I have not heard the three-disc LP version of which AW writes above but the greater transparency and immediacy of the two-disc CD version compensates to a degree for the insufficiently forward placing of voices that he remarks upon. I was still aware, though, of some of the singers having to work rather hard to project through Chailly's orchestra, and this, I am sure, is why Cathryn Pope's Anne sounds at times so subdued, at others rather nervous (there are one or two patches of tremulousness and of less than perfect intonation). Langridge, too, despite his care for words and despite much characteristically beautiful quiet singing, is too often obliged to force his tone, as AW says, into edginess. Both of them are effective and affecting in the last act, but it is bound to be over all a slightly disappointing Rake's Progress in which the elegantly exuberant Sellem, the fruitily stagey Baba and the malignly powerful Shadow remain in the memory as more positive portrayals than those of hero and heroine.
I echo all that AW says about the dramatic fire of Chailly's direction and the beauty and precision of the London Sinfonietta's response to it. The very clean and efficient recording, for all its sound effects and movements about an imaginary stage, does not prevent this from sounding like a concert performance: very enjoyable in its way (I have never heard so many of the written notes before) but lacking in real Theatrical pungency.'