Here in this programme of Debussy it is perhaps the woodwinds and brass that lend the orchestral sound its personality: there is an intriguing, appealing blend of mellowness and seductive spice to the flute’s opening solo in the Prélude à L’après-midi d’un faune, a quality that is echoed as other instruments join in and the general orchestral texture is established.

None of this adherence to historically aware principles would count for much, however, if it were not for the spirited way in which van Immerseel harnesses them. He sees beyond the mere timbre itself and looks to the bristling impact that the music must have made when it was new in the decades surrounding the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. In La mer as much as in Images, the freshness of Debussy’s imagination is underlined by performances that have a strong dramatic impulse inflected with all manner of expressive subtleties that bring the music to life. This repertoire is not exactly under-represented in the catalogue but Anima Eterna’s disc approaches it with a compellingly rejuvenated outlook. © 2013 Gramophone Read complete review on Gramophone