Monteux's 1950 mono recording [of the Chausson Symphony] is brilliantly lit (and bass-boosted), faithfully capturing the more transported 'playing out' of his San Francisco players, and of Monteux's own relishing of the Symphony's Wagnerian synthesis (space doesn't permit itemizing all the Symphony's constituent Wagnerisms, so I'll settle for Magic Fire Music in the first movement; storm and horseback-ride in the third; and Tristan all over the place). Monteux's choice and gearing of tempos also has that quality of 'rightness' you recognize within minutes - all of which prompts the thought that if there were more conductors of Monteux's persuasion around, this Symphony wouldn't be playing second fiddle to the César Franck.
