Brahms - Serenades 1 & 2

The Guardian 60

Gävle Symphony Orchestra/Martín
(Ondine)

Anyone who champions Brahms’s gloriously eccentric, lyrical and capacious Serenades – No 1 in D with six movements, No 2 in A with five – deserves full attention. Here they get it. Jaime Martín was chiefly a flautist until switching careers to full-time conducting in 2013. He gets three big pictures on this CD – the first in a series of Brahms recording with the Gävle Symphony Orchestra – whereas Brahms has only one, scarcely bigger than a postage stamp. Despite occasional thickening of textures, there’s some lovely playing, with warm woodwind and horns and nice, crisp syncopations. Martín does not allow the tempi to drag: important in works that need to be kept agile and alert to reveal their special charm.