Los Angeles Philharmonic/Esa-Pekka Salonen. Sony Classical SK 62598 [Concerto for Orchestra and Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta]
Salonen has a way of being faithful to the score without clamping down on his players’ natural musicality, as a number of 20th-century “specialists” tend to do. True, there is more polish than pizzazz to these readings, but they are still quite convincing and extremely well played (Bartók’s virtuoso writing in the Concerto for Orchestra is tossed off with effortless ease by the Angelinos). The recording, made in 1996 in a dryish-sounding studio that permits a great amount of detail to register, is well balanced and has exceptional impact. – Ted Libbey, author of The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection.
