Brilliantly recorded CD... choir makes us understand all about sexual abandon - 'I am bursting out all over' is a joy... soprano makes a rapturous contribution... delectable, ravishing climaxes" (Penguin Guide 3 stars) "the digital sound means we notice things not discovered before: the piano part, and superb tuba contributions... The clarity of the consonants when the chorus hisses out the words 'O fortuna' in the closing section is very telling... splendid playing - trumpets and horns are joyously thrusti ng, the solo bassoon most piquant, while in their round dance the strings are positively smoochy... this (Abbey Rd) version is demonstrati on class" (Gramophone).
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 8 / Noseda, London Symphony Orchestra
LSO LIVE
SACD
$13.99Oct 05, 2018
Composed against a cataclysmic backdrop of Stalinist oppression and the Second World War, Shostakovich's Symphony No.8 is a deeply affecting poem of suffering. The composer described it as, ''an attempt to reflect the terrible tragedy of war,'' and it contains some of the most terrifying music he ever wrote. Here, Gianandrea Noseda conducts the London Symphony Orchestra with intensity and understanding, allowing the music to tell its own story as it travels from darkness into light, yearning more for peace than for victory.
Wilhelm Backhaus Edition - Early Recordings 1927-1939
Profil
CD
$24.99Feb 03, 2023
Essentially, in the incredible ease and naturalness of his pianism, in the unassuming simplicity and absorption of the man, Backhaus was much the same artist and personality then. And he was far from unknown. Even before he won the Rubinstein Prize in 1905, Backhaus was internationally celebrated as a prodigious virtuoso. Backhaus never failed to win a succès d'estime among professional musicians. They always knew his qualities, always marveled at his instrumental perfection, his titanic mastery that scorned every complexity, his unsurpassed freedom and endurance. There was never a time when Backhaus could not toss off any or all of the Chopin études or the Brahms-Paganini variations with an imperturbable calm, an implacable security that left one open-mouthed. Not everyone, for only the pianists really knew what was happening before their eyes and ears, knew how to measure such achievement. There they all sat, in breathless astonishment and envy and despair. Backhaus was a shy, unaffected, recessive personality whose sensational capacities were so unsensationally projected that lay audiences remained totally unconscious of his fabulous accomplishments. (Gerhard Melchert)
Chief Conductor Sir Antonio Pappano and the LSO build upon their stunning performances of Ralph Vaughan Williams' Fourth and Sixth Symphonies with a magnificent interpretation of his beloved Fifth and enigmatic Ninth. Vaughan Williams' Symphony No.5 reaches for hope amid the turmoil of war. This sophisticated and deeply original work moved audiences at it's 1943 premiere-it's bittersweet melodies and transcendent climax offering a vision of future peace. By the time he wrote his final symphony in 1957, Vaughan Williams had witnessed the true devastation of two world wars and the years that followed. The Ninth is a powerful final statement, balancing darkness with warmth, and unease with resilience. Together, these two symphonies reflect a lifetime shaped by conflict and change. Side by side, they form a portrait of a composer who could embrace both light and shadow, hope and uncertainty, with equal mastery.
• These recordings, made during Sir Colin Davis' 'Indian summer' with the London Symphony Orchestra, are acknowledged amongst the finest recordings ever made of this repertoire, receiving numerous awards. • The symphonies were originally released between 2011 and 2013 and are now made available together for the first time as a splendidly packaged 3 SACD box set, including one Pure Audio Blu-ray disc. • Despite giving titles to the majority of his symphonies, Danish composer Carl Nielsen (1865-1931) was often vague about what influenced each work. • That fact notwithstanding, Neilsen was a master symphonist and his music is often mesmerizing, combining propulsive energy with lyrical invention. • 'Colin Davis establishes himself as a first-class Nielsenian on our pick of the week...' LSO0722 Symphonies Nos 2 & 3 (The Sunday Times) • Editor's Choice LSO0694 Symphonies 4 & 5 (Gramophone) • Disc of the Week LSO0715 Symphonies Nos 1 & 6 (BBC Radio 3)
Mendelssohn: Elijah / Hickox, White, London Symphony Orchestra & Chorus
Chandos
CD
$21.99Aug 26, 2014
'Never was there a more complete triumph', wrote The Times after the premiere of Elijah by Mendelssohn. The performance, conducted by the composer at the 1846 Birmingham Music Festival, marked the beginning of the life of Elijah as one of the best-loved choral works in the repertoire, a status it still holds.
