Sakari Oramo’s Bartók is like a completed jigsaw where you know there are joins but can’t actually spot any. There’s such an audible line to everything. You hear the musical reasons why one instrument picks up from another: the oboe at 4’43” into the first movement of the Concerto for Orchestra, for example, such a warm and seductive sound, the way it leans forwards on a harp glissando to make way for the clarinets backed by horns. Woodwinds come off particularly well, always beautifully focused, and at 5’24” into the ‘Giuoco delle coppie’ second movement, beneath the staccato trumpets, you can appreciate the harmonic drift of what the strings are doing. The ‘Elegia’ movement is again admirably transparent (though there’s a clunky edit at around 5’58”) and the finale’s opening is painstakingly articulated. It’s a thoughtful performance and not without individuality, though there are times when Oramo and his players might have let themselves go just a little more – an element of calculation sets in from time to time – but keen intelligence more than compensates.

In the past, the Concerto for Two Pianos has tended to strike a rather negative note, its fleshed-out contours less subtle and effective than the highly original sound frame of the parent Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion. Musically the two works are virtually identical but the beauty of Oramo’s performance is the way the orchestra emerges as a significant component, more so than on virtually any other recording. Listen, for example, to the held woodwind chord from 3’25” into the first movement or the impact of the full orchestra at the climaxes at 2’58” and 8’35”. Woodwinds make the most telling contributions, underlining the ‘central’ sonata.

Other details include strumming pizzicati in the finale, where pianists Heini Kärkkäinen and Paavali Jumppanen attack the notes with admirable drive and accuracy, though the rival Labèques (under Rattle) are just as exciting. The full-string arrangement of the popular Romanian Folkdances is superbly done, the opening given with squeeze-box-style emphases, the well differentiated closing dances played with tremendous energy.

Comparisons in the Concerto for Orchestra include Iván Fischer, dance-like and idiomatic, Rattle for spontaneity and fine detail and the still-amazing Reiner, a vintage virtuoso reading not to be missed on any count. Oramo is a somewhat cooler customer but a fine guide, and you’re unlikely to leave this CD without knowing at least something about the music that you didn’t know before.