Vaughan Williams: Complete Symphonies A. Davis & BBC Symphony Orchestra (6 CDs)

From HMV website↓

Vaughan Williams: Complete Symphonies
Andrew Davis (Conductor)

Digital recordings from 1990-1996. Symphony No. 1 is a grand work that begins with majestic music featuring vocalists, using Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass as its text, and its official title is A Sea Symphony.
The following Symphony No. 2 depicts impressions of the great city of London and is a descriptive work that the composer himself favored most, with the official title A London Symphony.
Symphony No. 3 beautifully musicalizes impressions and meditations on rural landscapes, with the official title A Pastoral Symphony.
From the next Symphony No. 4 onwards, they were officially numbered, and except for Symphony No. 7, which was originally film music, titles were no longer used.
Symphony No. 4 reflects the unsettling mood of pre-World War II Europe and is a work brimming with tension, with its dramatic progression being highly stimulating. Furthermore, its intense ending, in contrast to the fact that 7 out of the 9 symphonies conclude softly, asserts a unique presence among Vaughan Williams' symphonies.
The subsequent Symphony No. 5, perhaps due to following the intense Symphony No. 4, is an introspective work pursuing a calm and peaceful world, which seems hard to believe was composed during wartime, or perhaps precisely because of it.
Symphony No. 6, written from during to after the war, is a powerful masterpiece that can be seen as a radical and ferocious development of the world of Symphony No. 4. The decadent atmosphere evoked by the tenor saxophone and the impact of the pounding bass drum are overwhelming.
Symphony No. 7 is a work that reconstructs the descriptive film music Scott of the Antarctic, and its official title is Sinfonia Antartica. Its panoramic appeal, which could be described as Vaughan Williams' version of An Alpine Symphony, is a highlight. The effective use of numerous percussion instruments, organ, female chorus, and soprano solo is also impressive.
Symphony No. 8, with its instrumentation requiring a two-orchestra ensemble and five percussionists, is an elaborate work featuring variations without themes, a march-like scherzo, a cavatina, and a toccata.
The final Symphony No. 9 was composed in the composer's mid-80s, shortly before his death, but the mood of dominant lament and resignation may be fitting for his final work. The use of tenor and alto saxophones is also unique.