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By 1941, the year of the Concierto del sur, Ponce’s style had changed and matured, he having meanwhile studied in Paris with Dukas; and this is one of the best guitar concertos in the repertory (though far outdone in popularity by a much inferior work by a composer 20 years his junior); its Mexican character is evident in the festive finale. Moreno’s performance is strong in urgency and intensity....

Ponce’s only other concerto, that for violin two years later, is his best-known thanks to the championship of Szeryng, its dedicatee, and through the inclusion in its melancholy second movement of references to his famous song Estrellita (whose rights he had unwittingly surrendered to an astute publisher). Szeryng plays the virtuoso solo part – which includes a lengthy cadenza, as does the guitar concerto – brilliantly....

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [8/1996] [reviewing the Ponce concertos]

This is not the place to give a resume of the career of one of the father-figures of Mexican music, but his influence on every aspect of music in his country was far-reaching: here, however, we can hear what influenced him. His first composition to attract attention, the 1912 Piano Concerto, is a characteristically lirico-dramatic late-romantic work in three connected movements, well-constructed and picturesquely scored, such as a talented musician schooled in Italy and Germany might be expected to produce. It contains a great deal of bravura and brilliant writing, in which Osorio acquits himself with distinction. Of Mexican idiom there is scarcely a trace: the folk background to the loosely rhapsodic Balada Mexicana of a couple of years later is richly ornamented.

Then, at the age of 44, Ponce went to Paris and studied with Dukas. The transformation in his style is evident in Chapultepec, three symphonic sketches depicting the suburb of Mexico City in which he lived. Deeply imbued with the spirit of French impressionism, but with an exhilaratingly Indian finale, these subtly coloured movements – most persuasively presented in their 1934 revised form under a sympathetic Batiz – make a strong case to be included in concert programmes here. The latest work on the disc is the 1935 Poema elegiaco, whose intensity is conveyed in some heartfelt orchestral playing.

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [1/1996] [reviewing Vol 6 in the original series]

Those who may have been deterred by some of Chavez’s often astringent and acerbic music now have the opportunity, with the present selection of his works, of hearing him in more approachable vein. Much the most attractive is the longest work here, the symphonic suite The daughter of Colchis, originally the score for the Martha Graham ballet Dark meadow. Its calm, pastoral atmosphere, spare texture and mostly diatonic and linear style make it sound very much like Copland, for whose work it could easily be mistaken. The Toccata, taken from some incidental music to a dramatized version of Don Quixote, also comes as a pleasant surprise: the first third of its six-and-three-quarter minutes is taken up by a pastoral oboe solo; gradually other woodwinds then enter, the pace quickening the while, until at about half-way through the piece the whole orchestra becomes involved in a vigorous scherzo. In contrast, the Mexican landscapes are full of thematically disjunct, noisily grandiose dramatic gestures masking nationalistic turns of phrase and dance rhythms.

All the works so far mentioned were written in the 1940s: the earlier, brief Songs of Mexico, musically primitive, exploits an exotic orchestra of native instruments and ends in a dance of raw energy; the Baile (“Dance”) of 1953 was the original finale of the Fourth Symphony, and progresses curiously in aggressive short jerks. The playing and recording throughout are both excellent.

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [1/1996] [reviewing Vol 7 in the original series]

During the past few years several recordings of Mexican music conducted by Enrique Batiz have appeared, including the Sinfonia india by Chavez and various orchestral pieces by Revueltas. In this further instalment, all the music is refreshingly direct and unpretentious, with performances to match.

In the three works by Revueltas, all written in the 1930s and reflecting his skills as a theatre and film composer, there may be a tendency to go on for too long—in Caminos, especially. But an almost Ivesian swagger counters any tendencies to Hollywood exoticism: and, as the end of Musica para charlar (''Music for chatter'') shows, Revueltas's punchy sense of humour doesn't prevent him from generating powerful climaxes out of attractive melodic material. The earliest piece, Ventanas, is the most serious in tone, evoking either a battle or a particularly bumpy train ride, and the fact that one hears an almost direct quote from The Rite of Spring towards the end shows that there is much more to Revueltas's style than folky post-impressiomism. There is a far greater range of style in the two works by Carlos Chavez, written 20 years apart and with the kind of symphonic ambitions one imagines Revueltas would have scorned. Sinfonia de Antigona (1933) offers an unusual mixture of austere and lyrical music, and the sheer idiosyncracy of the piece is striking, but it is let down by an attempt at faster music in modal style. Copland would eventually be much better at this kind of thing. The Symphony No. 4 (1953) is much more conservative, and I found the easy-going first movement dull. The other two are much more interesting: a Molto lento with a strong sense of line, and a genial, expansive finale with a raucously affirmative ending. The performances have panache, the sound is variable, some of the bigger climaxes lack definition. But this is undoubtedly a disc to sample.

-- Arnold Whittall, Gramophone [8/1989] [reviewing what became Vol 8 in the original series]