SOMM RECORDINGS announces the first release of never before available performances by one of the defining partnerships of modern American music in the specially priced two-album set George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra: The Forgotten Recordings. Long considered one of America’s “Big Five” orchestras, the Cleveland Orchestra entered its second century in 2018 and earlier this year was hailed by The New York Times as “America’s finest [orchestra] still”.

The Forgotten Recordings features eight historic performances made for the Book-of-the-Month Club in 1954 and 1955 – seven of which are first releases – that have been restored and remastered by the multi-award-winning audio restoration engineer Lani Spahr, who also provides extensive and informative booklet notes. Three works – Bach’s Third Orchestral Suite (BWV 1068), a revealing engagement by Szell with a composer he is not usually associated with, Smetana’s The Moldau and Strauss’s Till Eulenspiegel (with an early spotlight on legendary horn player Myron Bloom) were recorded in mono in a remarkably productive session on Christmas Eve, 1954.From October 1955 in stereo recordings are two works by Brahms – his Haydn Variations and the Academic Festival Overture, two symphonies – Mozart’s No.39 and Schumann’s Fourth – and a Stravinsky Firebird Suite that “crackles with energy”. “Here”, says Spahr, “we can appreciate that the orchestra was well on its way to becoming, in Szell’s words, ‘this glorious instrument... that perfectly reflects my musical ideals’.”

REVIEW:

George Szell’s tenure as music director of the Cleveland Orchestra began in 1946 and ended with his death in 1970. He can be credited for transforming the orchestra into a first class ensemble, with its own characteristic sound and style. When he first accepted the position, he vowed to "dedicate all [his] efforts…to make The Cleveland Orchestra second to none in quality of performance." Musicians were hired and fired in an effort to achieve this goal – a warm, refined sound, clarity and technical perfection, demanding total commitment from the players. His lofty goal was eventually achieved.

These ‘Forgotten’ recordings were made for the Book-of-the-Month Club (BOMC), a mail order outfit that dealt with popular books sold by subscription. In 1954 it made the decision to branch out into classical LPs, with accompanying analysis of the works by such noted writers as Thomas Scherman and Deems Taylor. Many of the issues were licensed from labels such as Vanguard, Vox and Decca, conducted by some notable names - Max Rudolf, Alfred Wallenstein, Fritz Stiedry and Leonard Bernstein. George Szell was also approached by the company and was happy to accept, considering it a means of supplementing his musician’s income.

On December 24 1954, the first recording session took place at the Masonic Auditorium, Cleveland, with the Bach, Smetana and Richard Strauss works, music that had recently featured in subscription concerts. The session was recorded in mono. The rest of the works featured in the set date from 1955 and are in stereo.

Bach is not a composer one usually associates with Szell. Though HIP had a long way to go, Szell pares his orchestra down, and employs a harpsichord continuo. Tempi throughout don’t drag, with the dance movements being quite animated. The ubiquitous Air is nicely paced. There’s some wonderfully refined woodwind playing in Smetana’s Moldau (Vitava), and the recording balance enables the river’s rippling undercurrents to form a vivid backdrop. Szell never overdoes it with the brass, which lets down some performances, but steers everything along maintaining balance and proportion. The quieter moments are quite magical. Strauss’ Till Eulenspiegel features the renowned horn player Myron Bloom in one of his first appearances on record. A year later he became the orchestra’s principal horn. The performance captures the very essence of the witty, light hearted, mischievous prankster, and reveals the discipline and virtuosity of the Cleveland players, especially in the brass and woodwind sections.

Over three days in October 1955, five more works were recorded for BOMC, this time in the new stereophonic sound. Szell takes a rather more relaxed view of Mozart’s Symphony No.39, which is free-flowing, refined and eloquently phrased. The Menuetto is lively with a distinct spring in its step, and the finale is truly exhilarating. There’s a bracing account of Brahms’ Academic Festival overture, infused with spirit and celebration. Szell’s approach is warm-hearted in the composer’s Variations on a Theme by Haydn. The performance is well-paced and the variations are deftly-characterized.

There’s a purposeful reading of Schumann’s Fourth Symphony, soused throughout with drama and tension. The Romanze excels for its tender moments. Szell injects plenty of energy into the fourth movement, and the orchestra respond with gusto and panache. Stravinsky’s Firebird is heard in the 1919 version. It’s an atmospheric account of many moods. There’s the captivating lyricism of the Round of the Princess, which contrasts strikingly with the Infernal Dance of King Kastchei, where Szell invests the music with an extra ounce of punch and sizzle. I certainly concur with Lani Spahr that this is the highlight of the set.

Comparing the three mono recordings with those taped in stereo, the latter have a degree more bloom to the sound and register more presence. All the works featured are making a first appearance on CD, with the exception of Brahms’ Variations on a Theme by Haydn. These compelling aural documents have been expertly restored by Lani Spahr, who has also contributed the booklet notes, running to 19 pages. All in all, the entire project is an unmitigated success.

– MusicWeb International (Stephen Greenbank)

SOMM Recordings’ historic complete survey of Charles Villiers Stanford’s String Quartets by the Dante Quartet reaches its end with a third volume focusing on Nos. 1 and 2, and the first recording of No. 6. Already acclaimed as a composer of choral music, Stanford came relatively late to the string quartet form, composing his first two at the age of 39 in 1891. Six more followed over the next three decades, including the Op. 122 String Quartet, No. 6 in 1910. This final volume features the early String Quartets, Opp. 44 (No. 1) and 45 (No. 2) which share a concern for meticulous use of individual instrument voices and a leaning towards lyricism. Allusions to Beethoven and Mozart are contained within Stanford’s own beautifully crafted music. Heard here in its premiere recording, the Sixth String Quartet is a work of rich contrasts, restless energy and some of Stanford’s most expressive writing for the medium. Volume I (SOMMCD 0160) was admired as “an excellent disc in every respect” (MusicWeb International), applauded as “most enterprising and thoroughly likeable” (Classical Ear) and acclaimed “a really worthwhile release” (Gramophone). Volume II (SOMMCD 0185) was described as “essential listening... SOMM and the Dantes have broken important new ground with impressive commitment” by Gramophone and by Limelight as being “played with great élan and sensitivity by the excellent Dante Quartet”.

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REVIEW:

The Dante Quartet play splendidly throughout the album, with noticeably clean articulation and gratifying intonation. Unerringly accomplished, these Dante performances, combined with spirited interpretations that breathe vitality and enthusiasm, would pass the most rigorous examination. The engineering team, recording in St Nicholas Parish Church, Thames Ditton, has provided first class sound quality. Stanford biographer Jeremy Dibble has written the booklet notes. Lovers of British music, and Stanford in particular, need not hesitate in acquiring this superb album.

