This is one of the finest of all collections of Rossini overtures to have been recorded in recent decades. The superbly stylish playing apart, one of the reasons for the disc’s success is the fact of its working within shrewdly appointed boundaries of chronology and style. All the overtures are early, dating from the years in which Rossini put his own indelible mark on the operatic overture (or “musical visiting card” as Gino Roncaglia so elegantly expressed it). They also date from the time, pre-Naples, when Rossini was writing for smallish orchestras; no danger here of us being ricocheted from early Rossini to late by some grand maestro and his souped-up symphony orchestra. It is also nice to hear overtures that do not normally get a look-in in such anthologies.