Another orchestral tour de force from Sascha Goetzel and this outstanding orchestra: after their acclaimed debut recording for Onyx of Respighi, Florent Schmitt and Hindemith, the Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra and their charismatic Viennese music director have devised a fascinating programme of ballet music composed during the turbulent inter-war years of the 20th century.

The music reflects the edgy, dangerous and turbulent political and social landscape of the period. This is music of great rhythmic vitality: Ravel’s refracted memories of a vanished Habsburg Vienna destroyed by the 1914–18 War, to the primitive barbarism of Prokofiev’s 'Scythian Suite' and the lurid violence of Bartok’s 'Miraculous Mandarin' with its themes of lust, criminality, prostitution and murder.

Schulhoff’s ballet 'Ogelala', like Prokofiev’s score, concerns pagan rituals and warring tribes, and a young couple who are meant to kill each other, but end up falling in love.

Holst’s comic opera, 'The Perfect Fool', written in 1918–22, begins with a ballet which is danced by Spirits of Earth, Water and Fire. The score is brilliant – and though less concerned with human drama than the other works on this disc, the drive, energy and sheer brilliance of Holst’s score is very much of its time.