PHILHARMONIA ORCHESTRA / MAY 2016
Nielsen’s Symphony no. 3 “unfolded naturally, with Jarvi keeping a weather eye on momentum, and allowing that glorious waltz tune near the end of the first movement to emerge triumphantly. The Andante was rendered sympathetically, its cloudless tranquillity beautifully evoked by smooth horns and warm-toned strings.”
Bachtrack.com

“Echoing the symphony’s soubriquet, Järvi’s gestures were themselves expansive – he is a conductor who makes full use of the space around him – and the orchestra responded perfectly, presenting wonderful warm string passages, enchantingly twittering woodwind birdsong, and powerful brass counterpoint”
Music OMH

PRAGUE SPRING FESTIVAL OPENING CONCERT / CZECH PHILHARMONIC / MAY 2016:
“Ma Vlast” presented at the opening concert of the Prague Spring and on the podium before the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra was Paavo Järvi. In the Smetana Hall and with Smetana’s music there was something new. It was both innovative and traditional, interesting and satisfactory. Rich and, most importantly, without any sense of routine .. The Philharmonic played extremely cultivated and sophisticatedly, repeatedly and willingly going into great expressive intensity. “My Vlast” sounded as beautiful music, without excessive pathos, with clear contours and soft tones …”
www.casophisharmonie.cz

CD RELEASE: WALTON & ELGAR CELLO CONCERTOS | STEVEN ISSERLIS & THE PHILHARMONIA / HYPERION:
Steven Isserlis made a fine, fierce recording of the Elgar Cello Concerto with the LSO 18 years ago; this new version, with the Philharmonia and conductor Paavo Järvi, is fiercer still – older, wiser and even more convincing. Isserlis’s cello rages against the dying of the light, sounding angry yet still beautiful, and under Järvi the orchestra is full-bodied but focused …
The Guardian

He – and Paavo Järvi – steer a course between the astringent dynamism of Elgar’s own reading, tender intimacy and the grand passion of Jacqueline du Pré. Ensemble is hand-in-glove, wind solos eloquent. The scherzo has plenty of attack, the Adagio is almost unbearably poignant while Isserlis’s finale explodes into life with a bristling humour and rhythmic vitality all-too rare.   [BBC Music Magazine]

He is also blessed in having such a scrupulously attentive partner as Paavo Järvi, who procures playing of the very highest quality from the Philharmonia.
Gramophone

CD RELEASE: NIELSEN COMPLETE SYMPHONIES | FRANKFURT RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA / SONY JAPAN:
The great Paavo Järvi pilots his Frankfurt Radio Orchestra in promoting modernist aspects of the Danish master without altering the music’s essence
Jean Luc Caron, Resmusica.com

Paavo Järvi’s cycle … provides a fine document of the conductor’s six years as music director of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra; these superb recordings were made between 2009 and 2013, when Järvi’s tenure ended. … There’s a wonderful energy about all of the performances from Järvi and his orchestra, and the excellence of the solo wind playing is vividly captured.
Andrew Clements, The Guardian

Multiple details suddenly become perceptible, to the point of changing the perception of the rich and bountiful style coined by Nielsen himself. The direction of Paavo Järvi similarly stresses the inexhaustible inventiveness of the Nielsen’s orchestra, which then becomes a creator at the crossroads of the most diverse aesthetic. The most complex of the series, the 6th symphony is simply amazing. In reality, Paavo Järvi captures all the malicious nature of the work of the Danes, and gives a performance which is both incredible and full of musical relevance, constantly exciting. A great success.
Qobuz

Paavo Järvi has just released a new recording with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and it has almost become an “historical” high point. With his Estonian musical family roots he has sucked the sound and thought world of the Baltic Seas as if, so to speak, it is his mother’s milk. What especially distinguishes the recording: A quasi natural empathy with the erratic, sometimes almost childish naitivty, but always built on a masterful craft and understanding of Nielsen … .. Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Symphony Orchestra engage so enthusiastically and selectively in this universe, that you can trust their leadership.
Udo Badelt, Kulturradio RBB

Järvi represents the role of a sovereign trustee for the art of Carl Nielsen in this symphonic cosmos.
Der Opernfreund

Between 2009 and 2013, The Estonian Chief conductor of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Paavo Järvi, performed all six symphonies of the original modern Dane, Nielsen … And for the 150th anniversary of the birth of the composer RCA has released these terrific recordings in a box set.

The merit with Paavo Järvi is to be able to sit back as a listener and appreciate the natural spectacle of instrumental sounds, going between restful and contrapuntal rigour … Järvi’s approach and understanding of these works, written between 1891 to 1916, clearly allows the linear structures to emerge, nothing must remain on the surface … We experience a culinary luxurious sound
Dr. Ingobert Wahba, Der Neue Merkur

DEUTSCHE KAMMERPHILHARMONIE BREMEN / BRAHMS TOUR – DECEMBER 2015:
“A few years ago The Beethoven cycle hit us like a meteorite: so new, fresh, dramatic, so thoroughly consistent and rhetorically convincing that one could hardly have imagined the symphonies performed otherwise. Following Beethoven and Schumann cycles, the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen and their chief conductor Paavo Järvi now move their focus to the weightiest of Germans … Everything is alive with this ensemble, both fresh and free … Transparency instead of foggy pathos”
Der Standard

