The truly great revolution in music-making in the past half-century has been the transformation of choral singing. The mind boggles at the thought of what a Russo-German Verdi Requiem such as the one we have here would have sounded like 60 years ago. One swallow that did predict the summer to come was Ferenc Fricsay’s trail-blazing 1953 Berlin recording of the Requiem (DG, 2/96), where the egregiously splendid St Hedwig’s Cathedral Choir was joined by the newly founded RIAS Chamber Chorus.

On this fine new Cologne recording, Semyon Bychkov deploys two specialist German radio choirs shrewdly intermixed with the chorus of Turin’s Teatro Regio. If Bychkov’s reading doesn’t quite burn white in the Dies irae as Fricsay’s did, or Toscanini’s, it is nonetheless a supremely well directed Requiem, scrupulously observed, meticulously prepared, vivid, lucid, forward-moving. If I have a reservation, it is that the recorded balance occasionally has one straining to hear how good the choral work actually is.

The Proms audience which was denied the chance of hearing the acclaimed new double-act of Violeta Urmana and Olga Borodina can catch up here. Borodina, who was unable to appear at the Royal Albert Hall on August 31, is an eloquent exponent of the mezzo-soprano role, well matched to her younger colleague, herself an erstwhile mezzo. What Urmana’s voice lacks in evenness in legato passages is more than made up for by her command of the spinto manner, the drama of the text vividly purveyed. Ferruccio Furlanetto, now in his 59th year, has lost none of his mastery of the legato style. He brings an authentically Italianate feel to the music, as does bel canto specialist Ramón Vargas, here at his eloquent best.

Verdi’s Requiem can seem a somewhat self-regarding piece, not least when “great interpreters” get hold of it. This reading, for all its distinction, gives itself no airs.