SIBELIUS: VIOLIN CONCERTO. Jascha Heifetz, violin. Walter...

SIBELIUS: VIOLIN CONCERTO. Jascha Heifetz, violin. Walter Hendl conducting Chicago Symphony. PROKOFIEV: VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 2. Heifetz, violin. Charles Munch conducting Boston Symphony. GLAZUNOV: CONCERTO, OPUS 82. Heifetz, violin. Hendl conducting RCA Symphony. RCA Red Seal Compact Disc RCD 1-7019. With this one CD, the unsurpassed Heifetz throws down the gauntlet to violinists of another generation. Few can match his technical virtuosity on these patented performances. His 1960 recording of the Sibelius sets the standard that few, even Perlman, have equaled. The Prokofiev has been played with more passion and fire, but seldom with more accuracy in devilishly hard passages; although Heifetz eschews much of Glazunov’s lyricism, he gives the composer an enviable purity of line. This CD is an exceptional buy on more than artistic grounds--it contains nearly 69 minutes of music in RCA’s 65-minute-plus CD series. Another CD, the Heifetz performances of the Beethoven and Brahms concertos, runs over 72 minutes. In a time when most record companies simply duplicate on CD the meager contents of an LP, this is welcome news for the consumer.