I'm not sure when I last enjoyed a reading of the Rachmaninov Second Symphony so much...they play here as if possessed; the brass are on especially magnificent form...by heaven, Antonio Pappano invests the piece with a passionate sense of belief...Principal clarinetist Alessandro Carbonare is exemplary on the long and haunting solo in the slow movement.

Pappano and his Rome-based orchestra cultivate a feeling of deliberate understatement throughout this live performance which gives Rachmaninov's Second Symphony a light, almost ethereal feeling...Although lacking in full-on power, this performance is no less intense with elegant, sophisticated playing from the orchestra, and there's still plenty of drama when required.

Pappano is revelatory. It is rare indeed to hear the Second Symphony executed with such clarity and with such a faithful, balanced spectrum of instrumental colour but the performance goes much further than that. Pappano has passion, too, and he knows when to unleash it and when to keep it quietly in reserve.

Pappano has a wonderfully acute ear for orchestral detail. He draws playing of remarkable alertness, polish and warmth from his Italian orchestra...when I say that his new recording is very nearly a match for Previn's classic account, I can pay it no higher compliment. Pappano is also a little more rhythmically sharp...The Enchanted Lake, played with great detail, drawing out all the delicate colours of [the] exquisitely orchestrated miniature tone-poem.

This is a superb performance, faithful to the score, intelligently balanced, organically conceived and infused with passion.

Pappano, master conductor of opera, revels in the long lyrical lines of Rachmaninov’s second symphony, in which the tender orchestral songs never end, even when the “Dies Irae” plainchant breaks in...he gets velvet delicacy from Rome’s Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. They also excel in the pianissimo textures of Liadov’s The Enchanted Lake.

I like the sound of Pappano’s Rome orchestra; there’s a satisfying richness to the lower string sonority which gives the glowering introduction a brooding intensity. The tiny touches of rubato, of ebb and flow, are unobtrusively applied; the first movement’s lyrical second theme emerges haltingly, hesitantly...This is a really good performance.