The Ulster Orchestra has announced that it will record three CDs under principal conductor Dmitry Sitkovetsky for the Classic FM label just launched by BMG Conifer, writes Michael Dervan. Mendelssohn's Scotch and Italian symphonies will be recorded later this month. The Second and Fifth symphonies of Sibelius will follow next year, and his First, along with Finlandia and the Karelia Suite will follow in January 1999. When the Mendelssohn disc is issued it will bring the Ulster Orchestra into direct competition with the NSO, whose performances of these two symphonies under Reinhard Seifried was issued on Naxos earlier this year.