A luscious pair of late-Romantic chamber works by a little-known pupil of Giuseppe Martucci, in new recordings by an Italian ensemble with a notable track record of success in reviving such rarities. Born in 1875, Guido Alberto Fano emulated the model of his teacher Martucci in pursuing a multi-faceted career as composer, conductor, pianist and teacher. At the age of 30 he became director of the conservatoire in Parma before transferring, in 1916, to the Sicilian city of Palermo. A year later he wrote this powerful and turbulent Piano Quintet, which sets out in a broad, contented and Brahmsian vein of expression before venturing into more troubled and chromatically contemporary harmonies, to which a finale brings resolution via a noble chorale theme. At the Quintet's climax, this theme soars over the texture on a solo trumpet, in a stroke of instrumental imagination which anticipates Honegger's Second Symphony by two decades - and indeed the 45-minute Quintet has the dimensions of a 'veiled symphony' in the manner of Brahms's early chamber works and sonatas. Wistful, major-minor Brahmsian motifs and harmonies still permeate the String Quartet which Fano composed in 1941 - another distinctively 'wartime' work - but whether through age or experience they are suffused with a late-style radiance which brings the style of the Quartet closer to Richard Strauss and Debussy. The Ensemble Mark Rothko is a flexible line-up of Italian musicians who specialising in reviving forgotten chamber works of the late 19th and early 20th century. Their discography includes albums dedicated to Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Heitor Villa-Lobos and Karl Weigl, and this collection of Guido Alberto Fano marks their debut on Brilliant Classics.
Fano: String Quartet & Piano Quintet
$14.99
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Brilliant Classics
Jul 24, 2026
BRI97757
Thomas Fortmann: Lieder Zyklen
Metier
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$25.99
Jul 17, 2026
In July 2026 Metier is delighted to present Lieder Zyklen (Song Cycles) by contemporary Swiss composer Thomas Fortmann. Featuring settings for voice and piano trio of poetry and text by writers including Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Christian Haller, Prolitheus Pfenninger and Fortmann himself, these works demonstrate the composer's eclectic and unusual style that combines postmodern music, serial techniques, rock and jazz. The Swiss tenor Tino Bru¨tsch and Swiss soprano Nuria Richner perform alongside the Trio Accademia Amiata and a Trio of soloists Malwina Sosnowski, Donitille Jordan and Talvi Hunt. The album also includes Fortmann's Hommage to Schubert's Winterreise and his arrangement of this iconic song cycle for baritone and string quartet is given a powerful performance by Florian Prey, son of the great German baritone Hermann Prey alongside the Amar Quartet. Fortmann's setting of the intriguing poem Am Ende des Flurs (At the end of the hallway, 4th floor) by his close friend, Swiss Literary Prize Winner Christian Haller, is followed by The Hofmannsthal Verses. Composed in his early twenties as striking rock songs to poetry by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, who became the librettist to Richard Strauss, the lyrics are a collage of Hofmannsthal poems Fortmann found moving for their linguistic power and their social and political statements. Geschichten (Histories) are concise, short songs that intertwine the timeline of a love relationship with that of human history and dimensions of the cosmos. The Prolitheus Songs are based on e-mails from the extraordinary visual artist Prolitheus Pfenninger, complex and often laden with double meanings and wordplays. Schubert was the favourite composer of Fortmann's mother, a well-known soprano - she often sang his songs to him and his sisters, and the music's sensitive emotions resonate deeply. The Hommage an Schubert's Winterreise, Der Su¨sse Ton (the Sweet Tone) is Fortmann's setting of a text collage from Joachim Ringelnatz who often referred to Schubert in his poetry, passages of text from Eduard von Bauernfeld on Schubert's funeral and excerpts from poetry of Schubert himself. The Homage opens with a typical rock riff, reminiscent of how Schubert drew on popular rhythms of his time, and the work refers to the songs of Winterreise in various ways, some of them hidden in contrapuntal forms. Despite the different compositional techniques throughout Fortmann shows his musical-emotional kinship with Schubert. Recreating Winterreise for voice and string quartet was a delicate task of reassembling the work while trying to stay as faithful as possible to the original. Fortmann sought to recapture the mood of the songs, their simplicity and touching directness, and to achieve this with a string quartet some modifications were necessary including extra notes that do not appear in Schubert's original. In the 1970s Thomas Fortmann had a very successful career as a writer of rock music - and also as an international golfing star! At age 26 he abandoned this career to study formal composition which laid the foundation for an extensive body of work that includes chamber music, operas and musical theatre, orchestral, choral, and organ works, as well as several song cycles. Fortmann's distinctly personal style often unites different - and sometimes opposing - impulses of modern music. Lieder Zyklen marks the sixth release of his music on the Metier label.
