Samuel Barber’s heartfelt Adagio for Strings has become an elegy for the modern age and few conductors have lavished on it the love that Leonard Bernstein brings. A committed champion of music by fellow American composers, he and his superb New York Philharmonic energise the ballet music of Bernstein’s friend Aaron Copland. The pastoral simplicity of Appalachian Spring has a gorgeous sheen, while the rough-and-tumble Rodeo and Billy the Kid find conductor and ensemble at their vibrant best. Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man rounds out this incredible album.