COMPOSERS: Elgar/Walton
LABELS: Sony
WORKS: Cello Concerto; Cello Concerto (Elgar and Walton)
PERFORMER: Yo-Yo Ma (cello)LSO/André Previn
CATALOGUE NO: SMK 53333 DDD (1985)
Yo-Yo Ma’s recording of the Elgar Cello Concerto more than stands up to its many rivals. He is far less idiosyncratic and more focused than Jacqueline Du Pré, but hardly less Romantic in his reading of Elgar’s yearning lyricism.
The account of Walton’s concerto is equally compelling – Previn is almost audacious in the slowness with which he takes the outer movements, allowing space for Ma’s singularly rapt meditation, both tender and sumptuous. William Humphreys-Jones