– MusicWeb International

SOMM celebrates Christmas this year with Carols from Chelsea, a delicious offering from the Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea under their Director, William Vann. The Royal Hospital, founded in 1682 by Charles II, is the home of the iconic Chelsea Pensioners, who are all retired soldiers of the British Army. The Chapel Choir sings for the Sunday morning Matins service in the Royal Hospital's Wren Chapel during the year, but in December provides the music for carol services and other Christmas-themed events almost every day. This recording showcases some of the Choir's most cherished carol repertoire, alongside solo organ music performed by the Royal Hospital's Organ Scholar, James Orford, and a very special performance with Chelsea Pensioner and George Hatton. Many of the Royal Hospital's carol services begin wtih Franz Gruber's spine-tingling carol Stille Nacht, an especially moving carol to hear in the original German, given it's celebrated performance in the trenches on Christmas Day, 1914. Once in Royal David's City is the first of three carols that are usually sung with the full congregation, opening with the famous solo that captures the mood of Christmas like nothing else.

SOMM Recordings is delighted to announce the release of an intriguing new recording, introducing the melodious, rhythmically vibrant choral music and songs of Penelope Thwaites. Featuring 19 premiere recordings, From Five Continents celebrates a lifetime of making music around the world to showcase Thwaites’ distinctive compositional signature. The album’s centrepiece, a moving new Missa Brevis, is coupled with four Psalm settings, songs influenced by the sounds of Indian and African music, folk-styles from the Americas and an evocation of the vast Australian outback. From Five Continents features three outstanding singers venturing into new musical territory. Making their debuts on SOMM are Carolyn Sampson – whose brilliant soprano ranges from shimmering choral solos to guitar- accompanied folk song – and baritone William Dazeley, who vividly conjures the inherent anger of the much-set Fear no more the heat o’the sun, one of five Shakespeare settings. Enveloped by drums and saxophone, tenor James Gilchrist returns to SOMM for a stirring tribute to Nigeria’s second-largest city, Kano. The composer herself provides exceptional accompaniment on piano throughout the album. Also returning to the label is Ex Cathedra under their inspiring conductor Jeffrey Skidmore to demonstrate again a rare versatility and the most beautiful of choral sounds while reveling in the punchy, rhythmic vivacity and telling colors of Thwaites’ music. Thwaites’ previous release on SOMM was the premiere recording of the concert version of her musical co-written with Alan Thornhill, Ride! Ride! (SOMMCD 017) which featured Keith Michell as the 18th-century religious and social reformer John Wesley. “The strength of Alan Thornhill’s libretto and the sheer variety of Thwaites’ music combine to create a compelling aural drama”, said Gramophone.

SOMM Recordings is thrilled to announce the release of Mosaic featuring the label debut of the A4 Brass Quartet. Formed in 2013 at Manchester’s Royal Northern College of Music, the quartet comprises principal players from some of the UK’s top brass bands, including Black Dyke, Foden’s and Brighouse & Rastrick. Its unique blend of instruments – cornet (Jamie Smith), tenor horn (Jonathan Bates), baritone horn (Mike Cavanagh) and euphonium (Chris Robertson) – creates a unique sound that stands out from the standard brass quartet. An exciting kaleidoscope of new music and bespoke arrangements for the ensemble’s distinctive line-up, Mosaic makes a bold claim for the vibrancy and variety of contemporary brass music. Its aim, the quartet says, “is to take the listener on a journey in which they are never quite certain what lies around the corner”. First recordings include Bramwell Tovey’s Street Songs, inspired by photographs of 19th-century Salvation Army bands, three movements from Christian Overhead’s vibrant portraiture in music, 5 Miniatures (both composed for A4 Brass), an arrangement by Jonathan Bates of José Serebrier’s vivacious Cuarteto, Bates’s own virtuosic Toccata 2, and Daniel Hall’s visceral take on a notorious Hollywood murder dubbed The Black Dahlia, which won the A4 Brass Quartet’s inaugural composition competition in 2018.Lighter fare is provided by Elgar’s perennially popular Salut d’Amour, the ebullient Overture to Leonard Bernstein’s Candide, and three more arrangements by Bates: Percy Grainger’s dancing Molly on the Shore, the lovelorn jazz standard, Autumn Leaves, and Kentaro Sato’s tribute to victims of the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Tsuna’ngari (‘connection’).Euphonium player Chris Robertson provides striking arrangements of Bruckner’s beloved motet Locus iste, and Bartók’s Six Romanian Folk Dances that exploit the quartet’s distinctively individual signature.

SOMM Recordings is pleased to announce the fourth volume in Leon McCawley’s much praised series of Franz Joseph Haydn’s Piano Sonatas. Six Sonatas spanning the years 1766-80 are featured: the earliest the miniature First Sonata in G major, the latest the E flat major Sonata No.51, while Robert Matthew-Walker’s fascinating booklet note charts how deftly Haydn balanced the expectations of others and his own creative ambition. “Intended more to entertain than engage the intellect”, the fleet, divertimento-like First Sonata seems to anticipate the pedagogical leanings of Bartók’s Mikrokosmos more than a century and half later.With its unabashed galant style, the D major-led Sonata No.30 is ‘Papa’ Haydn at his most quicksilver brilliant and delightful, while Sonata No.35, in A flat major – “a masterpiece of piano writing” – displays striking characteristics of early Romanticism. Composed with the enhanced voice of the then newly available fortepiano in mind, sibling Sonatas Nos.48 (C major) and 49 (C sharp minor) maintain a winning Classical poise even as one surprise after another see Haydn pushing the sonata form in new and unexpected directions. Volume I (SOMMCD 0162) received a coveted Diapason d’Or from Diapason magazine, which enthused: “What a range in his interpretation and how many layers of gradation! McCawley ties these together in a special quality of inflexions which make their point with great intelligibility and sensitivity”. BBC Music Magazine declared Volume II (SOMMCD 0602) “should stand high on any list” of quality recordings of Haydn, adding “the sparkle of McCawley’s touch is instantly apparent”. Of Volume III (SOMMCD 0624) Gramophone hailed McCawley as “a thoughtful, keenly intelligent artist in peak form… [Haydn’s] piano works an inexhaustible source of artistic riches.”

