Dohnanyi always gives good Mendelssohn, a composer whose music responds well to his neat, precise, tasteful, understated style of conducting. The Scottish Symphony captured here displays all of these virtues in lively tempos, typically superb playing by the Clevelanders, and a finale in which the add-on coda emerges with impressive naturalness from what has come before. But the real treat is the coupling: Die erste Walpurgisnacht (The First Witches’ Sabbath), a marvelous and (for Mendelssohn) quite ferocious cantata lasting a bit more than half an hour in which a pack of bloodthirsty druids intimidate a bunch of squeamish Christians.

This splendidly produced collection will surprise and, I believe, delight. Lehar's mastery of the orchestra has never been in doubt; and here is further evidence of his technical accomplishment…What other operetta or waltz composer could have written music as powerful, gripping and spine-tingling as this?