Finnish soprano Soile Isokoski has never made a more beautiful recording than this. She offers what must be accounted, hands down, as the finest performance of the tone poem Luonnotar currently available. Not only does she pronounce the words more clearly and meaningfully than anyone else, but she easily copes with the music's cruel tessitura. Her achievement is all the more impressive given the very realistic balances: listen to how she rides out the big crescendo, which Segerstam plays to the hilt, vanishing briefly like a surfer behind a huge wave, only to emerge upright on the other side. It's an incredibly thrilling moment. Unlike many other performances, where the voice fades into the final note of the violins, Isokoski finishes forte, bright and strong, and it's entirely in keeping with her ability to capture the bold, primal character of the music.

Throughout this program, Segerstam and the Helsinki Philharmonic are equally outstanding. All of Sibelius' original song arrangements for solo female voice are here. Isokoski catches the gentle rapture of "Demanten pa marssnön" (Diamonds on the March Snow) to perfection, and her haunting rendition of "S'en har jag ej fragat mera" (I Questioned Them No More), one of Sibelius' darkest songs, will stay with you long after the disc has ended. Most of these texts are in Swedish, but among the items orchestrated by other hands, including the composer's son-in-law Jussi Jalas, is the particularly wonderful Finnish setting of "Kaiutar" (The Echo-Nymph) from Op. 72. It's a mini-scena in Sibelius' richest late style, and like all of the songs on this disc, it deserves to be much better known.

If you haven't encountered this music, you can't do better than to acquire this disc without delay. Sibelius was a terrific song writer, and the only thing that prevents these works from being better known is the dearth of singers comfortable singing in Swedish and Finnish, a state of affairs now being mitigated both by recordings and by the current, healthy crop of excellent Scandinavian vocalists. Certainly Isokoski takes pride of place among the sopranos. She has all of the interpretive intelligence of her compatriot Karita Mattila, but her voice catches the microphones better, sounding richer and smoother throughout its range. The engineering in both stereo and SACD multi-channel formats is uniformly outstanding, and the booklet includes complete texts and translations. A marvelous release in every respect. [5/1/2006]

--David Hurwitz