If you want to hear Rhapsody in Blue with the percussion predominating, the opening clarinet glissando stretched out to infinity and a mega-secure piano soloist not quite swinging in the rhythmic syncopations, you’ll probably like this interpretation more than I do. At times Licad’s full-power bravura seems more appropriate to the Brahms B flat Concerto, as in the opening cadenza, for example. The crisper articulation of Gary Graffman, Lincoln Mayorga or André Previn better suits the music’s style.

Gerard Salonga’s spirited tempos for the Concerto in F’s outer movements are right on the money, and even the arguably extravagant rubato in Licad’s opening solo conveys compelling character. But the solo muted trumpet and oboe passages in the Adagio lack the authority and melodic profile distinguishing their counterparts in the better engineered Freddy Kempf/Andrew Litton traversal, not to mention Uan Rasey’s classic trumpet part in the 1960 Previn/Kostelanetz recording.

The ‘I got rhythm’ Variations fare best when the music is brooding and lyrical, yet I don’t get a sense of the soloist and orchestra truly ‘in the pocket’, so to speak. The first variation exemplifies what I mean, where the orchestra’s main melody and Licad’s decorative passagework don’t lock in as in the brisker and more rhythmically decisive Earl Wild/Arthur Fiedler reference version (RCA, 11/87). However, Licad and Salonga achieve a stronger meeting of minds in a well-integrated and expertly dovetailed performance of the Second Rhapsody. That said, the jazzy orchestration packs a stronger punch in more vividly engineered renditions, such as Michael Tilson-Thomas leading the Los Angeles Philharmonic from the piano or, again, Kempf/Litton. The latter remains top choice for all of Gershwin’s works for piano and orchestra on a single disc.