RECORDS / Classical: Stockhausen - Michael's Reise (ECM New Series 1406 437 188-2)

Virtuosic self-indulgence on a scale that only Stockhausen could contemplate, 'Michael's Reise' is the journey sequence from his cosmic opera Donnerstag aus Licht and, like everything else in it, a celebration of the Stockhausen family as cultural icons at the centre of world order. Even Wagner had nothing on that - although the concept of the Reise clearly looks back to Siegfried's journey down the Rhine, with Stockhausen's trumpeter son Markus playing hero and other members of the clan in lesser roles. The cast, and drama, is entirely instrumental, the performances compelling, and the writing charismatic - one of the composer's most effective recent works. But the conceit . . .