This highly anticipated box set brings together Valery Gergiev's acclaimed cycle of the complete Rachmaninov symphonies, which were recorded alongside the London Symphony Orchestra across 2008 to 2015. These masterful accounts of the Russian's complete symphonies are accompanied by his 1940 composition Symphonic Dances, while two symphonic poems by Mily Balakirev echo the luxurious textures present throughout Rachmaninov's music.
Bernard Haitink is internationally renowned for his interpretations of Bruckner and is widely recognized as the world's leading Bruckner conductor. Bruckner's symphonies are often described as 'Gothic cathedrals in sound,' an apt description considering the composer's devout faith and early vocation as an organist. He died before he could finish his Symphony No.9 but within it's three movements can be found some of his most complete music, imbued with a sense of deep solace and resolution.
The second release in LSO Live's cycle of Janacek opera recordings, Katya Kabanova tells a story of love, entrapment and, ultimately, tragedy. Captured live at the Barbican in January 2023 under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle, the cast includes the superb tenor Simon O'Neill and, appearing in one of her signature roles as seen at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Amanda Majeski as Katya. Young, sensitive and desperate for love, Katya is trapped in a remote country village with a bored husband and his snobbish family with no way out - until a summer thunderstorm changes everything. Uncompromisingly honest, and pulsing with intensely human emotion, the story of Katya Kabanova is written in music that cuts straight to the chase. The LSO's concert stagings of classic operas always make headlines: and this one was no different.
London Symphony Orchestra Principal Guest Conductor Gianandrea Noseda continues his survey of Shostakovich with the monumental Symphony No.4. Extravagant and challenging in equal measure, it's a work of epic proportions, requiring over a hundred musicians - including large percussion and brass sections. Owing to Soviet censure, the work went unperformed for almost thirty years after it was completed, until in 1961 it was revealed as one of the significant milestones of the composer's output - the work that solidified his reputation as a master symphonist.
Janacek: The Cunning Little Vixen & Sinfonietta / Rattle, LSO
LSO LIVE
SACD
$20.99Sep 04, 2020
A 2021 GRAMMY Nominee for Best Opera Recording!
Melodious and charming, The Cunning Little Vixen is a work rooted in Czech history and folk music; a sentimental journey through the cycles of life. For Sir Simon Rattle, it’s a deeply personal and emotional work. "It’s the piece that made me want to become an opera conductor... and still one of the pieces that reduces me to tears more easily than any other," says the LSO's Music Director. Towering fanfares open Janá?ek’s Sinfonietta, an ode to the composer’s hometown of Brno in the now Czech Republic. It’s a portrait composed for a national celebration of Slavic culture, with Janá?ek’s love of musical tradition evident in dancing strings and celebratory brass.
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.
