Janine Jansen’s first concerto recording in nine years is worth the wait, not least thanks to her obvious rapport with the conductor Klaus Mäkelä and his Oslo Philharmonic. In the Sibelius, her playing has an old-school expansiveness that makes itself felt immediately, and when she plays the soaring second theme it sounds like she’s wringing every drop of juice out of it – but the playing all around her is calibrated such that it doesn’t sound overblown. Throughout, Mäkelä shapes the orchestra’s part into something truly symphonic in scope – there are passages that almost sound like Tchaikovsky. Jansen hurtles down the bobsleigh run of the finale at breathtaking speed, veering and swerving and almost threatening to fly off, but the rocksteady rhythmic bite of the orchestra keeps her on track.
They bring a different, lighter intensity to Prokofiev’s Concerto No 1, creating a spellbinding, storytelling atmosphere. Again, Jansens makes a white-knuckle ride of the fast movement – and again, the orchestra is with her all the way. For a bonus track there’s a tiny Sibelius duet for pizzicato violin and cello in which the uncredited cellist must surely be Mäkelä himself – a sweet sign-off to an unusually collegial concerto recording.
