Album: Beethoven, Piano Concertos - Lewis / BBC SO (Harmonia Mundi)

Four orchestras feature in Paul Lewis's forthcoming Proms Cycle of Beethoven's Piano Concertos, but just one plays in this box set, with mixed results.

Lewis's refined sound and phrasing are matched only sporadically by Jiri Belohlavek and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Though the woodwind is coolly intelligent, the string sound is slightly crude. Performances coalesce in the Fourth and Fifth Concertos, but elsewhere Behlohlavek's forthright confidence is at odds with Lewis's more probing musicianship.