Symphonies Nos. 1 and 15.

Shostakovich: Symphonies Nos. 1 and 15 Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra/Jesus Lopez-Cobos (Telarc CD-80572)

Maestro Lopez-Cobos, who is leaving the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, is also leaving quite an excellent legacy of recorded performances on the Telarc label. His Mahler, Bruckner, and Respighi recordings, for example, include some of the finest combinations of performance and sound quality ever achieved in that repertoire. (By the way, his recent release of the Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 2 is quite excellent as a recording, but I could not bring myself to review it because I find the music so utterly unsatisfying.) In one of his final sessions for Telarc, he has turned his attention to the first and last symphonies of Dmitri Shostakovich. With deadlines looming, I have not had enough time to really digest this new release, but I can report that the sound quality is truly excellent. The performances seem a bit on the somber side. The natural comparison would be with the Inbal recording on Denon, so I think I may suggest to Tom Lyle that we consider comparing these two CDs for a future Double Double.