SOMM Recordings announces the perfect escape from Lockdown Blues with a collection of appealing piano miniatures compiled and performed by Peter Dickinson to chase all your cares away. Lockdown Blues includes soothing masterpieces by Erik Satie (Trois Gnossiennes, Trois Gymnopédies), Francis Poulenc (Bal fantôme, Pastourelle) and Edward MacDowell (To a Wild Rose), alongside Eugene Goossens' melancholic Lament for a Departed Doll and Samuel Barber's valedictory Canzonetta. There is whimsy in George Gershwin's Three-Quarter Blues (familiar to British audiences as the theme to radio and television's After Henry) and Who Cares? from the musical Of Thee I Sing. Of interest are 12 iconic jazz tunes by Duke Ellington. Heard here in their original sheet-music versions, they are pure Ellington, the product of a sophisticated composer. Among featured classic songs are Solitude, Don't Get Around Much Anymore, Mood Indigo and It Don't Mean a Thing (If it Ain't Got That Swing). In his introduction, renowned broadcaster and writer Humphrey Burton describes Lockdown Blues as 'a delightful hour of discovery', hailing the Ellington selections as 'a real find that will surely be much anthologized long after Lockdown has been forgotten'. The disc is completed by three pieces by Dickinson - the titular Lockdown Blues, Freda's Blues and Blue Rose, a take on MacDowell's To a Wild Rose - together with Constant Lambert's Elegiac Blues, Lennox Berkeley's Prelude VI and John Cage's Satie-influenced In a Landscape. Peter Dickinson's career as a pianist has largely been in recitals, broadcasts and recordings with his sister, mezzo Meriel Dickinson, and he has worked with many other performers. Dickinson's Paraphrase II is included on Nathan Williamson's 20th-century British piano music collection, Colour and Light (SOMMCD 0196) and was praised by the British Music Society as 'a Theme with six hugely contrasting variations exploring the outer edges of tonality in a brilliant, structurally refined way'.

SOMM Recordings is pleased to announce the return of the acclaimed partnership of pianist Clélia Iruzun and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jac van Steen with two colorful late-19th-century Romantic Piano Concertos from Brazil and France: Henrique Oswald’s G minor Piano Concerto, Op.10 and the Fifth Piano Concerto in F major (Op.103) by Camille Saint-Saëns. Iruzun’s Brazilian compatriot Henrique Oswald shared a long friendship with Camille Saint-Saëns based on mutual admiration for each other as composers and pianists. They occasionally performed together some of Saint-Saëns’ music for two pianos in public recitals. Saint-Saëns’ exotic Fifth Piano Concerto, the Egyptian, was composed during a North African holiday in 1896. Combining complex piano writing with a deft lightness of touch, it boasts a lyrical main theme (described by Saint-Saëns as “a Nubian love song”), hypnotic echoes of the gamelan and a finale bursting with virtuosity. Oswald’s Piano Concerto was composed in Italy a decade before Saint-Saëns’ Egyptian. With bravura passages recalling Saint-Saëns’ Second Piano Concerto, its richly Romantic vein carries allusions to Fauré while brimming with Oswald’s intriguing native Brazilian rhythms. Like Oswald, Alberto Nepomuceno was a Brazilian who studied in Europe, later succeeding him in a prestigious teaching position in Rio de Janeiro. Modelled on Grieg’s Suite from Holberg’s Time, his Suite Antiga (Suite in the Old Style) combines Baroque style and Romantic attitude with a bewitching savoir faire.

SOMM Recordings' new series, "Elgar from the Archives," explores Edward Elgar's music with rare archival recordings, not only from well-known British interpreters but also from lesser-known, yet equally laudable, international conductors and soloists. Volume 2 in the series features historic live performances of Sir Edward Elgar's Violin Concerto in B minor, Op. 61, with Tibor Varga, and the Cello Concerto in E minor, Op. 85, with André Navarra. Lani Spahr-whose work as a master recording engineer of historic reissues has been honoured by Gramophone Magazine-has once again expertly realised the audio restoration of these performances. The Royal Philharmonic Society of London commissioned the Violin Concerto from Elgar in 1909. Composed within a year of his First Symphony, it is one of his longest orchestral compositions and has the reputation of being one of the most difficult in the violin repertoire. He dedicated it to the noted violin master of his day, Fritz Kreisler, who gave the premiere performance in 1910 with Elgar conducting. The Hungarian violinist Tibor Varga (1921-2003) was six years old when he made his first public appearance, becoming one of the most prominent soloists of his generation. The Franz Liszt Academy appointed him an honorary professor-a rare distinction also awarded to Elgar, Emil Gilels, Richard Strauss, and Arturo Toscanini, amongst others. Varga moved to London in 1947, became a citizen, and lived in Britain for nine years. That experience is reflected in his fine, committed performance of Elgar's concerto. This recording, from 1957, is with the Dutch composer and conductor Jan Koetsier and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra. Following the Great War, Lady Elgar noted that her husband's compositions were different in style and character. His four-movement Cello Concerto, completed in 1919, is barely longer than the first movement of his Violin Concerto, and it is a contemplative, elegiac work with a heartfelt third-movement adagio that is a masterful example of controlled emotion. Yet the concerto ends on a positive note, as the declamatory opening returns in a valedictory form at the end of the finale. The renowned cellist André Navarra (1911-1988) graduated from the Paris Conservatoire at the age of fifteen, and he was later mentored by Pablo Casals. He toured extensively in the United States, Europe, Asia, and the Soviet Union, playing with the great conductors of the era, and he was one of a number of distinguished French cellists who embraced the Elgar concerto. He chose it for his first public performance in Britain at the 1950 Cheltenham Festival with John Barbirolli-with whom he recorded the concerto in 1957. His recording here with German conductor Fritz Rieger and the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra comes from 1956.

The troubled life of English composer Ernest John Moeran (1894 - 1950) ended 75 years ago, when he fell into the water at Kenmare in Ireland, and his death was officially recorded as a cerebral haemorrhage. To honour the life of E J Moeran, SOMM Recordings is releasing broadcasts that were privately recorded by Lionel Hill, author of Lonely Waters - the diary of a friendship with E J Moeran. This commemorative release, with outstanding audio restoration by Lani Spahr, includes Moeran's Symphony in G minor conducted by Sir Adrian Boult and his Violin Concerto with the incomparable Albert Sammons as soloist. Additionally, Moeran's Cello Concerto, written for his wife Peers Coetmore, is available as a download. E J Moeran was born to an Irish Protestant priest and a Norfolk-born mother, and the duality of his nationality finds expression in his music. He wrote of his Symphony in G minor that it "may be said to owe it's inspiration to the natural surroundings in which it was planned and written. The greater part of the work was carried out among the mountains and seaboard of Co. Kerry, but the material of the second movement was conceived around the sand-dunes and marshes of East Norfolk." On 9 February, 1949, Moeran and his friend Lionel Hill attended a performance of the symphony at the Royal Albert Hall, with Adrian Boult conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra. That is the performance heard on this CD. The first movement of Moeran's Violin Concerto, written in Co. Kerry, was similarly inspired by the calm of Kenmare Bay in fine weather, while the Lento last movement reflected a period of seasonal colour and beauty along the Kenmare River. The second movement Rondo is unmistakably imbued with the spirit of Kerry fairs and Irish fiddlers. Moeran wrote that "Albert Sammons is the only living violinist I would like to have interpret it." This recording, a BBC Home Service broadcast from Norfolk on 28 April 1946, is Sammons' last public concerto performance. One cannot overemphasise the importance of this recording; it is, as far as we know, Sammons' only known live recording. In December 1943, eighteen months before their marriage, Moeran wrote to the Irish cellist Peers Coetmore, "Please write and tell me you would like me to write a concerto especially for you, and I give you my promise that I will put my whole heart into it." The result is a work of considerable beauty, especially memorable for the typically Irish tune that introduces the slow movement. Following the premiere in Dublin, Coetmore gave it's first London performance in April 1946-available here as a download-with Adrian Boult conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

