Alicia de Larrocha will always be remembered as one of the most idiomatic and poetic interpreters of Spanish piano music, but this beloved artist – born in Barcelona in 1923 to two pianists – was hardly less devoted to Mozart. In the 1990s, towards the end of her career, she undertook a series of concerto recordings for RCA with Sir Colin Davis – one of the great Mozartians of his time – conducting the English Chamber Orchestra, formidable Mozart veterans themselves. Now collected for the first time in a 6-album set, these performances were widely admired by music lovers and critics. Gramophone wrote: “In their transparency and vitality these performances are outstanding. Sir Colin’s partnership is affectionate and exemplary [Nos. 25 and 27].” And of their collaboration in Nos. 19 and 27: “Sir Colin’s unforced way with the opening tutti of K 595, his awareness of ‘all passion spent’ is haunting but unobtrusive. Such sensitivity is effortlessly mirrored by Larrocha with her enviable ease, her avoidance of all artifice or attention-seeking dalliance. Few other pianists are more attuned to Mozart’s mix of pain and radiance.”

This release features a live concert recording from St Petersburg. Beethoven composed a total of eight works for cello and piano, whose sheer joy and ingenuity are hard to beat and are wonderfully captured in this live recording. The French cellist Marc Coppey and Peter Laul, his St Petersburg partner at the piano, perform these works with great character and energy, creating an impeccable, sparkling sound in the popular variations and substantial sonatas. Even in a live situation, the technical perfection of the performers is impressive. As a venue for their "Beethoven marathon", they opted for the Small Hall of the St Petersburg Philharmonia: its historical ambience, steeped in tradition, and the supremely attentive audience create atmosphere as well as inspiration. Both are features of this recording, setting it apart from other complete recordings of these popular works, most of which are studio recordings. The hall's resident Steinway and the recording equipment from the former Melodya studios complete the Saint Petersburg ensemble.

REVIEW:

Coppey and Laul put forward a highly effective case for this great music. Their sound is well balanced, the recording much more satisfying. There seems very little audience noise and no applause, and the players are technically remarkable. These two musicians play together as one, and their sensitivity for when to pause and how to make the most of Beethoven’s music is just as I would wish to play it myself. In a word, these are outstanding interpretations of some of the greatest cello music.

– American Record Guide

Celebrating the 250th anniversary of his birth, Sony Music Entertainment presents four major reissues devoted to Ludwig van Beethoven in its series of Classical Masters. Among the treasures in these new budget-priced sets are the complete symphonies, string quartets and violin sonatas performed by illustrious musicians of the past century.

The Italian violinist Uto Ughi studied with Enesco, was signed by EMI while still in his teens and went on to become a major RCA artist in the 1980s and 90s. In 1978, he recorded Beethoven’s 10 Violin Sonatas with Lamar Crowson, whom none less than Alfred Brendel described as “one of the finest chamber music pianists of our day”. The set was acclaimed on its release in Italy on LPs but has been largely unavailable since then, making this first release on four albums particularly enticing to the many admirers of these two superb musicians.

REVIEW:

Sony Classical’s budget price release of a 1978 Beethoven cycle originally issued by Dischi Ricordi featuring violinist Uto Ughi and pianist Lamar Crowson comes as a welcome surprise. The 34-year-old Ughi’s instrumental mastery and intelligent musicianship were captured at the cusp of his early maturity. His burnished, almost viola-like sonority is firmly focused in every register, abetted by impeccable intonation and a knack for tossing off the most difficult passagework with flawless ease. More to the point, however, Ughi consistently taps into the sometimes stressful dramatic, dynamic, and emotional contrasts that characterize Beethoven’s style, as does his expert collaborator Lamar Crowson.

The G major Op. 30 No. 3’s Allegro assai exemplifies this in how the duo offsets their fleet and winged treatment of Beethoven’s lyrical themes with appropriately hard-hitting szforzandos and driving climaxes. Another cogent case of “opposites attracting” can be found in both the refinement of the rapid runs and the unfettered dynamic surges in the A minor Op. 23 Allegro molto finale (sound clip). Listeners also will notice the playfully dovetailed imitative writing in the “Spring” and Op. 30 No. 2 Scherzi, and, conversely, the controlled rapture of Op. 96’s sublime central movement, where Ughi’s sheer tonal beauty and seamless bow control yield no quarter to the immense catalogue competition.

Each variation in the “Kreutzer” sonata’s middle movement conveys a distinct character, yet easily flows from one to the next. I also like how Ughi’s unexpected accents or points of emphasis appear to push the finale’s scurrying triplets ahead of the beat, yet never actually do so. In this sonata, however, Crowson proves less assertive a partner than the conductor/pianist Wolfgang Sawallisch in Ughi’s stunning and slightly superior early digital-era RCA Victor remake, coupled with the “Spring”. A pity that these later alternative readings didn’t find their way into this bargain box, along with Ughi’s still-artistically-competitive and long unavailable RCA Beethoven concerto with Sawallisch conducting the London Symphony Orchestra. Still, the 1978 Ughi/Crowson cycle is a veritable sleeper, worth considering as a supplement alongside the Dumay/Pires, Perlman/Ashkenazy, and Grumiaux/Haskil reference versions.

