Arnold: Symphony No. 3 & Symphony No. 4

Albumbeschreibung

Richard Hickox and the London Symphony Orchestra do all they can to make great and sublime music out of Malcolm Arnold's Symphony No. 3 and No. 4. Hickox leads with precision, power, and inspiration. The L.S.O. plays with conviction, concentration, and tremendous virtuosity. And to the extent that Arnold's Symphony No. 3 and No. 4 are great and sublime music, Hickox and the L.S.O. completely succeed. Make no mistake: Arnold's Third is a great symphony, as great a symphony as has ever been composed by an Englishman, and Hickox and the L.S.O. revel in its greatness, creating as compelling a performance as the original Malcolm Arnold performance but with superior orchestral playing, conducting, and sound. But make no mistake: Arnold's Fourth is some kind of great symphony, but what kind of great symphony it's hard to tell. With blinding banality and overwhelming vulgarity as its salient features, it's hard to admit the greatness of the works' jests and arguments and as Hickox and the L.S.O. prove, harder still to acknowledge the work for what it is. Because if the Fourth is great, it is great because of its banality and vulgarity and trying to make the music sound conventionally great is absurdly inappropriate. Not to say doomed from the start: in more honest performances like Vernon Handley's with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Arnold's Fourth is as great as it is banal, but in Hickox's with the L.S.O., the Fourth is banal while trying to appear gentile. Chandos' 1994 sound is big and round.
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