Joseph Swensen enters a competitive field: there are over three dozen listings in the current Classical Catalogue, but if versions of the Sibelius Concerto are legion, the six Humoresques and the Serenades are rarities. Like so many virtuosos Swensen was a pupil of Dorothy DeLay and has won golden opinions since he first appeared on the scene in the early 1980s. Those who heard his fine account of the Sibelius Concerto with the RPO in London in the mid-1980s may like to know that this recording is even finer. He despatches its formidable difficulties with apparent effortlessness and aplomb, and without ostentation. Generally speaking his use of expressive vibrato shows taste, and his purity of intonation is exemplary. Although it would not displace Cho-Liang Lin's Gramophone Award-winning account (coupled with Nielsen on Sony), it is certainly among the finest versions to appear since.
I have often wondered whether some of the ideas for the Second Concerto on which he was working in 1915 found their way into Humoresques. These pieces captivate and have a poignant, wistful melancholy all their own. Indeed there are few in which the magic of the white nights of the Scandinavian summer is more vividly conveyed. Despite their lightness there is an all-pervasive sadness, which is even more intense in the two Serenades, which are earlier than the Fifth Symphony, and have great expressive poignancy. Apart from Leonidas Kavakos's rather mannered account of the Humoresques on Finlandia, the only rival currently available is by Dong-Suk Kang and the Gothenburg orchestra (BIS). In the first, Swensen rather overdoes the rubato and in the E flat, he is a shade too slow but this is perhaps a matter of personal taste. I would not prefer Swensen to either Dong-Suk Kang (or to Salvatore Accardo whose Philips account with Sir Colin Davis should be restored to circulation). The Serenades come off very well. Saraste gives admirable support and the recording is well balanced.'