Do you remember 'The Classic Sound'? Well, that has gone to be replaced by the Legends, another skilful marketing ploy by Decca in resurrecting their trusted and well tried mastertapes of such recordings as the Bernstein "Das Lied' or the Brahms/Curzon/Szell concerto. Thankfully there has also been room for some resurrections in this first batch of releases and none is more welcome than this astonishingly vivid 'Romantic Russia'.

The LP was quite legendary in its day and after hearing the CD for many times, I can safely say that the CD has recaptured all the warmth and bloom that made that particular recording so special. Solti's brazen unbuttoning in the 'Russlan and Ludmilla' serves for an ideal curtain raiser whilst the soft and mystical tones of the 'Khovanschina' Prelude find the LSO strings in admirable form. Rimsky Korsakov's arrangement of 'Night on the Bare Mountain' is also thrillingly evocative with great rush from the opening brass fanfares and a wonderfully trenchant central section.

Culshaw's expert production comes to the fore in the 'Prince Igor' items, I can hardly imagine a better version of the Overture whilst the Polovtsian Dances are almost orgiastic in their vivid intensity and sheer sense of abandon. The delightful bonus to the LP items is a complete recording of the rarely heard 1955 PCO Little Russian. Solti's reading is quick and bitingly cut, in many places it reminded me of Maazel and the VPO in 1964. The strong personality of this Hungarian firebrand was already in evidence here with some daredevil risks especially in the Allegro moderato and the rushing Finale marked Allegro vivo, it is really 'vivo' here.

Decca's presentation is ideal with some nice session photographs, original facsimile LP reproductions (although why the Little Russian cover is in black and white defeats me) and a CD that looks like one o those famous open reel tapes. If there were one CD that I would snap up from this collection it would have to be this one.

Reviewer

Gerald Fenech

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