When reviewing Claus Peter Flor’s Malaysian Philharmonic recording of Dvořák’s Seventh (8/12), I mentioned its close proximity, in climate if not in specific detail, to Rafael Kubelík’s versions of the same work. The Eighth is similarly reminiscent of Kubelík, the first movement energetic but with plenty of ‘give’ at key climaxes, the Adagio warmly emotive (with some very sonorous string-playing), the Allegretto relatively swift but with marked portamentos in the Trio section, while the finale is rhythmically pointed and, towards the end, touched with a rare brand of poetry. The reflective winding-down before the fast final onslaught reminded me as much of Bruno Walter as it did of Kubelík. My only criticism is that the finale’s trilling horns (ie at 2'08") could have had been granted greater prominence by the engineers. On the other hand, as with Flor’s recording of the Seventh and its fill-ups, having violin desks divided left and right of the rostrum is a definite boon. Flor is an imaginative narrator for The Golden Spinning Wheel, focusing its various episodes with a keen understanding of the full picture and making play with the score’s very Czech rhythmic elements, in the opening especially, and again at around 8'47" and beyond, where Dvořák returns to the world of his Slavonic Dances, albeit in this context with a heightened sense of drama. The Scherzo capriccioso is a rather tub-thumping affair, at least initially, with less of a lift to its rhythm than on either the Kubelík or the Kertész recordings (not to mention Šejna); but, again, there’s spirit and colour to spare and the SACD sound throughout the programme is excellent, with particular acknowledgement of the low brass. As to rivals, I would still rate Harnoncourt, Talich, Chalabala (Supraphon – nla) and Kubelík as top dogs in the Erben tone-poems while, in the Eighth, it’s Sir Colin Davis on LSO Live, Kubelík with the Bavarian Radio Symphony and Ančerl live with the Concertgebouw Orchestra in EMI’s ‘Great Conductors of the 20th Century’ series, if you can find a copy. Flor, though, will do very nicely in the SACD stakes.