of the Ozawa tenure, when Colin Davis was Principal Guest Conductor. By the early 80s, Ozawa had imposed a real discipline on the orchestra--but these recordings where made before all that. In many of these readings there is a lot of sloppiness. The brass (especially in the 1st) are often quite sharp and blaring. This is not the refined BSO of earlier or later years.
The readings themselves are Sibelius from an English point of view. Imagine Sibelius played as if it's Vaughn-Williams. They're clean and musical and at their best, they present aspects of the pieces you may not have noticed in other recordings. But there is a quality of the music that I find missing here. The recordings of Saraste or Segerstam are better at bringing out the essential strangeness of Sibelius. To my ear, Davis' reading of the 6th is the best in this set--perhaps because that may be the sunniest of the series.
Is this collection a good introduction to the symphonies (and tone poems) of Sibelius? Aside from the price, I'd say no. Instead, I think they're better for the Sibelius lover who would like to hear this music from a little different point of view.
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