The two most cherishable of oboe concertos make a delightful, if hardly generous, coupling, and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe once again on record give proof of superb artistry among these young players in the full ensemble, but even more stikingly in the individual imagination of the oboist, Douglas Boyd. This was a coupling which Heinz Holliger recorded very successfully for Philips in the early 1970s (6500 174, 1/72—nla), yet over and over again Boyd is more spontaneously expressive than that distinguished predecessor, less constrained in his playing, allowing himself a degree more expressive freedom both in the witty pointing of fast movements and in expressive warmth in more lyrical passages.
I have not been able to compare Holliger's latest CD recording of the Strauss (coupled with Lutoslawski's Double Concerto on MMG Vox cum laude CD MCD10006, 10/84), but using the earlier version as a yardstick I find that Boyd far more completely conveys the happy glow of this inspiration of old age. It is true that Holliger varies the tempo in the first movement far less, observing the score more meticulously, but the ebb and flow of expression in Boyd's performance with its delicate touching-in of the characteristic flourishes in the solo line is most persuasive, and consistently his tone is warmer, less reedy, which also helps to bring out what I think of as the Rosenkavalier element in this work.
In the Mozart too Boyd is a degree freer in his expression, and there more clearly on stylistic grounds many will prefer Holliger's lighter, straighter manner, but again I find Boyd the more memorable, and never to my ear unstylish, when Berglund—a bluff rather than an elegant Mozartian—keeps the whole performance fresh, countering any tendency to waywardness. What Boyd does—as in a different way Murray Perahia does in Mozart on the piano—is to capture the feeling of spontaneous expression that one looks for in a live performance and gets much less frequently on record. Recorded by Brian Culverhouse in London's Henry Wood Hall, the sound is first rate, with the ripe yet spare textures of the Strauss particularly well caught.'