January 2026 marks the 75th anniversary of The Elgar Society, which has, since the late 1990s, offered it's invaluable support to SOMM Recordings for new and archival releases of Elgar's works. In celebration, SOMM is releasing this month Vol. 1 of Edward Elgar from the Archives. The release offers "acoustic" recordings of Elgar's Enigma Variations conducted by the composer in 1920 and by Sir Henry Wood in 1924. Also included-abridged, in order to fit onto the original disc sides-is a 1919 recording of Elgar's Violin Sonata featuring the virtuoso, Marjorie Hayward, a fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, and the Australian pianist, Una Mabel Bourne. The London String Quartet, founded in 1908, is featured in an abridged version of Elgar's String Quartet, which they recorded in 1921. Elgar's recording of the Enigma Variations, the Violin Sonata, and the String Quartet are all remastered premiere recordings. Before the microphone made it's appearance in 1926, and revolutionized the technicalities of the recording industry through "electrical" recordings, musical performances were captured by "acoustic" recordings. Jutting from the wall in front of the players was a recording horn that was wound in tape to attenuate the "tinny" sound and reduce vibration. On the other side of the wall was a diaphragm, which transmitted the vibrations captured by the horn to a stylus positioned via a gimbal mechanism over the wax disc to be cut. The recordings on this release demonstrate the skill of the forgotten engineers from that era and show how they learnt by experience. Their skill has been realized for modern ears by the musician and master recording engineer of historic reissues, Lani Spahr, whose Elgar Remastered [SOMMCD 261-4] was described as a "vivid new transfer" by Gramophone Magazine when it was named their Historical Choice for Elgar's Symphony No. 1. Elgar and Richard Strauss were the first major composers to take the recording of their music seriously, and the Enigma Variations was Elgar's most substantial piece in his ten years of making recordings. This present performance with the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra was recorded at the HMV Studio, London, in three sessions: February and November 1920 and May 1921. Four years later, Sir Henry Wood conducted the New Queen's Hall Orchestra for Columbia. These two "acoustic" recordings, which bookend the Violin Sonata and the String Quartet on this release, offer a fascinating comparison. Wood's interpretation is marginally quicker overall and, as Lani Spahr points out, "the two orchestras sound to be about the same size but the balances are different and more forward in the Wood. Recording techniques had improved greatly in the four years between the Elgar sessions and when Wood recorded his Elgar set."

In November 2025, SOMM pays special tribute to the centenary of Sir Charles Mackerras (1925 - 2010) who was, amongst other stellar achievements, an outstanding interpreter of the music of Czech composer Leos Janacek (1854 - 1928). At the age of 25, and over the next six decades, Mackerras introduced generations of London opera-goers to Janacek's extraordinary masterpieces, and he was directly responsible for these works becoming established in the British operatic repertoire. Our centenary tribute features the release of a remastered broadcast, from 1964, of Mackerras's first London production of the opera The Makropulos Affair. Also included is Janacek's quasi-operatic song cycle, The Diary of One who Disappeared. Audio restoration is by Lani Spahr, whose previous restorations for SOMM of works by Elgar, Bruckner, Holst, and Bliss have recently received no less than three Gramophone Editor's Choices. Shortly after Mackerras arrived in the UK from Australia in 1947, a British Council Scholarship enabled him to study conducting with Vaclav Talich at the Prague Academy of Music, during which time he discovered Czech music and Janacek in particular. His breakthrough in introducing Janacek's unfamiliar music to British audiences came in February 1964, when he conducted The Makropulos Affair at Sadler's Wells. This release is an exciting, highly-charged souvenir of that first London production. The title of the opera, inspired by Karel Capek's 1922 play, refers to a century-old probate case, which holds the key to the formula for a life-extending elixir. The coolly enigmatic opera diva Emilia Marty shows great interest in the case, and is revealed to be Elina Makropulos, a woman from Crete, who has lived for 337 years. This recording features the Australian dramatic soprano Marie Collier, an outstanding exponent of the role. The vocal writing in the opera is predominantly conversational, underpinned by an orchestral score that is both uncompromisingly modern and evocative of ancient times. The lead characters in two of Janacek's operas Kata in Katya Kabanova and Emilia Marty in The Makropulos Affair were inspired by Kamila Stosslova with whom he fell deeply in love, despite their both being married and he being almost forty years her senior. The earliest work to be inspired by Kamila was The Diary of One who Disappeared, begun the month after Janacek met her in 1917. This unorthodox song cycle for tenor, contralto, female voices, and piano was inspired by a diary-in-poems about a village boy who falls in love with the gipsy girl Žofka. Janacek wrote to Kamila, "All through the work I thought of you! You were my Žofka." This 1956 recording features Bernard Keeffe's English translation with Richard Lewis, tenor, Maureen Forrester, contralto, women from the BBC Singers, and pianist Ernest Lush.

SOMM Recordings marks the 150th Anniversary of the great French-American conductor Pierre Monteux (1875-1964) with his live performances of Claude Debussy's Images pour orchestre and Igor Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms. These 1961 broadcasts, featuring the BBC Symphony Orchestra & Chorus, have been superbly remastered by Lani Spahr, whose critically acclaimed audio restorations for SOMM have received high praise from Gramophone, BBC Radio 3, and The Sunday Times, amongst many others. While Monteux was born 150 years ago this past April, his death came 61 years ago-still within the lifetime of many present-day music lovers. He was, therefore, a link with the musical past, and enjoyed professional relationships with both the composers on this recording. By the early 1910s, Monteux had a reputation as the leading French conductor of the younger generation, and Debussy chose him to prepare the world premiere of Images pour orchestre, which Debussy himself conducted in January 1913. Debussy's colourful orchestration of his original piano work opens with "Gigues," inspired loosely by English and Scottish folk-tunes. At the heart of Images is "Iberia," of which Manuel de Falla said, "There is more real Spain in 'Iberia' than in all of Albeniz's work." The more veiled final movement, "Rondes de printemps," ultimately brings Images to a superb full-orchestra climax. Monteux's first conducting position was with Paris's Colonne Orchestra, which Sergei Diaghilev engaged for the 1910 season of the Ballets Russes, and Monteux came into contact with Stravinsky's music when he played viola in the company's premiere of The Firebird. At the request of Stravinsky, he conducted the premiere of Petrushka in 1911, and he led the famously riotous first performance of The Rite of Spring in 1913. When Monteux was conscripted into the army during World War I, Diaghilev persuaded the French government to discharge him so that he could direct the Ballets Russes on a North American tour. The success of this tour led to Monteux's five-year tenure as chief conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. His successor there was the Russian maestro Serge Koussevitzky who, in 1931, commissioned a number of leading composers-including Stravinsky-to write commemorative works marking the 50th anniversary of the BSO. Stravinsky's offering was his Symphony of Psalms for chorus and orchestra. Composed in a Neo-classical style with a nod to Bach's oratorios, it is one of the great choral works of the 20th century, creating a unique, ritualistic atmosphere in the setting of three psalm texts in Latin. These live recordings from late in Monteux's life, demonstrating his profound and personal insights into the works of Debussy and Stravinsky, are paired with a Pierre Monteux tribute from violinist Alex Nifosi.

