Carousel is Rodgers & Hammerstein’s greatest achievement, says conductor John Wilson. He’s even likened it to Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, a fellow masterpiece in which music and drama are integrated so brilliantly that it’s impossible to separate them. After hearing his superb new complete recording for Chandos, it’s easy to see why Wilson makes this claim. Who wouldn’t be swept along by this performance, the scene set with the opening Carousel Waltz and its old-school sound, luscious strings and delicious swing, carrying us all the way through to the stirring finale as the ‘Carousel Ensemble’ voices swell.

 The fantastic orchestral playing – taut, colourful, joyful – is one reason for this recording’s success. In the pit (and it is recorded in a theatre, to give that authentic Broadway feel), is the Sinfonia of London, Wilson’s own orchestra, only formed six years ago and already garlanded with an indecent number of five-star reviews and accolades. Given one of the album’s other selling points is that we hear every note of the music, the band has a starring role. But part of me does wonder, as a...