Favourite Sibelius cycle

[Madame Suggia]

I started with the Neeme Jarvi set on BIS and it would still be my first choice.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Another vote for the Vanska from me, too. (And, as Cali points out [#7] you get the original version of #5 as well as the published one. Cali's also right about excellence of the performance of the "real"#5.)

[Roehre]

I grew up with Maazel (with the VPO !) and the Colin Davis Boston sets, but Vanska is my preferred set

[Sir Velo]

So we are after some recommendations for a complete set of Sibelius symphonies
we probably have most of them in various versions
but a complete cycle in all their moomin glory would be perfect

I thought there was a Salonen set (which would be my first choice) but alas not

so over to you CD anoraks

What, the great modernist and post modernist iconoclast de nos jours asking for a recommendation for not one but the complete symphonic opus of the arch reactionary composer of the 20th century? Has the world finally taken leave of its senses? Gong man, have you never read what Adorno had to say about the old fashioned Finn?

However, I can vouch for Blomstedt as both energetic and thoughtful, so should be right up your street.

[gurnemanz]

One good way to get Vänskä is via the good value Essential Box. My other two are Rattle and Bernstein. All three recommendable.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Clearly I must investigate the Vänskä.

[Nick Armstrong]

Another vote for the Vanska from me, too. (And you get the original version of #5 as well as the published one.)

See my #7 above (good to know things haven't changed overnight!)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

See my #7 above (good to know things haven't changed overnight!)

- ah, the joys of the Edit button!

[Pulcinella]

Four complete sets here:

Philharmonia/Ashkenazy (first purchase; happy with them) [Decca box: says digital]
BSO/Davis (two Philips Duos) [bought to replace the LPs given as a baby-sitting thank you present by friends when I lived in Canada: they had gone to Boston so brought them back as a memento; CD sound is a bit dull to my ears]
LSO/Davis (RCA) [bought dirt cheap to supplement collection with Kullervo]
Bournemouth/Berglund (EMI) [bought after recommendations on this board; remain to be convinced as sound level dim in places, again perhaps only to my ageing ears!]

But as a one-off Sibelius hit it's either the LSO/Monteux recording of number 2, which I got as an import from Hungary on the Decca Eloquence label (the recording has since become available more easily in the UK), coupled with the LSO/Monteux Enigma, a very special CD in my collection, or the RPO/Beecham recording of number 7, in the HMV Classics incarnation coupled with the Ida Haendel/Bournemouth/Berglund recording of the Violin Concerto (not included in the symphonies box), and another very special CD!!

Spoilt for choice already, so despite other recommendations the Sibelius slot on the shelf is full!!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I recall the Ashkenazy Sibelius 4 being used to demonstrate the power of the Philharmonia's new set of 5-string double basses. Was this a passing phase, or are they still in use?

[Pabmusic]

I recall the Ashkenazy Sibelius 4 being used to demonstrate the power of the Philharmonia's new set of 5-string double basses. Was this a passing phase, or are they still in use?

5-string basses are still common. They can go down to a C (an octave below a cello). They've been around a long time. Both Butterworth's Love Blows as the Wind Blows and (I think) RVW's London Symphony have passages marked something like "only those basses that have the low C".

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

5-string basses are still common. They can go down to a C (an octave below a cello). They've been around a long time. Both Butterworth's Love Blows as the Wind Blows and (I think) RVW's London Symphony have passages marked something like "only those basses that have the low C".

RVW's Fifth also - the cumulative point in the Symphony at the very end when D major (as "opposed" to the flattened seventh, mixolydian colouring) is finally achieved: those Double Basses positively heave a sigh of relief onto that bottom note (the lowest sound heard in the whole work).

[Pabmusic]

RVW's Fifth also - the cumulative point in the Symphony at the very end when D major (as "opposed" to the flattened seventh, mixolydian colouring) is finally achieved: those Double Basses positively heave a sigh of relief onto that bottom note (the lowest sound heard in the whole work).

Just so!

[Roehre]

5-string basses are still common. They can go down to a C (an octave below a cello). They've been around a long time. Both Butterworth's Love Blows as the Wind Blows and (I think) RVW's London Symphony have passages marked something like "only those basses that have the low C".

Mahler 2 requires them

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Yes - five-string basses have been the norm for many decades in Europe, and, I had thought, Britain; I'm surprised the Philharmonia made such a fuss that they'd only so recently "caught up" - unless their point was that they were the first British orchestra to have an entire 5-string Bass section?

They can also be scordaturaly [is that a word?] tuned down a semitone to B - keeping the fourths tunings with the other four strings. IIRC, Strauss calls for this in Also Sprach and Schönberg in the Five Orchestral Pieces. It weakens an already weak sound, but beefs up the solo contrabassoon which would otherwise be the only instrument playing at such points.