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BIS continues to unearth large quantities of previously unknown – or at least seldom heard outside of Finland – music by the composer with whom this label has chosen to identify itself to a degree without parallel in the history of recordings. Anyone wishing to acquire a large, varied sampler of Sibelius's music for male chorus, a cappella or with orchestral accompaniment, will find this anthology a source of much pleasure and discovery.

The YL Male Voice Choir certainly has an almost proprietary relationship with Sibelius's music, since it was founded in 1883, only one year after the conductor Robert Kajanus organized the first permanent symphony orchesta not only in Finland, but in all of Scandinavia. Just as Kajanus was entrusted with the first performances of many orchestral works, so too did the YL Chorus give the first performances of many works for choir, both a cappella and in combination with intrumental ensembles. Not all of those pieces were topdrawer Sibelius, but they were in demand by this publisher and they brought in more royalties than his orchestral scores, at least in the lean years when Sibelius was hard-pressed to keep food on the table. Fortunately, even the obvious pot-boilers in this collection reveal the composer's fastidious craftmanship, if not always his higher levels of inspiration.

BIS has arranged the contents in chronological order. Most of the selections date from the composer's most fervent nationalist period (roughly from 1890 to 1917, the year where Finland declared its independence from Russia). Sibelius collectors will be especially interested by the earliest incarnation of Rakastava (The Lover), which is far better known in its later arrangement for string orchestra. Hearing it performed in its original scoring, for tenor, male choir, and a more modest-sized body of strings, reveals the music as a more intimate, almost autobiographical, study in yearning and erotic nostalgia. One hopes that, for the sake of domestic tranquility, the composer's young bride, Aino, believed herself to be the source of inspiration, but given the young Sibelius's tendency to develop a crush on every pretty female who caught his eye, the sensual qualities of the music were probably not inspired by monogamous devotion!

The most substantial work here is the original version of Opus 32, The Origin of Fire, for baritone solo, male chorus, and orchestra – a curious but highly effective “Kalevala Piece” with dark nationalist elements that seemed “mythic” to the Russian censors, but carried a far different message for a Finnish-speaking audience. This 11-minute tone poem is clearly, and rather awkwardly, divided into two distinct parts. The first six or seven minutes recount a very shamanistic creation myth from the Kalevala, which becomes transformed, in a stentorian, full-throated climax, into a stirring anthem that seems to herald the not-yetaccomplished birth of a free and sovereign Finland. The only competing recording, a vivid early stereo experiment from 1954 (!), commemorates an ad hoc partnership between the Cincinnati Symphony under Thor Johnson and the Helsinki University Chorus, in its first American tour. It still sounds amazingly good, and the choral declamation at the climax is thrilling, but with the appearance of this more polished and inifinitely better-recorded rendition, that pioneering effort can finally be retired.

Most of the other selections are shorter and more generic, including the obligatory hymnal setting of Finlandia (gloriously sung here, less than three minutes long, so it seems to stop just as it's getting warmed-up). Most of the remaining music will be new to American listeners, and although the level of inspiration is clearly uneven, the choral singing is never less than superb; the conducting of Matti Hyokki (director of the YL Choir since 1980) is masterly; and, when called on to reinforce the preceedings, Vanska and his excellent Lahti musicians do that in exquisite balance with the voices.

The incomparable BIS Sibelius cycle has, in short, produced another magnificent release filled to the brim with music that some of us have waited decades to hear and that anyone who values great choral singing will find executed with breath-taking beauty.