Thomas Fortmann: Lieder Zyklen
$25.99
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Metier
Jul 17, 2026
MEX77214
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
ROYAL CONCERTGEBOUW
Available as
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$24.49
Sep 21, 2018
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
$24.49
DVD
ROYAL CONCERTGEBOUW
Sep 21, 2018
RCGB70194DVD
RICHARD STRAUSS
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON
Available as
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$26.99
Feb 28, 2025
RICHARD STRAUSS
RICHARD STRAUSS
$26.99
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DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON
Feb 28, 2025
DEGR168254.2
Richard Strauss: Tone Poems and Interludes
Accentus Music
Available as
CD
$39.99
Aug 21, 2026
Don Quixote' and 'Ein Heldenleben' are two large-scale tone-poems that Richard Strauss composed in Munich and Berlin during the final years of the 19th century. Whilst the first work was inspired by Cervantes' tragicomic novel hero, in the second work he effectively stylised himself as a successful (artistic) hero. Similar characters make an appearance in the two other works on this album: Shakespeare's tragic hero 'MacBeth' in an early overture, and another domestic Strauss hero (named 'Stork') in the opera 'Intermezzo', from which four symphonic interludes are featured here. As General Music Director of the Zurich Opera Orchestra, Gianandrea Noseda has conducted these compositions by Strauss, some of which feature a huge orchestra. They are now released together on this album.
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Richard Strauss: Tone Poems and Interludes
$39.99
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Accentus Music
Aug 21, 2026
PHR0115
Fritz Reiner Conducts Richard Strauss
Sony Masterworks
Available as
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$24.98
$18.99
Jan 01, 2014
Reviews of some of the earlier releases that make up this set:
Symphonia domestica, Le bourgeois gentilhomme "Fritz Reiner’s 1956 performance of Richard Strauss’s Symphonia domestica was essentially its first recording in modern stereo sound. As such, it probably introduced the work to many American listeners. Prior to this, recordings conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and Clemens Krauss and the composer himself with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra were undoubtedly authoritative, but hardly competitive from a sonic standpoint. Subsequently, fine stereo versions by Rudolf Kempe (EMI), Herbert von Karajan (Deutsche Grammophon), and Zubin Mehta (Decca-London) have been released, but none of them are superior to Reiner’s justly famous Living Stereo interpretation. This represents the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at its peak, and Reiner had no peer as a conductor of the orchestral music of Richard Strauss. If anything, Reiner’s no-nonsense style is even more suited to the charming, chamber-like Le bourgeois gentilhomme Suite."
-- Arthur Lintgen, Fanfare [1/2008]
Scenes From Salome And Elektra "Solti's now-infamous comment that the Chicago Symphony was a provincial orchestra before he appeared is further discounted by the reissue of these unrivalled performances. None of Reiner's successors as a Strauss conductor, neither Solti himself, Kempe nor Sawallisch, seems quite to achieve the clarity of texture, mastery of line and intensity of feeling displayed in these recordings of 35 years and more ago, nor has any orchestra, certainly not the CSO of Solti's day, evinced the richness and brilliance of sound found here. Above all, Reiner brought to these scores, especially Elektra, a classic grandeur of utterance, a saturated sound that overwhelms the ear without ever deafening it. Perhaps these impressions are enhanced by the superb recording, preferable to so much that passes for good sound today. The fidelity, even balance and deep sonority of this early stereo in Chicago is truly amazing. Just as arresting is the perfect placing of the voices in relation to the orchestra."
-- A.B., Gramophone [5/1993]
Also sprach Zarathustra "Reiner's 1954 Also sprach is arguably more characteristic than his 1962 RCA remake. That is to say, it is even more intense and extrovert. In his second year with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the conductor was already getting a thrilling response from the strings, although woodwind intonation could be a problem. Confident and well played as it is, the spectacular opening sunrise inevitably lacks the impact of, say, Preyin's Telarc recording (the organ is particularly disappointing). Nor is there the dark solemnity of and detail in the bass familiar from Karajan's DO versions. What we have instead is a measure of raw passion and forward thrust unequalled on disc. In reflective passages, conductor and/or engineers display some reluctance to achieve a real pianissimo, but as the tempo builds Reiner invariably creates great excitement and the orchestral playing is marvellous."