A grand oratorio in two parts, Elijah is very much composed in the spirit of Mendelssohn's baroque predecessors, combining the dramatic sweep of Handel with episodes of sublime meditation such as are found in Bach. It tells the story of the stern Old Testament prophet Elijah who preached against the idol worship of the Israelite people. Mendelssohn adapted the Biblical texts to produce intensely dramatic scenes depicting, for example, the resurrection of a dead youth, a contest of the gods, and Elijah's ascension into heaven on a fiery chariot.
This recording, made in April 1989, presents an all-star cast with Willard White in the title role and Rosalind Plowright, Linda Finnie, Arthur Davies, and Jeremy Budd singing the various supporting parts. Conducting the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus is the late Richard Hickox, a musician who built an immense reputation for his masterful performances of choral music during his career. This release is a part of the ongoing Richard Hickox Legacy series.
Wilhelm Backhaus: The Complete Pre-War Beethoven Recordings
APR
CD
$21.99Oct 26, 2018
Wilhelm Backhaus (1884–1969) left a 60-year recorded legacy which began in 1908, but though known particularly for Beethoven and Brahms in his later years, he performed a much wider repertoire before the war (as seen on the companion album which presents works by Chopin, Liszt and Schumann) and the four sonatas and two concertos included here are the totality of his early Beethoven output. These are nevertheless important recordings – the ‘Emperor’ concerto was only the second ever recording and the first recorded by the ‘electric’ process. The 4th became an instant classic and still stands high among recorded versions. The sonatas benefit from the spontaneity of youth – the didactic and gruff presentation which occasionally afflicts Backhaus’s later complete sonata cycles is little in evidence here. Three of the sonatas were issued with Bach ‘fillers’ and we have included these here to reveal yet another side of Backhaus’ musicianship.
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REVIEW:
Backhaus has a particularly fascinating way with the development of the G major’s opening Allegro. The sonatas are a bit of a mixed bag, some superior to his later recordings, others not.
– Gramophone
The Pathétique was recorded the day after the Emperor and is an example of his unmannered (other than tempo speeding in the finale), direct, largely uneffusive sonata playing. The Moonlight has rather too many punctuation points for comfort but is otherwise eloquently phrased with real brio in the finale. Les Adieux is perhaps the pick of these early sonata readings for its consistency of vision; sometimes in Op.101 he is inclined to go hell-for-leather. This disc ends with a particularly beguiling performance of Clarence Lucas’ arrangement from Bach’s Christmas Oratorio.
Holst: A Winter Idyll, Elegy, Indra, Etc / Atherton
Lyrita
CD
$20.99Nov 01, 2006
A fascinating assembly of Holstiana. Three of these pieces have already appeared on record before, two of which—the colourful 1921 ballet, The Lure, and Dances from The Morning of the Year (an effective concert suite edited by Imogen Holst and Colin Matthews from Holst's 1926-7 choral ballet)—were available on an earlier Lyrita compilation from 1982, coupled with the ambitious 1904 scena for soprano and orchestra, The Mystic Trumpeter. David Atherton was the admirable conductor on that occasion, with the LSO enthusiastic protagonists and the engineers on top form. Wisely, then, this enterprising label has invited the same conductor (this time with the LPO) to continue the good work, and the result is this notably generous collection of absorbing rarities.