SOMM Recordings is immensely proud to present newly restored releases of Siegfried Wagner (1869-1930) conducting the music of his father, Richard Wagner (1813-1883). These recordings of the younger Wagner leading the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra, the Berlin State Opera Orchestra, and the London Symphony Orchestra were made soon after the introduction of the electrical recording process in April 1925. The painstaking audio restoration of these recordings by long-time SOMM collaborator, Lani Spahr, has been so expertly and stunningly achieved that it is difficult to believe they come from a century ago. Siegfried Wagner was named for the young hero in Richard Wagner's Ring Cycle and immortalized in the Siegfried Idyll, included on this release. He was born to Richard Wagner and his future wife, Cosima (nee Liszt), on 6 June 1869. Although Siegfried considered following a profession outside music (and, as a youth, studied architecture in Berlin and in Karlsruhe), it was inevitable that he would follow a career in music given the lineage of both his parents and his grandfather, Franz Liszt. In addition to receiving instruction in music from Liszt, the thirteen-year-old Siegfried began his advanced musical studies in Frankfurt with Engelbert Humperdinck, a true disciple of Richard Wagner. Siegfried became an assistant at Bayreuth in 1892, immersing himself in his father's music under the strong influence of Cosima Wagner and the conductor Hans Richter. In 1895, he made his debut at Bayreuth conducting a complete Ring cycle. The debut was a considerable artistic success, and Siegfried's future as the true guardian of the Wagner inheritance was assured, as he took a greater share in the direction of the Bayreuth Festival. With Cosima's full endorsement, Siegfried assumed the general directorship from his mother in 1908. Siegfried's busy professional life was devoted in the main to Bayreuth in the 1920s, but it was also during this time that he began a recording career devoted almost exclusively to his father's and his own works. Apart from his evident qualities as a conductor of his father's music-heard here in the recorded legacy he left of his performances at Bayreuth and in Berlin and London-he was equally keen to establish himself as a composer. The first of his twelve completed operas, Der Barenhauter (Bearskin) inspired by the German fairytale, met with public and critical acclaim when it was produced in 1899. The acoustic recording of the overture is heard here. Among the Richard Wagner works conducted by Siegfried Wagner on this historic release are well-known selections from Das Rheingold and Die Walkure from the Ring Cycle. Also included are a suite from Parsifal and selections from Tannhauser, Lohengrin, and Tristan und Isolde.

SOMM Recordings is proud to extend it's celebration of the 150th anniversary of Gustav Holst (1874 - 1934). The label was one of the few to mark the anniversary with it's double CD release last September of Holst: Savitri, Choral Hymns from Rig Veda, 4 Songs, The Evening Watch, Hammersmith, The Perfect Fool Suite & The Planets, ARIADNE 5030-2. These never-before-released live recordings from the 40s, 50s, and 60s were issued in meticulous restorations by long-time SOMM collaborators Lani Spahr and Paul Baily. Now, SOMM continues it's outstanding mission of issuing lesser-known music of interest with a pair of gems to enrich the catalogue of historic performances: a stereo recording of Holst's three-movement suite Beni Mora (the fictional name for Biskra, Algeria) and a live performance of the Choral Symphony. Both are played by the BBC Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent, who brought a personal acquaintance and a deep understanding of the composer's inspiration to the works. Once again, the suburb audio restoration is by Lani Spahr. Holst's The Planets is a justifiably well-known suite, but the great originality and skill in his writing is still largely under-appreciated. He lived a retiring life playing trombone in theatre orchestras as a younger man and teaching for much of his career at the St Paul's Girls' School in London. Yet, his abiding interest in cultures of North Africa, the Levant, and India were reflected in his rare musical expression. While spending time in Algiers in 1908, Holst heard an indigenous musician playing the same phrase repeatedly for two hours on a bamboo flute. This melody became the basis for the final movement of Beni Mora, where Holst repeats the eight-note tune 163 times in a manner foreshadowing minimalism. The first two movements of the suite evoke the mysticism, lively rhythms, and exoticism of the Arab world, juxtaposed with more reflective moments. Following the success of The Planets, Holst received a commission from the 1925 Leeds Triennial Festival, and he used the opportunity to revise the draft of his Choral Symphony. The work consists of a Prelude and four movements, in keeping with an idea of conventional symphonic structure. Holst's inspiration came from a widely diverse collection of poetry by John Keats-ranging from the famous Ode to a Grecian Urn to lines scribbled on the flyleaf of a book of plays. The response to the Choral Symphony was not initially favourable. Even Holst's lifelong friend, Ralph Vaughan Williams, admitted that he felt only a "cold admiration" for it. But within months of the first performance Holst wrote, "I think the work as a whole is the best thing I have ever written." This recording is evidence of that belief.

SOMM Recordings highlights the pianistic mastery of Francis Poulenc (1899 - 1963) with a release of extraordinary historic recordings including two of his four major concertante works and selected solo piano pieces. To mark the 100th anniversary of the death of Erik Satie (1866 - 1925), this recording also features Poulenc performing piano gems by Satie, whose distaste for academic routine and Romanticism had a profound influence on Poulenc and the other members of the ad hoc music group, Les Six. These performances, ranging from 1930 to 1950, have been brilliantly remastered by long-time SOMM collaborator, Lani Spahr, about whose work Gramophone has said, "There are historic releases that make the grade because they are just that - 'historic' - and there are releases that make history because they are musically overwhelming." This release opens with Poulenc's Concerto in D minor for two pianos and orchestra, commissioned by American-born heiress Princess Edmond de Polignac specifically to be premiered by the composer and his friend, Jacques Fevrier, at the International Festival of Contemporary Music in Venice in 1932. The vibrant colouration inherent in the piece was inspired by Balinese musicians whom Poulenc had heard at the Paris Colonial Exhibition of 1931. The performance heard here with Georges Pretre conducting the Orchestre National de France was recorded the year before Poulenc's sudden death, and again pairs Poulenc and Fevrier, thirty years after they created the world premiere. While on tour in New York during the winter of 1949 /1950, Poulenc recorded selections of his piano music along with twelve of his favourite compositions by Erik Satie. Poulenc's own music ranges from his earliest works, Trois mouvements perpetuelles, to the C major Nocturne from a set of eight, and the neo-classical Suite francaise of 1935-a homage to his 16th century compatriot, Claude Gervaise. Erik Satie was not as gifted a pianist as Poulenc, and his technical limitations largely confined his output to the shorter forms, particularly for piano, where his singular creative genius shone at it's brightest. Amongst some of Satie's deliberately absurd titles-like "Tyrolean Turk" and "Skinny Dance"-Poulenc also chose to record one each of Satie's exquisitely crafted Gymnopedie and Gnossienne. Aubade (Morning Song), a 1929 concerto for piano and chamber orchestra of eighteen instruments, is the final work on this release. It exists as both a Concerto choreographique, based on the Roman myth of the virgin huntress Diana, and also a concert version, as heard here. The positive response to Aubade led to a commercial recording with the Orchestre Straram conducted by Walther Straram, the 78rpm discs capturing Poulenc's only recording of this work.