-- ClassicsToday (Jed Distler)

Classical Music

The Enea Baroque Orchestra, founded by the mezzo-soprano Francesca Ascioti in 2018, is currently regarded as the best Roman Baroque authority because of the high quality of its musicians. On this album the ensemble turns to Johann Adolf Hasse’s masterpiece, the Neapolitan Baroque opera Enea in Caonia (Aeneas in Chaonia), a genuine gem within the genre of the serenata. The libretto was inspired by Book III of Vergil’s Aeneid, the most famous epic poem in Latin literature. It was very fortunate that Hasse and Aeneas “crossed paths” in Italy, for both of them a new adoptive home, and breathed new life into this work. It was from Italy, where Hasse composed this work at the young age of twenty-seven, that he went on to become one of the most popular and most sought-after opera composers of his times – not only in Italy but throughout Europe. We have obtained the services of the excellent Italian violin virtuoso and conductor Stefano Montanari as our principal conductor, and he will also lead this first complete recording of Enea in Caonia.

There is hardly a better way to approach Ludwig van Beethoven than through his piano concertos. Beethoven's own instrument was the piano, and in his improvisations - which made him the darling of the Viennese salons - he merged virtuosity and unbridled expression. The piano concertos give a clear idea of these performances. At the same time, they are prime examples of Beethoven's ability to create large orchestral works with seemingly endless arcs of tension. This release features his piano concertos nos. 1-5, performed by the Berliner Philharmoniker with special guest Mitsuko Uchida. Legendary pianist Mitsuko Uchida brings a deep insight into the music she plays through her own quest for truth and beauty. Renowned for her interpretations of Mozart, Schubert, Schumann and Beethoven, she has also illuminated the music of Berg, Schoenberg, Webern and Boulez for a new generation of listeners.

REVIEW:

Furtwängler famously considered himself a composer who conducted, rather than vice versa, and his most familiar surviving work is without question his Second Symphony. It’s a lovable outpouring composed in the last year of the Second World War but that has both its head and its heart buried among the dying embers of late Romanticism. Bruckner, Strauss, Brahms and Reger are all there in attendance and, although the work is well worth sampling, one laments the fact that, while we have at least four recordings of Furtwängler conducting it, we have none of him conducting the Missa solemnis or Parsifal. The 1954 Stuttgart RSO recording of Furtwänger’s Second, reissued here by Hänssler Classic, comes paired with a typically marmoreal account of Beethoven’s First. Both performances are characteristic...it’s nice to have seven minutes’ worth of Furtwängler in (German) conversation with the conductor Hans Müller-Kray, a privilege included only on the Hänssler Classic set.

-- Gramophone

HUMMEL Piano Sonatas: No. 2 in E?; No. 3 in f. Bagatelle in A?, “La contemplazione” • Susan Alexander-Max (fp) (period instrument) • CHANDOS 765 (67:11)


Johann Nepomuk Hummel (1778–1837) is an important transitional composer, especially from a pianistic viewpoint, between the late-18th and early-19th centuries; he is, unfortunately, also a composer who is underrepresented in the recording catalog. Among currently available recordings, Stephen Hough seems to be the only figure of international standing performing today to have devoted any effort to him. Two recordings that I think have stood out in the last 20 years have been the aforementioned one by Stephen Hough of three sonatas for Hyperion (67390), recorded back in 2003, and Dana Protopopescu’s album for Koch Discover (920237) of three sonatas, recorded in 1995. They both bring a virtuoso technique and a good musical sensibility.


Though I am no fan of the fortepiano, Alexander-Max is a good advocate for both the instrument and the repertoire. Her playing has sensitivity and a good attention to articulation and detail. Sometimes though, it is her attention to these small elements that hampers the overall flow of the music. Her tempos in the fast movements tend to be on the slow side: this provides her ample opportunity to bring out many details, but also tends to make the rapid scale and arpeggio patterns sound a bit sluggish. In comparing just the timings of the final movement of the F-Minor Sonata’s finale, marked Presto , Alexander-Max clocks in at 5:22 to Hough’s 3:59! There is no repeat in this movement, so the temporal difference is not reflected in the omission of any material. Even Protopopescu, who does not play this movement nearly as fast as Hough, clocks in around 5: 01—still over 20 seconds faster than Alexander-Max.


