From Amazon.co.uk
Yet another British music triumph for Naxos, David Lloyd-Jones and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. Bearing a dedication to Sibelius, the fifth symphony of 1932 is one of Bax's most personal, closely reasoned utterances, its bardic splendour, slumbering tragedy and epic thrust all most convincingly conveyed here. Not only is Lloyd-Jones scrupulously faithful to both the letter and spirit of the score, but he also has the happy knack of alighting on precisely the right tempo and never allows Bax's argument to sag in the way that occasionally afflicts
Bryden Thomson's rival interpretation with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for Chandos. What's more, he encourages some sensitive and sprightly playing from the RSNO (which certainly seems to enjoy making this mighty work's acquaintance). Completed the year before the symphony, the wintry tone poem
The Tale the Pine Trees Knew makes an apt coupling. Lloyd-Jones's performance possesses a clean-limbed vigour that contrasts strikingly with Thomson's more leisurely, wonderfully atmospheric view on Chandos (featuring an irreproachably eloquent Ulster Orchestra).Astonishingly, Naxos has been sitting on these fine recordings for more than four years; let's just hope we don't have to wait as long again for future instalments in Lloyd-Jones's absorbing Bax series.--
Andrew Achenbach
