The beginning of the first is similar to the second, you may want to hear it.

So many members have had this same problem... but all I can tell you is to keep trying on the other ones, when you are able to grasp Real Sibelius there is no better feeling. The 7th is my favorite.

I still listen to the last movement of the 2nd sometimes though... when I need extra... drama.

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"Summit or death, either way, I win." ~ Robert Schumann

This is an unfair criticism I think. You clearly haven't spent anytime trying to figure out his music other than to say what you don't like about it. I would let this opinion go if you were talking about that serialism garbage. I agree with you about the 2nd Symphony, but I don't agree with your general outlook of his music.

If all else fails, go listen to his tone poems. I can guarantee you if don't find beauty in "Pohjola's Daughter," then you clearly weren't listening hard enough.

Sibelius isn't a composer that hits you over the head with an emotional brick at every passing measure like Mahler. If you're going from a heavy diet of Mahler, then you're clearly not going to fall for Sibelius right away. Sibelius created music that should be listened to on it's own terms.

Sibelius meandering? This is sort of a shocking statement. I think if any major composer was big on being concise and to the point, it would be Sibelius.

I bet Trazom likes Mahler. Now what was that about meandering?

I cry to think I may never be able to hear it. Oh, the mystery around No. 8 that so many are trying to figure out.

Here is an excerpt from the web. What did he do for those 30 years? He promised it to his wife. Sibelius come back - your fans love you. I love everyone of your symphonies. Oh, the agony and torturer of it all. No wonder I can't sleep at night anymore!

Today, virtually none of the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius's Symphony No. 8 exists. The manuscript was probably burned by Sibelius in 1945. It remains one of the great mysteries of twentieth century classical music.
Sibelius produced his last major work, Tapiola, in 1926, but he lived another thirty years, and many think[who?] he spent much of this time working on an eighth symphony. He promised the work as early as 1930. In letters to his wife Aino, he discusses the symphony's composition. Furthermore, there are records of him ordering large amounts of manuscript paper and of him having a large work copied out in the mid 1930s. There exists a 1937 receipt stating that a large work had been bound. He promised the premiere of this symphony to Serge Koussevitzky in 1931 and 1932, and a London performance in 1933 under Basil Cameron was even advertised to the public [1].
But, after all this, "Symphony No 8" never materialised. His wife recounts seeing him feeding manuscript papers into a fire in 1945, and many believe[who?] that among these papers was the completed Eighth Symphony. Sibelius was prone to insecurity and depression, and such destructive behaviour was not unprecedented. It was once believed that he destroyed an earlier version of his Fifth Symphony and an extended version of the Karelia Suite, but both have since been located.
While Sibelius refused to discuss the matter with journalists, he did talk about the symphony privately with colleagues and friends. However, what he said was notoriously inconsistent. He told some that he had several movements written down, but others were told that the symphony still only existed in his mind. Even into the 1950s, long after it was supposedly written (and supposedly destroyed), Sibelius would still say that he was still working on his Eighth Symphony. Whatever its state of completion, the work died with him.
The only traces of the symphony that have survived are some marginalia in a copy of his Seventh Symphony, some minor sketches of the symphony that have been found in the library of Helsinki University, and Surusoitto, Op. 111b, which Aino claimed was based on material from the symphony.

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No, it's a Bb. It looks wrong and it sounds wrong, but it's right - Vaughan Williams.

Bill Carter, CPA

Well, I am a very baffled listener.

The Colin Davis set arrived yesterday, and I've been listening to his version of the 1st symphony, and comparing it with the Naxos Icelander version.

First off - the recording quality of the LSO set is rather better. More spacious, less 'boxy'. I expected that.

Now the performance. I find it downright boring. This is partly because it's so slow - the longer movements are each about 30 seconds longer than the comparable movement on the Naxos; but actually it sounds a lot slower than that would suggest. It drags.

To give you an example - consider the beginning of the exquiste 2nd movement. When the Icelanders play, it's lyrical. Slow, but rhythmic, and lyrical. Like a gentle walk. Then at around 1m20s, you know how the strings sweep in, a descending 4-note sequence di-dah-dum-daah with that lovely incisive effect? Now, if I listen to Davis doing this, first of all I'm starting to nod off after just one minute. The music seems to be sleepwalking into terminal decline. Then when the strings sweep in (at 1m30s for Davis the slowcoach), they come in more like a deflating balloon. They sound a lot more lush than the Icelanders, but by the third note I'm wondering if they'll ever get to the 4th.

