Yet another recording of The Planets by an international orchestra and non-British conductor. It always strikes me as odd that Karajan should have recorded Holst's suite twice and yet ignored Elgar's Enigma Variations on the grounds that he didn't need to conduct second-hand Brahms when the real thing was at hand. I've never been able to hear a note of Brahms in the Enigma, whereas if ever there was an eclectic rag-bag it's The Planets, with its chunks of Stravinsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Debussy and Scriabin—all the potent pre-1914 influences. Holst always said he'd never heard Dukas's L'apprenti sorcier before he composed ''Uranus'' and we've got to believe him, in which case here is another of music's remarkable coincidences.
And of course The Planets will always appeal to virtuoso conductors because it is such a marvellous display-piece for an orchestra, though I don't suggest that's all it is. Zubin Mehta plunges headlong into its kaleidoscope of colour and rhythm, although paradoxically ''Mars'' is not as menacing as it emerges from Boult's steady and remorseless beat (EMI) nor from Dutoit's grim-faced treatment with his superb Montreal orchestra on Decca. Mehta's fluctuations of tempo tend to disrupt the music's natural impetus, just as in ''Venus'' he can't resist an expressive ritardando whenever he sees the chance for one (the solo violinist's excessive rubato also implies a different kind of Venus from the one Holst had in mind).
Neither the quality of the playing nor of the recording is such as to persuade me to recommend this disc ahead of its rivals. Both are unexceptionable without being outstanding in any way—good, routine stuff. Nor does Mehta match Previn (EMI), for example, in his ability to go below the surface of Holst's music in the two last movements, ''Saturn'' and ''Neptune''. As it happens, ''Saturn'' does bring the best out of Mehta but one still feels his preoccupation is with the scoring rather than the substance. The women's chorus in ''Neptune'' sings its difficult part well, allowing for a few moments of uncertain pitch at the very end.'