-- David Gutman, Gramophone [12/1992]
Don Quixote, Burleske Throughout his career Fritz Reiner showed a particular affinity for the music of Richard Strauss. Here he delivers an exceptionally vivid account of Don Quixote – each bizarre episode from the eccentric knight’s adventures is portrayed with razor-sharp insight. One notices, in particular, Reiner’s miraculous attention to detail, his unfailing grip on the structural direction of the work and the superb response from both soloist and orchestra. With its flashes of sardonic wit, the earlier Burleske makes for an excellent coupling, and illustrates Reiner’s formidable prowess as a concerto accompanist. By any standards, a self-recommending issue.
-- Erik Levi, BBC Music Magazine
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Fritz Reiner Conducts Richard Strauss
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Sony Masterworks
Jan 01, 2014
88697686992
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
ROYAL CONCERTGEBOUW
Available as
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$21.60
Sep 21, 2018
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
RICHARD STRAUSS: SALOME
$21.60
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ROYAL CONCERTGEBOUW
Sep 21, 2018
RCGB70194SACD
Richard Strauss, Sergei Rachmaninov: Cello Works
Canzone
Available as
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$22.99
Aug 15, 1993
Richard Strauss, Sergei Rachmaninov: Cello Works
Richard Strauss, Sergei Rachmaninov: Cello Works
$22.99
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Canzone
Aug 15, 1993
CAN 33009
Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier
Sony Masterworks
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$14.99
Sep 11, 2015
DER ROSENKAVALIER
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Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier
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Sony Masterworks
Sep 11, 2015
88843058662
Richard Strauss: Elektra
Chandos
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SACD
$43.99
Mar 20, 2026
First performed in Dresden in 1909, Elektra was Strauss's first collaboration (of many) with the librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and is the most modernist of all of his operas. Based on the (heavily reworked) play by Sophocles, Hofmannsthal's version concentrates on the inner thoughts and feelings of Elektra as she holds individual conversations with other members of her family. Strauss's score is exceptionally adventurous harmonically, and famously features the Elektra Chord (a simultaneous combination of E major and C sharp major). The orchestration is exceptionally lavish - even by Strauss's standards - featuring eight horns, six trumpets, double timpani, and two harps. The performance was recorded live in Bergen in December 2023, Edward Gardner conducting a cast led by the great Swedish dramatic soprano Iréne Theorin, one of the finest Elektras of our time.
Richard Strauss: Elektra
$43.99
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Chandos
Mar 20, 2026
CHSA 5375(2)
Richard Strauss: Salome
Chandos
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$43.99
$32.99
May 16, 2025
Oscar Wilde's play Salome was conceived for the actress Sarah Bernhardt and was originally planned for performance in London, in 1892. The play was blocked by the sensor (it was forbidden at the time to depict biblical characters on stage) and so first given in Paris instead, in 1896. Wilde never saw his play performed, as he was serving a prison sentence for homosexual acts whilst the only two performances in his lifetime occurred. Subsequently the play gained popularity in Germany, and having attended a performance in Berlin in 1902, Strauss determined that this would be the subject for his third opera. First performed in 1905, Strauss's Salome has gone on to become much better-known than Wilde's play, and is regularly performed at opera houses around the world. This live recording was made at a performance at the Usher Hall, in Edinburgh, as part of the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2022. Edward Gardner and the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra are joined by an outstanding cast of soloists, led by Malin Bystrom in the title role, Gerhard Siegel as Herod, Katarina Dalayman as Herodias, and Johan Reuter as John the Baptist.
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Chandos
May 16, 2025
CHSA 5356(2)
Richard Strauss: Die Fledermaus [Recorded 1951]
Walhall Eternity Series
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$10.99
Jan 01, 2011
Classical Music
Richard Strauss: Die Fledermaus [Recorded 1951]
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Walhall Eternity Series
Jan 01, 2011
WLCD0332
Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier
Walhall Eternity Series
Available as
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$13.99
$10.99
May 12, 2015
Heinz Wallberg's intimate familiarity with the work (he conducted it on almost fifty separate occasions) can be heard throughout this 1961 performance of Richard Strauss' operatic masterpiece Der Rosenkavalier. Captured live at the Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1961 with a stellar cast that included Regine Crespin and Fritz Wunderlich, among other Straussian notables, and offered here in 24bit/96kHz re-mastered sound, this is a recording to be set alongside those of Clemens Krauss, Karl Böhm and Herbert von Karajan, all famed and important 20th c. Strauss interpreters.
