Radio-Sinfonieorchester Basel, Alun Francis - Darius Milhaud: Symphonies Nos. 5 & 6 (2000) CD-Rip

The symphonies date from a more mature period of Darius Milhaud compositional life and confronts the listener with music he or she probably didn't expect if one is familiar with the more bizarre, witty, early music with its many influences by light music, like Le Boeuf sur le Toit and La Creation du Monde. The sixth symphony of Milhaud is definitively his greatest. It contains two slow and two fast movements. The slow movements (2/3rd of the music) are of an astonishing beauty! This music of wide open spaces is full of calmness, austerity, clarity, with beautiful changing harmonies and slowly spiralling melodies. The fast movements make a lively contrast to this. The fifth symphony contains one similar kind of slow movement of 14 minutes with a same supreme beauty. Overall the symphony is a little less balanced. After the third fast movement you don't really need the more or less similar fourth. Performance and recording are very good.