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.

Sir Arthur Bliss (1891 - 1975) was an excellent conductor of his own music, but he sadly made only a limited number of commercial recordings. SOMM celebrates the 50th anniversary of Bliss's death with a 2-CD set of important archive performances, all but two of which he didn't record commercially, making them of particular interest. These live performances, mostly recorded at the BBC Proms and not previously made available, are skilfully remastered by long-time SOMM collaborator and executive producer, Lani Spahr, whose recent 6-volume "Bruckner from the Archives" received no less than two Editor's Choices from Gramophone magazine. At the invitation of Edward Elgar, Bliss wrote a new work for the Three Choirs Festival in 1920. He was inspired by a book on heraldry to compose a full-scale symphony incorporating symbolic meanings associated with primary colours. Hence, the four movements of A Colour Symphony are Purple, Red, Blue, and Green. The performance issued here is with Bliss conducting his 70th birthday concert at the Proms in 1961. For his 75th birthday concert at the Proms in 1966, Bliss conducted his Piano Concerto, commissioned by the British Council in 1939. Following this birthday concert, Bliss wrote that he felt "indeed positively youthful; perhaps that rejuvenation was accentuated by the exuberantly fine performance that John Ogdon gave of my Piano Concerto." That "exuberantly fine performance," along with Bliss's brief speech of thanks, are included in this set. Bliss and his younger brother served during World War I, and Kennard was killed at the Battle of the Somme. In 1930, haunted by nightmares of the war and grief about his brother, Bliss composed Morning Heroes, dedicating it "to the memory of my brother Francis Kennard Bliss and all other comrades killed in battle." The work is a symphony for orator, chorus, and orchestra, with poetry ranging from The Iliad to Walt Whitman and Wilfred Owen. Lady Bliss considered the pre-eminent orator of this work to be Donald Douglas, featured here with Bliss in 1968-surprisingly, the only performance to date of Morning Heroes at the Proms. The much-revised Concerto for Two Pianos is presented in a version for two pianos and three hands, which Bliss arranged after Cyril Smith suffered a stroke that paralysed his left arm. This performance with Bliss leading Cyril Smith, Phyllis Sellick, and the BBC Symphony Orchestra is from the 1969 Proms. Two shorter works complete this Bliss anniversary tribute. Mêlee Fantasque from 1921, influenced by Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, is a precursor to many ballet scores Bliss would produce. The Phoenix, subtitled "Homage to France August 1944," is noted in the score as symbolizing "the imperishable life and the transcendent beauty of France." 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.

SOMM Recordings concludes it's universally acclaimed six-volume Bruckner from the Archives series with his last two symphonies and Psalm 150. By a happy coincidence conductors Eugen Jochum and Henry Swoboda, who were featured conductors in Volume 1, make a welcome re-appearance, bringing the series to an elegant conclusion. This archival series celebrating Anton Brucker's bicentennial was conceived and designed by SOMM Executive Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer, Lani Spahr, with annotations from Professor Benjamin Korstvedt. Of Bruckner's two final symphonies Korstvedt says, "[With] the Eighth and the Ninth, Bruckner reached the pinnacle of symphonic achievement. They both pose considerable challenges, musically, textually and emotionally. Above all, they are unquestionably two of the greatest works in the genre, by any composer before or after." When Bruckner completed his Eighth Symphony in 1887, he asked his supporter, Hermann Levi, to conduct the premiere. When Levi responded, "I don't have the courage to perform it, " Bruckner was staggered by the rejection, but didn't lose faith in his score. On 10 March 1890, he wrote "entirely finished" on a reworked version. His revisions, extensive as they were, stayed true to his original conception of the work's dramatic course, and after the premiere in 1892, Hugo Wolf called the work "a complete victory of light over darkness." To honour Bruckner's bicentennial in this last Volume 6, the Bruckner Archive offers an exciting 1957 live performance, expertly re-mastered by Lani Spahr, featuring the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra led by their founding conductor Eugen Jochum. In 1949, Jochum made the first commercial recording of the Eighth, and this present recording offers a vivid example of his distinctive way with Bruckner in his approach to the dramatic possibilities of the score. Bruckner's last great sacred work, Psalm 150 from 1892, is a jubilant hymn of praise that references music in it's directive to "Praise the Lord" with trumpet and harp, with dancing and cymbals. This recording, the first ever made, is from 1950 during the pioneering days of LPs, with Henry Swoboda conducting the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and Vienna Academy Chamber Choir. Twice in 1894, and again in 1896, Bruckner's health declined so gravely that last rites were administered. When death took him on 11 October 1896, he had completed three movements of his Ninth Symphony. The symphony-with it's grimly epic opening, it's insistent Scherzo, and a long moment of silence before the resolution of the Adagio-is usually performed incomplete, as it is here. In this first release, Wolfgang Sawallisch conducts the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in the Musikverein-the same orchestra and hall as the premiere in 1903. Lani Spahr's previous SOMM releases include the lauded four-volume sets Vaughan Williams Live (ARIADNE 5016, 5018-20) and Elgar Remastered (SOMMCd 261-4), as well as two Gramophone Editor's Choice picks: Elgar from America Vol 3 (ARIADNE 5015-2) for "superb audio restorations [bringing] performances fully to life" and Bruckner from the Archives Vol. 1 (ARIADNE 5025-2) for the "high standards achieved here, where expert audio restoration and remastering is by Lani Spahr."

