The performance of the Concerto is the finest I have ever heard. Gershwin may have doffed his hat to Rachmaninov, Puccini and Ravel at various junctures in the score but this, as Chailly and jazz pianist Stefano Bollani are intent on reminding us, is an American Jazz Age concerto. Inhibitions are left backstage and, while all parties are alive to the smallest detail, there is an irreverence and spontaneity which capture the spirit of the work like no other. Applause, too, for the atmospheric solo trumpet (and the fourth horn’s sforzandos!) in the slow movement. Catfish Row, Gershwin’s own five-movement orchestral suite from Porgy and Bess (not to be confused with Robert Russell Bennett’s Symphonic Suite), provides a bridge and welcome contrast between the Rhapsody and the Concerto, containing as it does some of Gershwin’s darkest music. Rhapsody in Blue opens the disc. It’s a cracking account that inhabits the same world as the Concerto and is played in Grofé’s original jazz-band version, from which the piece always benefits. Here again, Bollani’s exuberance and panache are infectious – until 8'00" when he can’t resist rewriting bars 243‑75 and, more bizarrely, improvising the 26 bars after 12'24" in a style reminiscent of Bill Evans. If such anachronisms as Schnabel’s cadenzas to Mozart’s piano concertos don’t bother you, then neither will Bollani’s interpolations. For me, they spoil an otherwise classic account of a classic score; but, that said, there is no denying the merits of this fabulous disc superbly engineered by Philip Siney – and with the best cover shot of the year.