This new release features the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Sakari Oramo performing Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6.
These two symphonies, composed in 1944 and 1947, are very different in mood, but stylistically closely related. The Fifth was written amid the chaos of the Second World War and seeks to find a positive solution; but in the Sixth, completed soon after war, the mood is darker. Both feature Prokofiev’s melodic writing at its best.
Sakari Oramo, following his tenure as Chief Conductor of the CBSO, served as chief conductor of the Finnish RSO from 2003 to 2012. As of autumn 2013 he will be the chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. With the Finnish RSO, he has won considerable critical acclaim from recordings of 20th-century and contemporary Finnish repertoire.