Acetate surface showers across the Spring Symphony rather like spring rain, and yet the general mood of the occasion survives intact: the veiled mystery of the ''Introduction'' (with those premonitory, Shostakovich-style trumpets from 4'35''), the sumptuous vocal cavorting at the entrance of ''Spring'' herself (with Kathleen Ferrier reigning supreme), the sustained beauty of the middle triptych (Ferrier again, and a youthful Peter Pears) and the excitement of the closing section. In his excellent note, JBS makes reference to a meaningful emendation that, in the song ''Out on the lawn I lie in bed'', transforms the phrase ''Nor ask what doubtful act allows'' into ''Nor ask what dreadful act allows''—a fairly dramatic change, especially given its historical context. A more transitory textual hiccup has the excellent Jo Vincent sing ''Fair and Fair, and twice so fair'' as ''Far and Far'', although, admittedly she does re-adjust a little later in the song (1'15''), possibly in response to Pears's exemplary enunciation. And if the dim and distant recording does rather obscure Britten's more delicate traceries (especially in the first and last sections), the superb choruses emerge with relative clarity and the overall sound-picture does at least have some semblance of perspective.
This of course was the world-premiere performance; a month later and Serge Koussevitzky and the Boston Symphony (the score's dedicatees) were giving the Spring Symphony its first American hearing. Perhaps that too survives: certainly many other Koussevitzky broadcasts from the period do. Still, even Koussevitzky would have had a job sustaining Eduard van Beinum's level of authority. Everything here 'tells'; the pacing, the phrasing, the sense of stillness and gravitas engendered during ''Water's above'', and a sure sense of idiom.
Van Beinum recorded the Peter Grimes excerpts for Decca (including the fourth Interlude, or ''Passacaglia'') on two separate occasions (1/48 and 3/54), and these Four Sea Interludes are taken from the later set. They still sound splendid, although the strings make a very quiet false entry 1'30'' into ''Dawn'' and in this particular recording, van Beinum doesn't quite match the haunting sense of atmosphere that his most distinguished successor at the Concertgebouw, Bernard Haitink, conjured up so vividly at Covent Garden some 40 years later (EMI, 7/93). However, The Young Person's Guide is very well characterized, with polished solo work and a recording that makes the percussion—and the xylophone in particular—sound virtually tangible. Only the fugue seems to me a little on the sober side, but in other respects this valuable release offers a timely reminder that there aren't nearly enough Eduard van Beinum recordings in the current Classical Catalogue.'