“On the eve of a new concert season,” writes Scott Cantrell in Wednesday’s (9/2) Dallas Morning News, “the Dallas and Fort Worth symphony orchestras have new CDs on their own labels. Both discs have been edited from live performances last season. The DSO’s disc features electrifying accounts of the Tchaikovsky Fifth Symphony and Capriccio italien. … Jaap van Zweden, who took over last season as the DSO’s music director, has set the orchestra on fire. So have some fun with your savviest musical friends: Put the new van Zweden-DSO Tchaikovsky Fifth on the stereo and ask them to guess the orchestra and conductor. Chicago Symphony under Solti? This performance has that kind of ferocity in places, building to hair-raising climaxes. But it’s more elegant, more lovingly detailed, than Solti, or just about anyone else, with daring stretchings and contractions and amazing hushes. Captured in stunning sonics by recording engineers George Gilliam and Roy Cherryhomes, the DSO sounds like one of the world’s top 10 orchestras.”Cantrell also gives high marks to the Fort Worth Symphony’s CD of music by Peruvian composers, conducted by Miguel Harth-Bedoya.
Photo of Jaap van Zweden conducting the Dallas Symphony Orchestra by Jason Kindig
Posted September 3, 2009