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Walhall Eternity Series
May 12, 2015
WLCD0341
Richard Strauss: Die Frau Ohne Schatten / Böhm, Rysanek
Orfeo
Available as
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$37.99
Sep 21, 2005
This recording, live from the Vienna State Opera in 1955, was taped just weeks before virtually the same cast (there's only one major difference) entered the studio and recorded it for Decca. The performances are remarkably similar: Karl Böhm, a master of this complex, beautiful score, presents it almost complete (there are, I believe, very small cuts here and there) and has assembled a superb, enthralled, and enthralling cast. The one major change from the studio recording is that whereas Paul Schöffler was the Barak for Decca, here we get Ludwig Weber, whose voice may be somewhat less beautiful than Schöffler's, but is easily as expressive, endearing, and impressive.
Leonie Rysanek is the familiar Empress, seemingly hypnotized and enchanted, her voice settling down after some initial pitch problems mid-range to offer a glorious reading, with gleaming, cutting top notes and true sentiment throughout. She makes us feel for the character and her plight. Her Emperor is the beefy tenor Hans Hopf, who is less crude than usual and has the notes and stamina for the role, particularly in the seemingly endless final scene, which, when presented as complete as is it here, can be quite a challenge.
As the Dyer's Wife, Christel Goltz is not quite in the same class with the others; her singing is secure and good enough but she lacks any subtlety and can't compare with, say, Christa Ludwig in the role. Elisabeth Höngen's Nurse is nasty and biting, and she gets through the role without shouting. Kurt Böhme's Messenger is potent and the rest of the cast--Vienna stalwarts from the '50s--is top notch.
Böhm captures just the correct otherworldliness of the music, and the Vienna Philharmonic, tam tam, gongs and all, plays with great feeling and love. The sound is pure, clear monaural (the studio recording is early stereo but is essentially no better), with even the harps audible; Strauss' exotica is underlined but not so prominent that we can't hear the gorgeously tonal score. The vibrancy of the live experience is thrilling. If you own the Decca, you won't need this, really, but you must own one or the other.
--Robert Levine, ClassicsToday.com
Richard Strauss: Die Frau Ohne Schatten / Böhm, Rysanek
$37.99
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Orfeo
Sep 21, 2005
ORF-C668053
Eugene Ormandy conducts Richard Strauss
Sony Masterworks
Available as
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$17.99
Mar 13, 2020
The 4-album Richard Strauss set gathers together all of their early 1960s recordings of the famous tone poems along with Salome’s Dance, the Rosenkavalier and Bürger als Edelmann suites, the Burleske with soloist Rudolf Serkin and the First Horn Concerto, featuring Philadelphia principal Mason Jones. An early review in High Fidelity best summed up their powerful appeal in Strauss’s music: “There is no doubt that, for sheer gorgeousness, the Philadelphians have no peers.” More recent assessments in the Penguin Guide reaffirm that verdict: “Virtuoso orchestral playing … and many felicities of characterization” [Also sprach Zarathustra]; “Marvelous orchestral playing and the two soloists play splendidly with plenty of character” [Don Quixote]; “An extraordinarily voluptuous Philadelphia performance … Ormandy directs with licentious abandon, and the orchestra responds with tremendous virtuosity and ardor” [Salome’s Dance]; “Ormandy’s Ein Heldenleben is an engulfing performance, and the composite richness of tone and the fervor of the playing … bring the highest possible level of orchestral tension.”
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Eugene Ormandy conducts Richard Strauss
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Sony Masterworks
Mar 13, 2020
19439709532
Toscanini Collection Vol 30 - Richard Strauss: Don Quixote
RCA
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$17.99
Sep 05, 2007
LS had almost unqualified praise for the live 1953 Carnegie Hall recording of Don Quixote. "Nothing," he wrote "more clearly demonstrates Toscanini's true quality than the fact that it is possible to take one of his ordinary (one cannot use the word 'routine', for obvious reasons) broadcast performances and issue it in permanent form on record to complete satisfaction". He noted a momentary slip in the first variation; equally, one might like the two concluding chords of the work to have been re-made. But what a tour de force this is of orchestral wizardry and musical characterization in one of the repertory's most difficult works. What's more, Toscanini honours Strauss's original plan by having the orchestra's own front-desk cellist and viola player as the soloists. (Only a week later Carbon Cooley would distinguish himself as viola soloist in Toscanini's broadcast from Carnegie Hall of Berlioz's Harold in Italy—RCA 0 RD85755, 2/88.) I think it is reasonable to prefer this performance musically and sonically to Toscanini's 1938 NBC recording (Toscanini Society—nla) and to Strauss's own version with Mainardi recently reissued by DG (11/90), where the playing of the Staatskapelle Berlin is frankly not in the same league as that of the NBC musicians.
