Sir Simon Rattle and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe with Brahms’s Fourth Symphony

Transparent, lean, and sculptural – when Sir Simon Rattle leads the Chamber Orchestra of Europe through Brahms’s dark-hued Fourth Symphony, the chamber music qualities of the work come to the fore. Also tailored to the reduced forces of a chamber orchestra is Béla Bartók’s Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, with its expressive sounds and Hungarian rhythms. The concert opens with Ferruccio Busoni’s sensuous Sarabande – originally conceived as an orchestral study for his opera Doktor Faust, it unfolds a unique mystical atmosphere of its own.