Thomas Fey can always be relied upon to do something unpredictable as his Haydn symphony cycle reaches its 20th volume. The Mercury (No 43) is often considered to belong stylistically to the group of Sturm und Drang symphonies of the later 1760s and early 1770s, perhaps more for its general air of quirkiness than for sharing any outward hint of iconoclasm with, for example, Nos 39, 44 or 49. Surprisingly, Fey is less concerned with driving it hard and accentuating Haydn’s characteristic nervy energy, taking the first movement more gently than in many other recordings (but still speeding up when the forte tutti kicks in). This performance is mostly let down, though, by a sound picture in which over-present winds and horns to some extent obscure the string-playing. A harpsichord is (fairly subtly) deployed; all repeats are taken; the Minuet is played at a danceable tempo; but the reading only gets going in the finale.

Sound matters seem to improve in the two earlier symphonies that fill up the disc. No 25 is a rather strange work in which Haydn strings together a series of galant gestures that never quite coalesce into anything as straightforward as an actual theme. No 36 shares features with the earliest Esterházy symphonies – violin and cello soloists in the Adagio, for example – which remind one of the ‘Times of Day’ symphonies, Nos 6-8. Here Haydn lays out a set of contrasting themes, and Fey and his Heidelbergers audibly revel in the symphonic argument resulting from the dialectic between them. The most successful performance on the disc, Symphony No 36 is revealed as an important staging post on Haydn’s journey to becoming the great symphonist we know him as.