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- The Guardian, Friday 26 July 2002
In Britain, the American conductor David Robertson is best known as a contemporary-music specialist; he was Pierre Boulez's successor as musical director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain in Paris. But his sympathies stretch much further than that, and since 2000 he has been based in Lyon, where he has taken charge of the National Orchestra.
It is clear from the playing on this disc that he has inherited a responsive, highly competent band, though one without a distinctive sound or personality.
A great deal about the execution of these works is exemplary: the transparency of the textures, the detailed rhythmic articulation, the careful shaping of every climax. But there is nothing pungent or acerbic about any of it - no theatrical thrill about The Miraculous Mandarin, no earthiness in the Dance Suite, no expressionist extreme in the Four Pieces.
It is all far too civilised.
