[Dantone] is a master of pacing, driving finales with assurance, managing gear-changes with ease…Accademia Bizantina play excellently, responding with quick ensemble and sinewy strength to Dantone's interpretational demands

Dantone’s performances are models of historical good taste. There’s no harpsichord continuo – still a divisive issue among Haydn interpreters – and with just 15 strings, textures are buoyant and transparent...Dantone’s touch is always light, and the performance always comes before the scholarship informing it.

[Symphony No. 80] sounds close to a masterpiece on this fine two-CD set by Ottavio Dantone and Accademia Bizantina. Their lithe performances of all four symphonies, purposeful yet sensitive, are among the best available…the rarely recorded no. 81 comes across as another near- masterpiece, helped by Dantone’s subtle shaping of its dynamic outer movements and his tender handling of the Andante’s charming siciliano variations