RODRIGO: “CONCIERTO DE ARANJUEZ;” ARNOLD: GUITAR CONCERTO....

RODRIGO: “CONCIERTO DE ARANJUEZ;” ARNOLD: GUITAR CONCERTO. Michael Conn, guitar; Orchestra of St. John’s, Smith Square, conducted by John Lubbock. MCA MCAD-25203 (compact disc). Conn’s first recording is a charmer--a controlled, understated account of the unavoidable “Aranjuez,” and a similarly restrained but subtly phrased and colored revival of Malcolm Arnold’s neglected concerto. He finds a sense of spare, not exaggeratedly bluesy, melancholy in Arnold’s central tribute to Django Reinhardt, and articulates the bravura bits cleanly. Lubbock’s orchestral support is clear and sympathetic, the engineering unobtrusive.