SOMM recordings is delighted to release Frankly Speaking with Leopold Stokowski, which gives rare insight into the legendary maestro through live recordings of a performance, a rehearsal, and an interview. The CD features Stokowski conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra and soprano Gloria Lane in a performance of El amor brujo by Manuel de Falla at the Royal Albert Hall on 15 September 1964; a rehearsal of El amor brujo and Berlioz's Roman Carnival Overture with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra at the War Memorial Opera House on 19 December 1952; and a Frankly Speaking BBC Home Service interview with Stokowski answering questions put to him by John Bowen, Reginald Jacques, and George Scott at the BBC Studios in London on 25 August 1959. Leopold Stokowski's unorthodox seating arrangements, his flexibility regarding free individual string bowings, his emphasis on vibrato and tone, and his idiosyncratic baton-less conducting technique, were some of the practical elements that defined his popularity and his uniquely lush sound-coupled with allowing himself free reign to alter details of the musical text in his performances. Yet there remains a highly elusive element in the art of a great conductor. The rehearsal presented on this release provides a glimpse into Stokowski's creative process. One the one hand, he was fastidiously detailed and precisely demanding to the point of being draconian, but he also admired and encouraged an element of spontaneity, and even improvisation, within the framework of his extreme insistence on precision. The performance of El amor brujo-one of Stokowski's favourite compositions-was recorded at a BBC Promenade concert, and provides a stellar example of the effect that he was able to achieve through his singular and charismatic approach to making music. The extended interview, heard here for the first time since it's original radio broadcast in 1959, illustrates the brilliant repartee, levity, and charm of which this extraordinary musician was capable. Through the breadth of his public success-including his appearance in the film Fantasia and, even more significantly, his recordings as the Music Director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, which he led from 1912 to 1936-Leopold Stokowski reached a more wide-ranging audience than was typical for classical music in his day, and did much to debunk the perception that classical music is "elitist." Together, Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra racked up international sales figures that were unprecedented for orchestral discs, attracted a far-reaching following, and captivated an audience that ranged from classical music newcomers to some of his most celebrated fellow musicians.

The continuing collaboration of SOMM Recordings and Lani Spahr has produced another exciting release of long forgotten and neglected recordings, which highlight Sir Adrian Boult's life-long championing of the music of Edward Elgar. The label remains grateful, as ever, to Spahr for resurrecting these lost treasures and for his sterling work on sound restoration. On 17 February, 1918, in wartime London, a twenty-eight year old Adrian Boult visited the home of Sir Edward Elgar to discuss details for a performance of In the South that Boult was to conduct for the first time at Queen's Hall the following evening. In 1944, in the midst of another war, Boult would again conduct the concert overture in a broadcast performance with the BBC Orchestra. SOMM Recordings is proud to include this performance on it's release, Boult's Elgar - The Forgotten Recordings. Elgar had conducted the premiere performance of his Second Symphony at the Queen's Hall on 24 May 1911, and it was, by his own admission and according to Boult's description, "really rather a flop." Overshadowed by the success of the First Symphony, the Second had been received with polite restraint. After Boult conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in his first performance of the symphony on 16 March, 1920, Elgar wrote to him, "I send a word of thanks for your splendid conducting of the Sym: - I am most grateful to you for your affectionate care of it & feel that my reputation in the future is safe in your hands." And so it proved to be. Boult went on to perform the symphony more than seventy times, and it was largely thanks to his advocacy that audiences started to warm to the work. This present recording of the Second Symphony from SOMM, published on CD for the first time, was made by the Scottish National Orchestra in September 1963, a few months before Sir Adrian turned 75. Nigel Simeone, author of Edward Elgar and Adrian Boult, characterizes in this recording "an unerring sense of 'rightness' in his choice of speeds, a phenomenal grasp of the broad structures of each movement, and playing of unflinching sincerity and conviction." Some of Boult's earliest conducting experience had been with choirs during his student years at Oxford. The second disc on this release includes BBC radio broadcasts from July 1967 of ten unaccompanied choral songs, composed by Elgar between 1907 and 1914, with Boult conducting the BBC Chorus. This double CD also features three insightful interviews with Boult from the BBC. These include Sir Adrian talking with Elgar's daughter about the Enigma Variations and also his perceptions of working with Elgar on his 2nd Symphony and In the South.

SOMM Recordings is proud to celebrate the bicentennial of Czech composer, Bedrich Smetana, with world-premiere and never-before-released recordings of George Szell conducting the NBC Symphony and Boston Symphony Orchestras. These live performances from the 1940s have been masterfully restored by the critically-acclaimed audio engineer and producer, Lani Spahr. It's impossible to overstate the importance of Smetana to Czech music in particular and musical nationalism in general. He was born on 2 March 1824 in a small town east of Prague, and he came of age at a time of political upheaval that included the 1848 Prague uprising. It was during this period that he began composing nationalistic music. Throughout his life Smetana was dogged by personal tragedy and professional rejection, which drove him for a time to live and work in Sweden. While there, he composed a series of tone poems inspired by military leaders, including Wallenstein's Camp heard on this disc. But Prague kept pulling him back, and when a drama and opera theatre opened in the city in 1862, Smetana set about essentially creating the style of Czech opera. His resounding success in this endeavour was The Bartered Bride, the overture of which is included on this recording. One of the greatest personal tragedies of Smetana's life was his loss of hearing. By the age of fifty, he was completely deaf. At this time, he was working on a series of six tone poems collected under the title Ma vlast (My Fatherland), the best known being Vltava (The Moldau), included here. Despite his affliction, Smetana continued to write prolifically from the heart. His 1876 semi-autobiographical String Quartet No.1 in E minor, From My Life, evokes his youth as an artist, his love of dance in the form of a polka, a tribute to his beloved first wife, and the culmination of a held E natural at a high pitch mimicking the ringing in his ears. The quartet is included on this disc in an orchestration made in 1939 by Hungarian-born conductor George Szell, famously the Music director of The Cleveland Orchestra from 1946 until his death in 1970. On 8 March 1941 Szell conducted the NBC Symphony Orchestra in the world premiere of his arrangement along with the overture to The Bartered Bride and The Moldau. Having made his debut with the Boston Symphony in 1943, Szell recorded From Bohemia's Fields and Forests from Ma vlast with them in 1945, and that performance is also featured on this new release. Lani Spahr's previous SOMM releases include the lauded four-volume sets Vaughan Williams Live (ARIADNE 5016, 5018-20) and Elgar Remastered (SOMMCd 261-4), as well as two Gramophone Editor's Choice picks: Elgar from America Vol 3 (ARIADNE 5015-2) for "superb audio restorations [bringing] performances fully to life" and Bruckner from the Archives Vol. 1 (ARIADNE 5025-2) for the "high standards achieved here, where expert audio restoration and remastering is by Lani Spahr."

