Grieg: Symphonic Works Vol 1

WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln/Eivind Aadland Audite 92.651 SACD **

The first volume of Eivind Aadland’s new survey of Grieg’s orchestral music betokens a project with an agenda. Aadland is Norwegian, a violinist as well as a conductor, and from a family that’s strongly connected with folk music. So, for instance, part of the selling point of his performance of the Symphonic Dances is the directness of the link with the folk songs which Grieg used in the work. The result is mixed.

Yes, the flavour is distinctive, but the overall effect can be rather slack, almost as if academic i’s and t’s are being crossed at the expense of genuine animation of spirit. And the same has to be said of the two Peer Gynt suites, which here lack the sheer strength of musical richness that the best conductors bring to them. And even the deeply felt

Funeral March

in memory of Rikard Nordraak, with its echoes of Berlioz, doesn’t quite gell. See audite.de