BERLIOZ - RAMEAU Symphonie fantastique / Hippolyte et Aricie, suite d'orchestre Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Daniel Harding

A world might seem to divide the unbridled Romanticism of Berlioz from the highly controlled art of Rameau, standard-bearer of the French Late Baroque . . . A whole world: and yet, at a distance of less than a century (Hippolyte was premiered in 1733, the Fantastique in 1830), the same passion links two works much less dissimilar than their stylistic divergence might suggest. There is the same audacity in the orchestration, combined with an innate sense of drama that springs repeated rhythmic and harmonic surprises. The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra performs here a task requiring unusual versatility under Daniel Harding, with his matchless gift for establishing a dialogue between two pioneers of genius: beyond the purely factual echoes, what counts is their powerful inspiration!