Just one work offers the chance for comparative listening, the haunting Invocation for cello and orchestra from 1911. Imogen Holst has observed that, from a textural point of view, this music presages many features of ''Venus'' from The Planets (indeed, if I'm not mistaken, the cello's opening senza misura passage even quotes a turn of phrase later used in that selfsame movement). Memorably recorded for RCA by Julian Lloyd Webber and Vernon Handley in 1983, this often magical creation is equally well served by these newcomers: perhaps Alexander Baillie is the more hyper-sensitive and tonally beautiful of the two soloists, whereas Handley is a rather more imaginative partner than Atherton. Its companion opus, A Song of the Night for violin and orchestra, was composed in 1905: a less characteristic essay, its central climax glows with romantic fervour, especially in a performance as passionately dedicated as this one.
From 1899 to 1906, Holst worked on his large-scale opera based on Indian mythology, Sita. Colin Matthews has put together this brief orchestral interlude containing music from Act 3: its excitable, very Wagnerian manners are striking, as, for that matter, is Holst's beautifully judged orchestral writing at the hushed conclusion. There's plenty more Wagnerian spectacle in Holst's earliest completed Indian-inspired creation, the 12-minute tone-poem, Indra, from 1903. This colourful, enjoyably rhetorical portrait-in-sound of the god, Indra, and his battle against the drought, again reveals a confident, assertive master of the orchestra, if not without an occasional touch of vulgarity in some of the more over-blown tuttis. The heartfelt, if not especially memorable Elegy in memoriam William Morris in fact comprises the slow movement of Holst's Cotswold Symphony from 1900. To begin with, Holst's processional is momentarily reminiscent of Magnard's glorious Chant funebre, though, as the music progresses, the comparison quickly becomes a cruel one! Finally, there's A Winter Idyll which, although the earliest work on this CD (it dates from 1897, when the composer was still a student at the Royal College of Music), is scored with no little aplomb; certainly, Holst's teacher, Stanford, would have approved of the felicitous transparency and sure design of this, his pupil's very first orchestral work.
In all, a most rewarding survey, handsomely played and engineered, and graced by extensive and knowledgeable booklet-notes from Lewis Foreman.
Puccini: La Boheme / Nagano, Te Kanawa, Leech, Ambrosian Singers, LSO. Composer: Giacomo Puccini, Performer: Alan Ewing, Richard Leech, Roberto Scandiuzzi, Carlos Chausson, Conductor: Kent Nagano Orchestra/Ensemble: London Symphony Orchestra, Ambrosian Singers, St. Clement Danes Nearly a century after it's premiere in Turin in February 1896 we have a fresh and vibrant new recording of this opera - one of the best known and probably most loved in Puccini's output. Nagano is well able to delineate Puccini's large musical canvas, sweeping the colors of the orchestral scoring and the glorious vocal lines onwards and upwards with an intoxicating, rumbustious swagger. If Te Kanawa had made a recording of this role around the time she sang it at Covent Garden in 1976 (with Pavarotti as Rodolfo) or in the subsequent revival in 1979, it would have made for a fascinating comparison. Amazingly, this is her first recording of Mimì and she has successfully managed to integrate her mature, lustrous sound with the poignant vulnerability and gradually ebbing strength of Mimì to remarkable effect. It is a hauntingly convincing performance. Leech provides an excellent shaping of Rodolfo with a rich, passionate tone. Titus (Marcello) and Gustafson (Musetta) are as finely characterized and vividly sung as one could hope and all the ensemble interplays, especially in Acts III and IV, have a fresh and dynamic intensity.
For the five works on this disc, Ginastera drew upon Argentine and other Meso- and South American subjects. Evocative of native influences, the life of the gaucho on the pampas, and influenced by the music of his time, they span the composer’s entire creative life, from his first acknowledged work, the ballet score Panambí, and the Inca-inspired Ollantay, to the Mayan mythological compendium Popol Vuh, which occupied him for about eight years and remained unfinished. These exciting, richly orchestrated works abound in the beauty and energy of dance.