“Chief Conductor Järvi allowed the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen to shine in Brahms’ first Symphony after the interval … with great ease and good balance. It is a fine and dignified orchestra with a deep string sound which in the Andante seemed to purr like a contented cat.”
NRC Handelsblad

“The bond between Paavo Järvi and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen is inseparable … From the outset, communication between musicians and maestro ran like clockwork … allowing you to feel a vitality and enthusiasm that many professional orchestras can only dream of … Seldom do you experience an orchestra where there is so much eye contact and laughter. Such enjoyment was clear from the outset of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen’s performance of Brahms’ Symphony No.3 … the freedom with which this orchestra played music is quite unique.”
Die Welt

“When Järvi appeared as a guest conductor with his Orchestre de Paris at the Philharmonie recently he maintained the efficient upper hand as leader. With the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen however there is no music director, simply fellow musicians, and the energy currents flow and intensify with each moment. Weariness is not something that this cohesive ensemble know about. They are driven only by their desire to raise our perception of Brahms. And this is what the Bremen musicians precisely achieved in this blazing evening.”
Der Tagesspiegel

EUROPEAN TOUR / ORCHESTRE DE PARIS – NOVEMBER 2015:
“It’s Paavo Järvi’s last season as chief conductor of the Orchestre de Paris and on Saturday they performed together at the Vienna Konzerthaus. Taking this performance as a yardstick, these five years together must have been a very fruitful collaboration: one rarely experiences such an immediate connection between orchestra and conductor, such an extraordinarily attentive presence on both sides so that with economical means an understanding of the most subtle shades is possible.”
Wiener Zeitung

“This was a special evening at the (Berlin) Philharmonie … One thing is for sure: Järvi is not one of those conductors who exhaust themselves visibly … His body language is one of controlled movements which demonstrate reasoning and nobility.”
Berliner Morgenpost

“… the Orchestre de Paris sounds as if the musicians are just one person … and Järvi knows to use it. With the help of their uncommonly precise interrelationship he succeeds in building up a fascinating musical suspense.”
Süddeutsche Zeitung

“Järvi’s Nielsen 5 (with the Philharmonia Orchestra) was immensely commanding. There were elements of subjective thinking but it was to the benefit of the music. The very opening found the violas playing piano very softly before descending to almost nothing at the required diminuendo. This typified the conductor’s attention to dynamic contrast. There were subtleties of phrasing and true understanding of Nielsen’s colouring … rarely has Nielsen’s orchestration been so well defined.”
classicalsource.com

PÄRNU FESTIVAL 2015:
“Perfect Pärnu – There isn’t a hint of a hothouse environment on stage – these are simply musicians having the time of their lives, no small thanks to the inspiring Paavo Järvi himself, and they’re an inspiration, in turn, to the festival youth orchestra.”
BBC Music Magazine

“Top players, great Estonians – Utopian music-making led by the Järvi family in Estonia’s magical summer town … The result begged comparison with the elasticity of Abbado’s concerts with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, which is as good as it can get.”
theartsdesk.com

BERLIN PHILHARMONIC – MAY 2015:

“Paavo Järvi allows the musicians a mostly cheerful approach (in Shostakovich’s Symphony No.1) and tightens his interpretation again and again, to suddenly bring the orchestra into a higher voltage. Then, with rumbles and crashes into the rafters of the strings, one has the feeling that Järvi is firmly and quite clearly at the heart of the sound of the Ensemble…”
Berliner Zeitung, May 2015

MUNICH PHILHARMONIC – APRIL 2015:
“Even today such an important and original composer as the Dane, Carl Nielsen, receives too little attention on the German concert scene. Some of his symphonies are played, but the comic opera “Maskarade” premiered in 1906 is never encountered here … Paavo Järvi, not just the busy chief conductor in Bremen (Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie), Paris (Orchestre de Paris) and Tokyo (NHK Symphony Orchestra), but also a welcome guest with orchestras around the world, now offered this work with the Munich Philharmonic as a virtuoso piece for large orchestra … an inventive, elegant and multicolored programme in which Paavo Järvi is so well versed – always curious and inspired.”
Süddeutsche Zeitung

NIELSEN’S FOURTH SYMPHONY WITH PHILHARMONIA ORCHESTRA:
An awesomely executed performance of Nielsen’s fourth symphony sat alongside perfectly pitched Haydn and sparkling Beethoven.
The Guardian

At the outset Järvi and the Philharmonia hurled us into the vortex with maximum force. It is possible to take a longer view building more patiently to the first movement’s glorioso climax, but this had conviction in spades and in Nielsen conviction counts for a great deal. It also had genuine finesse … This was a concert to make one realise why one keeps coming back for more.
classicalsource.com

Järvi and the Philharmonia captured the white heat of the opening movement presenting us with an uncontained maelstrom of sound.  Järvi synthesised the composite elements into a seamless organic whole, bringing out the angularity of the writing and feelings of disquiet in the more reflective material.  Nielsen’s sonic and harmonic shocks, rhythmic asymmetries and unusual textural collages were all brought thrillingly to life … This was great playing from Järvi and the Philharmonia – and it’s good to see these wonderful symphonies by Carl Nielsen receiving so much public exposure.
seenandheardinternational.com