Dvorak - Complete Symphonies - Neumann w/ Czech PO

Václav Neumann's Dvorák cycle certainly stands with the classic sets by Kubelik, Kertesz, and Rowicki, and it's better recorded (by far) than any of them..
..even where Neumann takes special care over rhythmic detail, such as the five-note accompaniment figures in the First Symphony's opening movement, or in the deliberate but hair-trigger precise finale of the Third Symphony, the result has the effect of giving the music an extra breadth and weight..
..the incomparable Czech Philharmonic, which offers playing that pretty much eclipses the competition in charm, rhythmic snap, and sheer timbral beauty..
..Take the Fourth Symphony, for example: Listen to how Neumann has the winds in the scherzo emphasizing their dotted rhythms against the triple-time accompaniment, and the increased musical tension this generates. Smart man! The finale takes one of Dvorák's most interesting formal experiments (it's the earliest extant prototype for the Romantic finales of Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto and Rachmaninov's Second and Third Piano Concertos and Second Symphony) and weds it to arguably the least interesting principal tune that he ever wrote. The movement has never sounded better than it does here..
..Both the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies are of course masterpieces all the way through, and from the first sound of those inimitably Czech clarinets that open the Fifth, you know it's going to be smooth sailing..
..Neumann, by contrast, shines in the Seventh, perhaps Dvorák's greatest symphony. His attack on the first movement's climax remains unrivaled, and he milks the finale's tragic foreboding for all it's worth but never lets the music bog down (those marvelous Czech winds help a lot too). The Eighth is noteworthy for its effortless sense of flow, and also for a finale that, in the Czech tradition of Talich, takes the scherzo variations in tempo yet still has sufficient rhythmic kick to provide an exciting conclusion. Neumann recorded the "New World" Symphony more times than I care to count, his last efforts revealing sadly diminished capacity. This is his best version, a "traditional" performance in the sense that it doesn't bring new revelations to this oft-played symphony, but it's also one whose feeling of "rightness" (note the beautifully relaxed yet seemingly self-propelled Largo and the trenchantly argued finale) married to superb playing places it among the handful of great accounts. Supraphon's first-rate sonics also distinguish this, the most consistently excellent of all complete Dvorák symphony cycles, from the rest of the pack - David Hurwitz