Charles Dutoit, the erstwhile French-Swiss director of the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, in his Decca contract years – as inheritor of the mantel of Ernest Ansermet – never really ventured further into the Austro-German repertory on disc than a cycle of Haydn’s ‘Paris’ symphonies.  It is intriguing to report in our global age that his orchestra under American conductor Kent Nagano, with at least some of the old principals and many French names in its ranks, still manages to play Mahler with a hint of Gallic nostalgia. It should be said the main reason for purchasing this Sony recording of Mahler song cycles is the extraordinary and very personal singing of the German baritone Christian Gerhaher. Mahler’s songs have always been a cornerstone of Gerhaher’s repertoire and every word and phrase tells. It is also a completely distinct voice – in its top range (where this music often is) he sounds as much like a heroic tenor as a baritone.  In the end it is the commitment and lustrous power of the singing that will continue to demand attention rather than perhaps being the most representative version of these works on disc:  a hypnotic disc nevertheless.

I can’t detect any orchestral French accents the LPO’s disc of Das Lied von der Erde despite the fact that the conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin is a native of Montreal and a Dutoit protégé, but it is an outstanding recording of this work, comparable with the great recordings of Klemperer and Kubelik, with even better sound. Both soloists excel: Sarah Connolly has a brighter voice than such alto rivals as Christa Ludwig and Janet Baker, let alone Kathleen Ferrier. The concentration of both Connolly and Nézet-Séguin in the final movement is almost miraculous – walking the tight-rope of maintaining a drifting effect rather than actually drifting as so many performances do.

Both records reviewed here are from live performances, the Gerhaher disc recorded in the Montreal orchestra’s new concert hall, the LPO disc at the RFH, but it is interesting to note that the sound in the LPO recording, with its production team of two –Andrew Walton and Mike Clements – is much more focussed than in Montreal, where the audience is a rustling presence despite a Sony production team of nine.