For me one of the toughest tests for any conductor of Ravel comes towards the close of Ma Mère l’Oye’s climactic “Le jardin féerique” where as the last lap approaches the opening theme returns freshly cushioned on some of Ravel’s most sumptuous string-writing. Monteux did it incomparably in the context of the complete ballet, and Rattle in Berlin also prompts a tear or two, but if you want the suite rather than the whole ballet then Yannick Nézet-Séguin in Rotterdam achieves layered textures that are as warm and as flowing as any. The “happy ending” crescendo is especially joyous, and there’s a gorgeous blend of woodwind timbres in “Impératrice au bois”. Knitting together the Valses nobles et sentimentales, charting their many contrasts in mood and colour, is always a challenge, and again Nézet-Séguin reveals himself to be not only a fine conductor but an expert listener too, the slow epilogue with its wafting motifs like so many stray letters blowing in the early hours charged with a very special atmosphere. Not everyone brings this music off as well whereas the challenges of La valse are quite different and here Nézet-Séguin and his players don’t quite achieve the same level of expressive continuity. The closing pages, too, need to sound more riotous and disruptive. However the Daphnis et Chloé Second Suite is given a gem of a performance, the opening dawn sequence unravelling like a luxuriant carpet, the principal climax truly momentous. This is a sultry, insinuating Daphnis, stronger on seduction than on translucency, a performance steeped in a sense of theatre, very dynamically recorded. It’s the crowning glory of a fine and compelling programme though I hope that the passing years will eventually yield a Nézet-Séguin version of the complete Daphnis et Chloé ballet. The evidence of this Second Suite suggests an opportunity that would be too good to miss.