Schumann: Symphonies Nos. 1-4 - Overture to Manfred
Nimbus
CD
$16.99Jul 07, 2017
Yondani Butt was born in Macau. He studied conducting with Wolfgang Vacano (1906-1985) at Indiana University, majoring in chemistry. He continued to study conducting with Josef Blatt (1906-1999) at the University of Michigan while pursuing his chemistry degree. Hailed by Robert Marsh of the Chicago Sun Times as ''an outstanding talent'', Yondani Butt has received acclamation from critics and audiences for his many recordings and concert performances. He died on August 28, 2014. ''Anyone seeking these two symphonies on one disc, together with a generous 'filler' into the bargin, could hardly do better than to acquire this eminently recommendable issue'' Robert Matthew-Walker, International Record Review on the original release of Symphonies Nos. 3 & 4.
Pablo de Sarasate was a successful Spanish composer and virtuosic violinist. His output for violin is indicative that this composer truly understood the nature and nuances of the instrument. Many of his compositions are still a part of the standard repertoire, including the ones presented on this album. Perhaps one of the greatest violinists of the twentieth century, Ruggeriero Ricci is best known as the first violinist to record Paganini’s 24 Carprices in their original form. These recordings were made from 1959-1961.
SOMM Recordings is proud to mark the centenary of the legendary German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (28 May 1925-18 May 2012) by adding to his canonical discography with live recital and concert recordings from the Music Preserved archive. Fischer-Dieskau was at the very height of his powers from 1960-75, and the performances on this album date from that period. A bonus CD contains two interviews conducted by Jon Tolansky-appearing here in their entirety for the first time-the 75th Birthday Interview (2000) and 80th Birthday Interview (2005). The extraordinarily vast repertoire of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau over his 45-year career comprised lieder, operas, cantatas, and oratorios. He sang these in German, Italian, French, Russian, English, Hebrew, Hungarian, and Latin, from eras that spanned the Baroque to the latter part of the 20th century. Particularly, it was the controlled power and beauty of his voice, and the dramatic intensity and poetry of his interpretations, that led him to excel in the genre of German lieder. In this form he exerted a virtually unprecedented stylistic and interpretative influence-not only on the musical world of his day, but also on generations of performers to come. SOMM's centenary tribute opens with four songs by Ferruccio Busoni, all being works that were written late in the composer's career. They come from a programme that Fischer-Dieskau gave with Gerald Moore in 1962. At the 1971 Helsinki Festival, Fischer-Dieskau presented a recital with Irwin Gage, which was devoted entirely to songs with texts by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The recital, described by a contemporary critic as "a landmark event," featured compositions by contemporaries of Goethe, who lived from 1749 to 1832, such as the Countess Anna Amalia, Kapellmeister Johann Friedrich Reichardt, and Goethe's friend Carl Friedrich Zelter. The more familiar composers represented on this Goethe-inspired recital were active during the first part of the 20th century. They include Richard Strauss, Max Reger, and Ferruccio Busoni. This tribute to Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau also includes six songs from a programme of works by Gustav Mahler, which was presented with his long-time collaborator, Karl Engel. Three of the songs are from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, based on texts of German folk poems, and three are from the collection of five Ruckert-Lieder, after poems written by Friedrich Ruckert. The musical component of this collection closes with a concert performance of three songs by Zoltan Kodaly, sung in Hungarian by Fischer-Dieskau. The composer proves himself an outstanding interpreter of his own music in conducting the London Symphony Orchestra. In the two interviews included on the bonus CD, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau discusses his early years, his teachers, the development of his career, and a small but revealing cross-section of his enormous repertoire.
Pablo Casals - The Complete HMV Recordings 1926-1955
WARNER CLASSICS
CD
$29.55Aug 25, 2023
The Catalan cellist Pablo Casals (1876-1973) was first to bring to wider notice the works that open this set, J.S. Bach's solo cello suites. Thereafter we hear his celebrated partnership with Horszowski in Beethoven and the groundbreaking piano trio formed with Thibaud and Cortot in Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn. From the symphonic repertoire come the concertos by Dvořák (with George Szell) and Elgar (Adrian Boult). Finally, an enchanting disc of encores and - with Casals's own street-band or cobla - seven examples of the sardana, the national dance of the great artist's beloved homeland.
