Meditations for a Quiet Dawn

"Superb. I just love Jonathon Carney playing the Lark Ascending....sublime."- Anonymous

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The symphonic cycle of Robert Schumann has been a musical "corpus" that during a good part of time provoked a huge intellectual and musical debate. This was a 
consequence that at the time it was said that the composer was not a good symphonic orchestrator, which led some directors to be responsible for adding modifications 
and alterations that did not appear in the original scores. With time and thanks initially to Arturo Toscanini, and later to other directors like Szell or Bernstein, the 
manipulations carried out in Schumann's symphonies were eliminated and expunged. Nowadays no one disputes the musical quality and above all the use of an 
unconventional orchestration that was used at the time of the four symphonies of the German composer, which makes it possible to find in the market a bulky repertoire of 
them. at the level of integrals as independent interpretations.

The full cycle presented by the prestigious British label Nimbus Records is performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and the orchestral direction of Yondani Butt. It 
should be noted at the outset that this symphonic cycle was already published in a subsidiary seal of Nimbus itself in different compacts but this time they are grouped 
together. Yondani Butt was a prestigious director who had at his disposal one of the best orchestral groups that exists today and from which he extracts a very good
 repertoire mainly in the quieter and more sedate passages. The interpretation of Symphony No. 1, Op.38, (a more traditional composition with clear musical references to
 Beethoven) runs through classical channels while Symphony No. 2, Op.61, we must highlight the excellent and well-known adagio , full of majesty and chromaticism
 without using superfluous emotions but with a marked romantic character with which the German composer was inspired.

With regard to Symphony No. 3, Op.97, it begins in a less spirited way than should be expected, it has a character that pervades the whole symphony that makes it 
excessively predictable and not very substantial. The Symphony nº 4, Op.120, and last of the cycle, presents a more interesting and organic orchestral work; the 
contrast of ideas and calm approaches together with a more contemporary and energetic ending offer a suggestive and attractive hearing of the symphony.
Note that this compact double closes with a correct version of the "Manfred" Overture, Op. 115, by Schumann himself." - Joan Carles Abelenda