He grabs tightly on to the big waltz-like secondary theme in the first movement, and brings the second movement to two huge emotional climaxes. There are other, later Oistrakhs from Russia and the West in variable states of sound, but this one shows what a marvellously natural, balanced player he was.ДЄnother superb mid-20th-century performance comes from Zino Francescatti, who sports a beautiful, aristocratic tone with a fiercely sweet upper register. His tone is warm and emotional вЂ“ without being over the top вЂ“ in the second movement, and he gets more colour out of the first movementвЂ™s largamente cadenza than almost anyone. Sixten Ehrling is dependable on the podium, but little more and the sound is nothing special.Д®hrling turns up unobtrusively again in David OistrakhвЂ™s earliest bout, with Sibelius in the West (1954), in which the violinist is already at the peak of his form.

Her tone has a unique cry in the first movementвЂ™s opening bars, after which she strikes a good balance between a cool temperament, technical fireworks and, in the second movement, emotional involvement. WicksвЂ™s 1952 Stockholm session, reissued at last in 2006 after years in limbo, is more interesting. But I find NeveuвЂ™s 1945 recording to be a sometimes tedious, slug-it-out, musically not-very-unified affair, with pedestrian conducting by Walter Susskind, lots of throbbing vibrato in the coda of the second movement and a rather deliberate finale as Neveu fights hard for each note. There are many collectors who swear by two early female Sibelius champions whose careers were cut short вЂ“ one by choice to raise her family ( Camilla Wicks) and the other by a plane crash ( Ginette Neveu). The tempos in his second recording are probably the fastest on record, cutting a minute off his first. For instance, on both recordings he second-guesses the composer by extending the finaleвЂ™s last ascending scale to the G beyond the written E flat, presumably for bravura effect. Although his tone is a bit thinner and his technique not quite as impervious as in 1935 (nor is Walter HendlвЂ™s conducting as imaginative as BeechamвЂ™s), HeifetzвЂ™s violin still sings, exults, blazes and dominates. Heifetz tried the Sibelius again in stereo in 1959, almost pulling off a second benchmark. HeifetzвЂ™s first recording still sets a near insurmountable benchmark Despite the less-than-full reproduction of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, there is still much to learn from this antique recording. Thomas Beecham is propulsive and supportive, exploring the darkness of the orchestral writing as few others have since. Heifetz does indulge in a few portamentos, but there is not a hint of sentimentality. The concerto seems made-to-order for the Heifetz personality вЂ“ the emotion shooting through every stroke that belied his impassive physical presence, the combination of what one critic called вЂfire and iceвЂ™ that suits this piece perfectly. Yet 72 years on from the first recording, even as the performances on disc proliferate, HeifetzвЂ™s first recording still sets a near insurmountable benchmark. The concerto also wears well because there is depth in the searching, brooding reflections of the icy Nordic landscape in the opening movement because of the motoric rhythms that drive the outer movements and because of the surging Romantic emotions of the climaxes in the second movement. And conductors like it because there are many passages in which they and their orchestras can shine. The work seems to attract younger violinists in particular: it offers them numerous opportunities to flash their stuff. Nowadays, with general technical standards at an all-time peak, almost everyone wants to play the Sibelius.

Indeed, it is possible to date the emergence of the Sibelius concerto into the standard repertoire from the point of HeifetzвЂ™s retirement in 1972. Perhaps Heifetz set such an unbelievably high standard that few dared to approach it. Even Jascha Heifetz вЂ“ who in 1935, at the height of the Sibelius boom, was the first to record the concerto вЂ“ couldnвЂ™t punch it into the repertoire. But it took a long time for the work to catch on in the 20th century, partly because Sibelius, himself a skilled violinist, gave fellow fiddlers a tough obstacle course.

It has succeeded in turning the вЂmighty fourвЂ™ вЂ“ Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms and Tchaikovsky вЂ“ into the mighty five. As we observe the 50th anniversary this month of the death of Jean Sibelius, his Violin Concerto in D minor op.47 is at the summit of the great concertos.

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