About this recording

The sound of Vagn Holmboe’s sinfonias and the work Chairos is dazzlingly intense. The composer paints in long, broad strokes with both profundity and pathos. The clear lines and incisive rhythms show the inspiration the composer received from eastern European and Japanese music, while his distinctive symphonic style has roots as far back as Haydn.

In recent years Dacapo’s CD recordings of Vagn Holmboe’s music have turned the gaze of the international music-loving public on Denmark. In 1996 Holmboe was awarded the Composer of the Year prize at the Cannes Classical Awards. The composer died the same year, but Dacapo continues with the series of CD releases of Holmboe’s works in the capable hands of the best Danish and Nordic musicians.

The Danish Radio Sinfonietta and its Finnish conductor Hannu Koivula are on firm ground as Holmboe interpreters. Their recordings of Holmboe’s chamber concertos have garnered excellent reviews and honours, including Gramophone Critics’ Choice with the comment ‘A definite must-buy’, and Classics Today’s top rating 10/10 – ‘The performances are uniformly superb’, wrote the editor David Hurwitz.

Holmboe’s four sinfonias are released in a special box with room for a bonus CD. For the sinfonias can be heard in two ways: either as four separate works, or as the unified work Chairos, where the fourth sinfonia is divided and forms the framing for the other three. Dacapo has made this possible by releasing both versions on two separate CDs – at the prize of a single cd.