I now see why I've enjoyed these Naxos recordings for so many years. They're rough and imperfect, but they're vital and alive. This Davis LSO version seems to have had all the life polished out of it. I shall keep listening in case the penny hasn't yet dropped, but I think I've probably wasted my money. (Don't say 'I told you so' - I knew this was a possibility, and the experiment is interesting, even if disappointing.)

Is this the LSO/RCA recording you're talking about?

Oh Elgarian, how I feared this would be the case...

True, if you have only listened to the first it's too early to condemn the rest of the set. Like I said, in the Segerstam/Helsinki set, the 2nd is extremely boring; if I listened to it first, I might think the rest of the symphonies would be equally bad...and I'd be wrong. So, maybe we have a similar case here...I hope!!

Unfortunately, Davis really does not come into his own (I think) until his 3rd cycle on LSO Live. His BSO cycle on Philips is over-rated, I think, because while the sound is fine, the performances are just to plain. All the notes are there, but it lacks that something special. Davis finally finds that something special on LSO Live.

Let's not give up yet, Elgarian. Give the rest of the set a go and we'll see where we end up from there.

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"Music is not philosophy." --Akira Ifukube

I'm just looking here at the comments in that long MusicWeb review (yes, MI, this is the RCA award-winning set):

"Not everything is ‘perfect’ - nobody can be that! - but this is as near as you’re going to get. If you’re new to Sibelius, I can’t think of a better introduction than this. If you’ve known and loved Sibelius for more years than you care to remember, and you haven’t yet encountered these recordings, then you simply must, must put that right."

Really? "Near to perfection?" As a soporific, does he mean? "No better introduction?" If this had been the first performance of the 1st symphony I'd heard, I doubt I'd ever have listened again.

I've never been so misled by a Penguin Guide recommendation. They've been consistently the most reliable set of reviews I know. But they got this badly wrong, or there's something wrong with my ears.

Of course I'll let you know how I get on with the rest, but with my scintillating box full of joy and excitement that is the King's Consort collection of Vivaldi's Complete Sacred Music beckoning, I'm not overkeen to spend much more time taking Davis's Sibelius-flavoured sleeping pills. On the good side, the experience has made me appreciate my Naxos set all the more!

I'm not fond of Davis' RCA Sibelius cycle. His LSO Live series is so much better. Like night and day actually. His Philips set was okay, but it's mediocre at best.

I don't like the Penguin Guide, so I don't read their reviews, but they're totally wrong about this set no question about it.

The LSO Live series is not only the superior Davis set, but it's the best sounding one too.

Well, I've been continuing my experiments into the second symphony, and I've made some progress. It's not the progress you might have expected, Tapkaara, but here goes.

Again, I'm comparing the Naxos Iceland recording with the LSO RCA recording. The first striking thing is that the Davis is much better in terms of recording quality. As I noticed with the first symphony, the LSO sound is weightier, more spacious, more convincing; by comparison the Naxos recording is 'boxy', and thinner.

The second thing I notice is yet again the terminally slow tempo of Davis by comparison with the Naxos. I dislike this immensely - the music drags itself along as if it's in the process of dying, and I constantly feel the need to urge it along, to 'get on with it'; I almost feel that if I loaded the audio file into Audacity and increased the tempo by a few percent, it would become something like acceptable. In the end I got so fed up that I stopped the disc, and just sampled favourite bits, comparing them with the Naxos. Apart from the recording quality, which is clearly inferior on the Naxos, I think the Naxos has a rough vitality which I like, and which the Davis completely lacks. Conclusion: I've heard enough. This RCA set can go off to the charity shop.

But then I had a brainwave. I went to the LSO Live website, where I discovered that a short section of the last movement of the second symphony can be sampled. Aha, I thought. I will compare the two LSO versions. So I played the web sample; the tempo was much better; I thought the performance was OK, but not startlingly good. Then I played the same bit from the CD, and was astounded. The CD was so much better, full of life and zing. I was completely baffled. How could I have got it so wrong? And then I noticed... I'd put the wrong CD in! I was comparing the LSO Live sample with the Naxos CD!!!!

