Orchestral showpieces such as those grouped here were among the\nmost obvious beneficiaries of the advances in recording technique\npioneered by Decca from the late 1950s onwards. Works which may\nhave seemed dauntingly complex to an earlier generation of\ngramophone collectors could now be captured with startling clarity,\ndue in no small part to the improved acoustic spread, and it was at\nthis time that the great twentieth-century classics began to win a\nlarger audience.

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When the young Claudio Abbado came to make these recordings in\nLondon in the 1960s (he was 32 at the time of his very first Decca\nsession on 11 February 1966 at which the recordings of Prokofiev’s\nChout and Romeo and Juliet were begun), he had already begun to\ndemonstrate his commitment to contemporary Italian music, and so it\nis perhaps not too surprising that he should have been contracted\nto record these classic works from the twentieth-century orchestral\nrepertoire. This release is also interesting as an early document\nof Abbado’s relationship with the LSO in 1966, eventually becoming\nits principal conductor in 1979.

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