There's been a bumper crop of fine Sibelius recordings since 2015, the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth, including a set by Klaus Mäkelä, the hot Finnish conductor of the moment. However, this recording of the Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 105, by the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and its first non-Finnish conductor, Nicholas Collon, is one that merits consideration from listeners. In its classic recordings by Eugene Ormandy and Herbert von Karajan, Sibelius' final symphony has a heroic tinge to its C major and ...
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There's been a bumper crop of fine Sibelius recordings since 2015, the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth, including a set by Klaus Mäkelä, the hot Finnish conductor of the moment. However, this recording of the Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 105, by the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and its first non-Finnish conductor, Nicholas Collon, is one that merits consideration from listeners. In its classic recordings by Eugene Ormandy and Herbert von Karajan, Sibelius' final symphony has a heroic tinge to its C major and its big brass themes, but Collon follows the example of another of the work's great exponents, Colin Davis, leaning into the work's complexity and forgoing big climaxes in favor of great detail in the strings and winds. The Symphony No. 7 is formally unclassifiable, and in Collon's hands, it seems to have a crystalline quality; it hangs in the air, and its various parts reflect each other uncannily well. Collon's delicate approach also builds a bridge between the symphony and the...
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