Balancing That Organ

This disk is a further example of DG mining their back catalogue. This time it is on something they called the Centenary Collection and the featured artist is Daniel Barenboim. It's not clear what the centenary refers to, since it is obviously neither the record label or the artist and although the three compsers concerned were all alive together at some point in their lives, I don't think there's a particular centennial connection with the works. Whatever, the works on the disk are Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole with Barenboim conducting the Orchestre de Paris and Itzhak Perlman the violin solist, Saint-Saen's Symphony No 3 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Barenboim and the organ played by Gaston Litaize and the Rigoloetto Paraphrase by Liszt with Barenboim on solo piano. Perlman is ideally suited to the Lalo and proves a fine advocate for the work. The Saint-Saens organ symphony is notoriously difficult to balance in terms of sound between the organ and the orchestra. The solution here to record organ and orchestra seperately in different locations and then splice together would infuriate purists and isn't ideal but to be honest it works well enough and gives a most respectable account of the work. The Liszt makes a nice coda to the disk, although just over seven minutes of music is hardly enough to give much idea of the importance and quality of Barenboim as a pianist, if that was the intention.