The main title, “Silent Woods”, and a soft-focus portrait through twigs of the glamorous soloist alerts us to the fact that this is no ordinary version of the Dvorak Cello Concerto. To demote the principal work on the disc like this in favour of an incidental fill-up may seem odd, but this is a version surely aimed less at the regular collector than at the many admirers of Ofra Harnoy. Greatly helped by having a Czech orchestra under such a distinguished Czech specialist as Sir Charles Mackerras. Harnoy immediately establishes the warmth of her approach both in tone and in expressive freedom, though one quickly registers that her tendency to draw out linking pasages grows wearisome when carried to such excess. More seriously, her vibrato becomes obtrusive in the great lyrical moments, so that in places it sounds almost like a sustained trill, detracting from the natural expressiveness.
Like one of my top recommendations – Heinrich Schiff’s second version for Philips – this issue offers an all-Dvorak coupling, a rather more generous one. Silent Woods brings more flutter-vibrato, while the Rondo is heavy-handed compared with Schiff, though Schiff – as in Silent Woods and his other two extra items – has Previn as piano accompanist instead of the orchestra. '