-- Gramophone [1/1991]
Toscanini Collection Vol 30 - Richard Strauss: Don Quixote
$17.99
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RCA
Sep 05, 2007
RCA60295
Richard Strauss: A Hero's Life
OUR Recordings
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$21.99
Feb 06, 2026
The "Tondichtung", or tone poem, was a popular European genre from the mid-19th to early 20th century. German composer Richard Strauss excelled in this form, producing ten works. A tone poem is a single-movement orchestral piece meant to evoke moods, stories, or scenes without following a strict narrative. Strauss's Don Juan, Op. 20 (1888), was inspired by Nikolaus Lenau's poetic take on the Don Juan legend, portraying him as a man seeking the perfect woman and ultimately succumbing to despair. Strauss's orchestral work mirrors this, opening with energetic themes of Don Juan's adventures, featuring lyrical passages for his loves, and concluding with dark chords symbolizing his demise. In 1898, Strauss composed Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life), a six-section tone poem inspired by Beethoven's Eroica, reflecting his own life and career. Themes depict the hero, his adversaries, companion, battles, peace, and eventual retirement. Critics debated Strauss's self-portrait as arrogant or humorous, but the work remains a testament to artistic struggle and triumph. Austrian conductor Hans Graf, Chief Conductor and Quantedge Music Director of the Singapore Symphony Orchestra (SSO) since 2020, is known for his curiosity, creative programming, and commanding presence. An acclaimed guest conductor worldwide, he has won multiple awards including the Österreichischer Musiktheaterpreis and recorded works by Mozart, Stravinsky, and Berg. Founded in 1979, the SSO is Singapore's flagship orchestra, performing year-round and achieving global recognition, including rankings by Gramophone and BBC Music Magazine. Under Graf, the orchestra has released over 50 recordings and revived rare works by composers like Kozlowski, Klenau and Ogerman. The SSO forms part of the Singapore Symphony Group, which also encompasses choruses, youth orchestras, and major music festivals.
Cello Sonatas of Richard Strauss & Edvard Grieg / Rosen, Walters
Bridge Records
Available as
CD
$18.99
$14.99
Nov 16, 2018
Cellist Marcy Rosen's recent recording of Mendelssohn's Complete Works for Cello and Piano with pianist Lydia Artymiw has received glowing reviews from the international press. The present reissue of her 1989 MHS Strauss & Grieg album presents two staples of the romantic cello repertoire in impassioned readings. Marcy Rosen has established herself as one of the most important and respected artists of our day. Los Angeles Times music critic Herbert Glass has called her "one of the intimate art's abiding treasures." She has performed in recital and with orchestra throughout Canada, England, France, Japan, Italy, Switzerland, and all fifty of the United States. She made her concerto debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra at the age of eighteen and has since appeared with such noted orchestras as the Dallas Symphony, the Phoenix Symphony, the Caramoor Festival Orchestra, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in Carnegie Hall, the Jupiter Symphony and Concordia Chamber Orchestra at Alice Tully Hall, and the Tokyo Symphony at the famed Orchard Hall in Tokyo. In recital she has appeared in New York at such acclaimed venues as Carnegie Hall, the 92nd Street "Y" and Merkin Concert Hall; in Washington D.C. at the Kennedy Center, Dumbarton Oaks, the Phillips Collection and the Corcoran Gallery, where for many years she hosted a series entitled "Marcy Rosen and Friends." In recent seasons she has given Master Classes and appeared on stage in Beijing and Shanghai, China, the Seoul Arts Center in Korea and in Cartagena, Colombia.
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Cello Sonatas of Richard Strauss & Edvard Grieg / Rosen, Walters
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Bridge Records
Nov 16, 2018
BCD9512
Richard Strauss: Elektra, Op. 58, TrV 223 (Highlights)
Walhall Eternity Series
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$10.99
Jan 01, 2012
Classical Music
Richard Strauss: Elektra, Op. 58, TrV 223 (Highlights)
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