I shall not rest until the French can play Howard Hanson and Elgar as well as we and the English can play Ravel!

Where Berlioz is concerned, let's not forget Charles Munch! I've never heard a "Harold in Italy" more electrifying than the Munch, Primrose from about 1961. To use Munch's own term, he had "the gift of fire".

We need more recordings of the Berlioz Overtures, though. Levine's "Corsaire" has been unsurpassible every time I've heard it live. And why not a disc from MTT?

Previn's 1970s collection is probably the best one out there, but one never turns to Previn for sheer electricity.

Colin Davis' Dresden compendium is one of those typical improvisational sounding performances he gives. You feel like saying, please give us what you really think of this piece, and for heaven's sake stop grunting!

I just finished a two-week stint in Paris, during which I heard only occasional wisps of what we old-timers remember as a "French sound". What I heard in a performance of Bruckner's Fifth by the Orchestre de Paris under our common SF, Boston, and Tanglewood friend, Herbert Blomstedt. He was delighted that the Paris audience was beginning to show some interest in Bruckner...following one of the loudest and longest ovations I've witnessed!

As for the greatest Berlioz conductor, I have to put Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Sir Colin Davis above Levine, although I was impressed and moved by Levine's Harold back in February, which I heard in a broadcast. Levine certainly had to struggle with his Troyens, though it came through in the end:

http://berkshirereview.net/music/berlioz_troyens.html

http://berkshirereview.net/music/troyens.html

I envy any writer who can say so many interesting things about an all-Ravel program, and one that includes the narcoleptic Ma Mere l'Oye. My limited experience with French orchestras tells me that they believe in Ravel, but that's not a reliable bellwether, as you say. The way it works, I think, is that any French orchestra that can't shine in Ravel is lost, but those that do shine in Ravel may be lost in other music.

Maybe you are so relieved that a French orchestra made it through a whole concert without mishap that you overpraised this one. I sympathize. I still hold my breath when the orchestra is French. After Haitink made a good Mahler Sixth recording with the Orch. National de France, I felt like crying for them.

Chung has recorded the most French-sounding Damnation of Faust since Markevitch, and it reminded me that I am more nostalgic for the real French sonority than I ever imagined. One last thing. Levine's Ravel in Boston proves that the French don't quite hold their old monopoly. But then, all French music suits Levine, who must be the best Berlioz conductor alive.
Huntley