I think this is all I need to know. I think Colin Davis's take on Sibelius simply isn't for me, no matter which version we're discussing, and no matter how many people prefer it. This is obviously a very personal thing, and difficult for me to explain. I think the best I can do is to say that Davis's versions seem to me to be too warm, too comfortable, too glossily smooth. The Icelanders are less proficient, and rougher, and I can see all kinds of reasons why their version might be thought inferior; but their vision of Sibelius is closer to my vision of Sibelius, edged with ice and bitter winds, and Northern snows.

It's been an interesting experiment, and the end result is that I have a higher regard for the Icelanders than I had before I started, which is interesting. And I've also recognised (though this is not new) that recording quality, and smooth sophistication of delivery, is much less important to me than that elusive vitality of playing, however rough and unpolished it may seem to other people. Phew. I can see you shaking your head in disapproval, Erik - but I know you'll agree that the important thing is to get the Sibelius I want in practice, not the Sibelius I ought to like in theory.

Well Elgarian, everything is worht a try, isn't it?

I was coming very close to picking up a disc of Davis's RCA cycle, but your comments have certainly snapped me back to where I was before. What you are describing sounds too much like Davis is his Philips cycle, and thus I really have no reason to purchase any disc in this set. I know I won't like it, so what would the point be?

I still contend that Davis's LSO Live cycle is worthy of the adulation I give it. The reason being is that is does sound rugged and less glossy. Tempi are well judged, too. But no two sets of ears are the same, and what I like will not necessarily be what someone else likes.

The Sakari/Iceland cycle has its moments. Have you heard they recording of the 6th and 7th yet? Best in the whole set.

I am with you, Elgarian, that I like my Sibelius a little less smoothed over. His sound needs to be a little like the "wilderness" from which it comes.

So, where do you go from here? Will you sample another cycle or will you be staying in Iceland for a while?

By the way, a cycle I did not recommend the first time may be of interest to you: Maazel/VPO. I did not suggest it because it is controversial. I feel like I am the only person on earth who likes this cycle, though it's gotten fairly good reviews on Amazon. It should not be to pricey. Maazel's Sibelius is very rough around the edges and sounds a little more untamed. His reading of the 2nd, in particular, is very majestic. May I also suggest this cylce?

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"Music is not philosophy." --Akira Ifukube

I've loved the LSO Live Sibelius, no matter how shocking it was especially to me.

The Maazel set in question is actually a very good introduction to the second, fifth, and seventh symphonies. I wouldn't exactly recommend it for the others, however. The third and sixth in that set, in particular, are outright failures interpretively. For those two I prefer Davis/LSO (Live) and Vanska/Lahti. For the first, nothing I've heard so far beats Segerstam/HPO. For the fourth, I'm not really sure. Karajan and the Berliners do a terrifying job of it, but I'm on the lookout for Levine/BPO and Vanska/Lahti. Bernstein and the NYPO also do it plenty of justice, as I recall.

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"Aufersteh'n, ja aufersteh'n
wirst du, mein Herz, in einem Nu!
Was du geschlagen
zu Gott wird es dich tragen!"
-Gustav Mahler

For me, it's hard beating Vanska, Jarvi, Barbirolli, Davis' LSO Live cycle, and I finally heard some of Segerstam's Sibelius and it's outstanding.

Everybody has their personal preferences of course and nobody is wrong and nobody is right no matter how much we like to think so. Elgarian could very well end up loving the Davis RCA cycle and good for him. If this helps him understand Sibelius from a different perspective, then I'm all for that. We need all the Sibelius fans we can get around here am I right, Tapkaara?

I think it's perhaps much to say that Maazel's 3rd and 6th are "failures," but that's just me. I would say that they are not the best recordings of either work by a long shot, but to call them "failures" I think is over-stating it. But I agree: it's agood starter set, and should not be too pricey.

Segerstam/HPO does boast, I think, the best recording of the 1st available, so I agree with Violist here. This can also be said of Segerstam's 5th.

Levine's 4th with the BPO lives up to the hype. It's excellent. I am less impressed, though, with Karajan in the 4th. I think his reading is over-rated.

I have only heard Berstein's 2nd, which is very good.

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"Music is not philosophy." --Akira Ifukube

To be honest though, I don't find much enjoyment in Sibelius' symphonies at all. Most of them don't do much for me. His tone poems, on the other hand, I enjoy quite a bit.

I find his symphonies lack direction, especially Symphony No. 2, which is a complete snoozefest.