Ashkenazy makes a superb job of Finlandia, which boasts some of the most vibrant, powerful brass sounds on disc.
More than 30 years separate En Saga and Tapiola, yet both works are quintessential Sibelius.
The latter is often praised for the way Sibelius avoided 'exotic' instruments, preferring instead to draw new and inhuman sounds from the more standard ones; and the former is, in many ways, just as striking in the way the orchestration evokes wind, strange lights, vast expanses and solitude. Both works suggest a dream-like journey: En Saga non-specific, though derived from Nordic legend; Tapiola more of an airborne nightmare in, above and around the mighty giants of the Northern forests inhabited by the Green Man of the Kalevala, the forest god Tapio (the final amen of slow, bright major chords brings a blessed release!). Ashkenazy's judgement of long-term pacing is very acute; the silences and shadows are as potent here as the wildest hurricane. And Decca's sound allows you to visualise both the wood and the trees; every detail of Sibelius's sound world is caught with uncanny presence, yet the overall orchestral image is coherent and natural.