We usually think of Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique in the context of the Romanticism burgeoning all around it at its 1830 premiere. Conductor Daniel Harding instead suggests, brilliantly, that we hear it as part of an ongoing French tradition exemplified only a century earlier by the swagger of the high baroque. Rameau’s suite of dances from Hippolyte et Aricie is an exuberant upbeat to a performance of the Symphonie that delights in the raw sonic capabilities of the orchestra. Harding’s own Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra are stylish in both. There’s some brazen playing to enjoy – the low brass in March to the Scaffold sound like a foghorn – but the impression of a lack of refinement is deceptive: the balance and pace are always tautly in check. Another Symphonie Fantastique, by the Concertgebouw, under Daniele Gatti, is released this month, but next to Harding’s it sounds grey.