SOMM Recordings continues it's six-volume Bruckner from the Archives series in celebration of the bicentennial of Anton Bruckner with the penultimate Volume 5, featuring his Sixth and Seventh Symphonies and the Te Deum. The series owes it's unprecedented success to SOMM Executive Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer, Lani Spahr. He conceived and designed the series in collaboration with Professor Ben Korstvedt, author of the authoritative notes, and John F. Berky, Executive Secretary of the Bruckner Society of America and Series Consultant. Bruckner thought of his Symphony No. 6 in A major (1881) as his boldest, his "sauciest," symphony. Sadly, it was not published during his lifetime, and he heard only the Adagio and Scherzo performed. When the first full performance was given by Gustav Mahler in 1899 and published that same year, it was with cuts and edits. The original version of Bruckner's score was not published until 1935, and this version is performed here in a 1961 recording with Christoph von Dohnanyi conducting the North German Radio Symphony Orchestra. The Symphony No. 7 in E major (1885) provided Bruckner with his public breakthrough. The first performance in Leipzig came just over a year after it's completion, and the second performance the following year was even more warmly received by Munich's music lovers. The Bavarian King, Ludwig II, was so impressed with the symphony that he financed it's immediate publication. By the late 1880s, Bruckner's Seventh was being widely performed, from Amsterdam and Berlin to New York and Chicago. The performance of the symphony included here is a 1955 recording by what was then the South German Radio Symphony (now the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra) led by their long-time music director, Hans Muller-Kray. Anton Bruckner was a devoutly religious man, and he composed his Te Deum (1884) "out of gratitude to God." The work being contemporaneous with his Seventh Symphony, elements of Bruckner's mature symphonic style find their way into this sacred text. It received it's first full performance at the Vienna Musikverein in 1886, and the recording on this release was made in that same hall in 1962, during a concert celebrating the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde. The performance features Herbert von Karajan conducting the Vienna Philharmonic and the Vienna Singverein.

SOMM Recordings is pleased to release this set of delightful never-before-released recordings of the music of Gustav Holst in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth. Here are works of grand and intimate scale, for orchestral and chamber forces, with and without singers, offering a vivid sampling of his oeuvre in meticulous restorations of recorded live performances given in the 40s, 50s and 60s. Chronologically, the earliest recordings are those on Disc 2, curated by Producer Lani Spahr. The live performances of The Perfect Fool suite and The Planets were recorded from New York's Radio City Studio in 1945 and Boston's Symphony Hall in 1946, respectively, with British conductors leading orchestras from "across the pond", where Holst had devoted much time in his later years conducting, lecturing and teaching. The recordings on Disc 1 are in various ways the result of Imogen Holst's championing of her father's music. A composer in her own right, arranger, conductor, teacher, musicologist and festival administrator, it was in the last capacity, especially, that she came to work at Benjamin Britten's side on his annual Aldeburgh Festival, becoming co-artistic director in the season of 1956. This recording of Gustav Holst's chamber opera Savitri dates from that summer and comes from the collection of Music Preserved. Nearly a decade later Imogen Holst, who by then was acclaimed for her founding and leadership of the Purcell Singers, a choir whose performances became a regular fixture at Aldeburgh, curated a series of broadcasts on BBC's Third Programme to feature works by her father and other composers. Some of the Gustav Holst pieces, like the Third Group of Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda and Hammersmith: Prelude and Scherzo for orchestra, were broadcast live from public performances at the Cheltenham Music Festival in July of 1965, Cheltenham incidentally being Gustav's birthplace. Others, like the 4 Songs for soprano and violin and The Evening-Watch for mixed chorus, must have been pre-recorded in closed sessions that summer for use later in Imogen's series of programmes. These two recordings were aired on 31 October 1965. All of the Cheltenham '65 recordings come from the collection of Stephen Crane of ARS Recorded Editions. Disc 1 has been fastidiously polished by Restoration Engineer Paul Baily. His restoration of the recent Sir Adrian Boult Conducts (ARIADNE 5024-2) was honoured with the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik (German Records Critics' Award) in the Historical Recordings category. Restoration Engineer for Disc 2, Lani Spahr's previous SOMM releases include the lauded four-volume sets Vaughan Williams Live (ARIADNE 5016, 5018-20) and Elgar Remastered (SOMMCD 261-4), as well as two Gramophone Editor's Choice picks: Elgar from America Vol.3 (ARIADNE 5015-2) for "superb audio restorations [bringing] performances fully to life" and Bruckner from the Archives Vol.1 (ARIADNE 5025-2) for the "high standards achieved here, where expert audio restoration and remastering is by Lani Spahr".

SOMM Recordings is delighted to release Volume 4 in it's "major commemorative series" (ConcertoNet. Com) Bruckner from the Archives. Many of the expertly restored and remastered recordings, like this performance of the Fifth Symphony, are appearing for the first time in any form. Conceived and designed by SOMM Executive Producer and acclaimed Audio Restoration Engineer Lani Spahr with support from the Bruckner Society of America, Bruckner from the Archives celebrates the 200th anniversary of the composer's birth in 1824 with rare archival recordings of the 11 symphonies and selected other important works. These have been sourced by Lani Spahr from the more than 12, 000 Bruckner performances in the Archive of John F. Berky, Executive Secretary of the Bruckner Society of America, who also acts as Consultant for this important series. This fourth instalment offers the first ever release of a live radio broadcast of Bruckner's Symphony No. 5 by the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra under Christoph von Dohnanyi (1963) and a debut CD release of the String Quintet and it's alternate movement, the Intermezzo, by the Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet joined by violist Ferdinand Stangler (1956). These rare interpretations of Bruckner masterworks offer a new perspective on the music and it's genesis in the context of Bruckner's life and compositional development, accompanied by the very latest in scholarship from Professor Benjamin Korstvedt, President of the Bruckner Society of America and member of the Editorial Board of the New Anton Bruckner Complete Edition. Prof. Korstvedt cites this recording of the Fifth, led by a young Christoph von Dohnanyi then in the early stages of his legendary career, as a fine example of the new, more objective approach to Bruckner performance favoured among the postwar generation. The early days of the LP bring us this recording of the Quintet by the string quartet in residence at the Vienna Konzerthaus, who along with their guest violist were members of the Vienna Philharmonic. The playing - vividly remastered - is a window onto a lost era, with it's portamentos, lyrical intensity, romantic tempos and phrasing epitomising a distinctly Viennese tradition that invests the music with a sincerity of sentiment and a depth of mood that is both rare and striking. Lani Spahr's previous SOMM releases include the lauded four-volume sets Vaughan Williams Live (ARIADNE 5016, 5018-20) and Elgar Remastered (SOMMCD 261-4), as well as two Gramophone Editor's Choice picks: Elgar from America Vol. 3 (ARIADNE 5015-2) for "superb audio restorations [bringing] performances fully to life" and Bruckner from the Archives Vol. 1 (ARIADNE 5025-2) for the "high standards achieved here, where expert audio restoration and remastering is by Lani Spahr". Praise for Volume One and critical interest in the Series: Gramophone Editor's Choice (June 2024) "We look forward to the next editions in the series; to further uplifting recordings and to new light, shed on a composer we thought we knew. "? The Quarterly Review: Endnotes, May 2024 "This is an auspicious launch of what promises to be a Bruckner series of uncommon interest. "? John Quinn, Music Web International