Julia Fischer's Poème is an excellent album for fans of late-Romantic and post-Romantic violin classics, essentially oriented toward melancholy coloration and passionate expressions.

The Poema autunnale by Ottorino Respighi, Poème by Ernest Chausson, and The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams are tone poems that feature the violin as soloist and maintain either a lyrical or reflective atmosphere for most of their duration.

Of the works included here, only Josef Suk's Fantasy in D minor has the full range of expressions, tempo contrasts, and formal design that make it a fully realized violin concerto.

Fischer's energy and technical virtuosity easily carry the Fantasy, and the performance is quite compelling for its brilliance and drama, centered around the violin's flashy part.

The tone poems are more ephemeral and diffuse in their moods, and while all have passages that allow Fischer to show her impressive skills, they are almost too consistently orchestral in texture to sustain a concertante feeling.

Rather, these works let the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo, under Yakov Kreizberg, share equally in the expression, so while Fischer is always prominent, her playing is more a textural part of the whole.

The net effect of this programming is that it permits the attentive listener and Fischer devotee to focus on details, while others who want an album of lovely background music can certainly play this CD at a low to moderate volume for that purpose.

Highly recommended.