Enescu’s Third Symphony, contemporaneous with the First World War, is a world unto itself, epic in scale, heavily though imaginatively scored (with six horns, piano, two harps and so forth) and featuring what Robert Matthew-Walker describes – in his note for the Olympia recording – as a first movement “exposition that is also developmental”. The sinister Scherzo releases intimidating waves of sound and the finale includes a wordless chorus that Chandos blend into the orchestral texture with considerable skill. There are side-references everywhere, most notably to Richard Strauss and, at the beginning of the finale, to Wagner’s Death of Siegfried. The ethnic element is secondary, but discernible, especially in some of the more lightly scored passages of the first movement, and the sum effect is akin to viewing vaguely familiar architecture in a strange but wonderful city. The Second Symphony has the stronger thematic material, but doesn’t venture quite as far, ideas-wise.
The principal virtue of this new recording is its sound quality, which reproduces the full tonal range of Enescu’s canvas, from organ and bass drum to filigree solo string writing. Rozhdestvensky’s reading is broader than any other in the current catalogue. The first movement runs to 20'27'', as compared with 16'33'' under Olympia’s Horia Andreescu, and 18'30'' in Cristian Mandeal’s Arte Nova recording. Alexandru Lascae’s Ottavio recording comes closest at 19'30''; indeed his is the nearest in overall concept to Rozhdestvensky’s but, with third-rate sound and mediocre orchestral playing, does not really enter into the running.
My one reservation about this new Chandos production is that dramatic contrasts are under-played, not so much in terms of volume – there are plenty of impressive climaxes – as a lack of drive and forward momentum. The first movement needs more in the way of hard action, and Mandeal’s more roughly played, less well recorded option relates a more gripping interpretative approach. His version would be my first choice, and even if it isn’t yours, it is still cheap enough to invest in as an informed second opinion. Rozhdestvensky’s easygoing account of the First Romanian Rhapsody would have benefited from the odd retake. Andreescu (overall a good second choice) offers the half-hour Romanian Poem, and Mandeal the Concert Overture “on themes in the character of popular Romanian music”.'