Cinderella Symphonies

It's a commonly held opinion that, with the exception of the sixth, Beethoven's even numbered symphonies are the Cinderella symphonies in the cycle. This BBC Music mag cover disk features Symphonies 2 and 4 played by the BBC Philharmonic conducted by Gianandrea Noseda. These two performances were part of the complete cycle famously made available for free download by the BBC as part of Beethoven Week on Radio 3 which played the composers entire output ( even including Wellington's Victory ! ) Millions downloaded the performances, leading to much gnashing of teeth by the mainstreeam record companies and a lot of debate about the future of classical music. It would be interesting to know how often the downloads have actually been played by the average punter. Noseda in fact gives very acceptable mainstream performances. The second symphony was written at a time when Beethoven apparently wrote his testament despairing of his developing deafness but the work betrays few traces of despair. The fourth was described by Schumann as "a slender Greek maiden between two Norse giants", referring to the third and the fifth. While the Eroica and the fifth are obviously more iconic, the fourth stands up as a fine symphony with plenty of intellectual rigour to please the most discerning listener. These happen to be the only recordings I have of these two symphonies and they are more than good enough performances for me.