Tempo is not the only factor that makes the fast movements seem sluggish though; it is also the lack of intensity brought to many of the figurational patterns that lead to important beats. The focus for example in the E? Sonata’s finale, this time marked Allegro con spirito , seems to be more on the clarity of notes than on the constant surging motion. In the passage from 00:20 to 00:24, Hummel marks a crescendo moving from piano to forte in the span of two measures. In this performance, though a small crescendo does exist, the kind that Hummel requires does not. The tension and release inherent in the sudden dynamic buildup and rest, held with a fermata that follows this passage, is lost. Though the passagework is clean and articulate, the musical excitement is absent. There is a lack of drama.


There are many good aspects to this album as well. My favorite piece that the pianist plays here is the Bagatelle in A?. Marked Larghetto , it is a fantasy in which much of the beginning material comes back with added figuration. Here, Alexander-Max chooses not only a good tempo, one that flows and allows the movement to progress naturally, but also brings all of her interpretative skills to the fore. She maintains an acute sense of articulation and voicing, and a quality of freedom, almost improvisatory at times—all essential for a fantasy. Her ending pianissimo is as delicate and beautiful as any I’ve heard.


This is a fine addition to the recorded discography of Hummel’s music. I would especially recommend it for period-instrument enthusiasts, though the two previously mentioned recordings, by Hough and Protopopescu—both on modern grand pianos—provide good, in some cases excellent, readings of this much-neglected repertoire.


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

Alongside the many works of Beethoven that are staples of the concert repertoire there are a number of piano pieces that have not received as much attention as their more famous siblings and remain infrequently performed. This recording (with the notable exception of "Für Elise") is dedicated to these works. Pianist and conductor Vladimir Feltsman is one of the most versatile and constantly interesting musicians of our time. His vast repertoire encompasses music from the Baroque to 20th-century composers. A regular guest soloist with leading symphony orchestras in the United States and abroad, he appears in the most prestigious concert series and music festivals all over the world.

“Who would I need to be to be able to talk about a man who is still growing…” (Adam Zagajewski: “The late Beethoven”) Margarita Höhenrieder and I have known it all our lives: the elucidations of Carl Czerny or Rudolf Kolisch, the latest Urtext editions that will lead us to “faithfulness to the text”, the disquisitions from Romain Rolland to Eleonore Büning – we read, we discuss, it all seems helpful and necessary. At the end of the day it is the mature individual, the serious exponent, who makes the decision led by the promptings of conscience, and who simultaneously senses this “growing” of which Zagajewski speaks. We climb a steep path, in order to approach Beethoven more closely. The summit of this path is visible, but not attainable. That is why we keep returning to this path, endless as it is. Beethoven lives in us, as he changes, as we change. Life aspires to art, art is a way forward, life is our way forward. Beethoven changes us through his “growth”. We grow with him!

Following the exceptional success of its debut album the Maxwell Quartet returns with its second recording of Haydn. The intriguing juxtaposition of Haydn string quartets with traditional Scottish folk music once again forms the basis of the programme. MusicWeb Inernational named Haydn: String Quartets Op. 71 as one of its Recordings of the Year stating: ‘… letting this superb playing simply wash over you has been one of the year’s great pleasures.’ The prize-winning quartet is performing Haydn’s Op. 74 and their selection of folk music will include traditional tunes from the Highlands and Shetland plus music by Niel Gow, Jean Finlayson of Lewis and Isaac Cooper of Banff. Following the Maxwell’s performance of Haydn’s String Quartet in F, Op. 74 No. 2 at the 2020 Edinburgh International Festival The Scotsman wrote: ‘Such distinctive personality informed Tuesday’s opening performance… its finely tailored Classicism enlivened with light-hearted repartee and risky spontaneity.’

Additional CD Content:

• Nathaniel Gow, Niel Gow, Maxwell Quartet: Coilsfield House – Drunk at Night, Dry in the Morning
• Sìne NicFhionnlaigh, Anonymous, Maxwell Quartet: Fear a’ Bhàta / Da Full Rigged Ship / Da New Rigged Ship
• Anonymous, William Marshall, Maxwell Quartet: The Burning of the Piper’s Hut / The Marquis of Huntly / Miss Gordon of Gight

REVIEW:

As in their debut disc of Op 71, the Maxwell Quartet respond eagerly to the boldness and brilliance of these predominantly extrovert works. They always seem to be playing to an imaginary audience. As on their Op 71 recording, the Maxwell – Scottish to a man – interleave the three quartets with their own arrangements of Scottish reels, jigs, and pipe marches.

– Gramophone

SIR SIMON RATTLE CONDUCTS BEET

William Youn Plays Mozart Sonatas, Vol. 1

Sony Classical is pleased to announce another ten releases in its increasingly comprehensive series of Classical Masters. These new budget-priced releases contain classic recordings, many of them newly remastered, by some of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. “Claudio Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic once again defy the inexorable progress of period performance in exhilarating accounts of Mozart using modern instruments,” opined Gramophone. The new reissue of these recordings from the early 1990s includes several favorite symphonies, the Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola, the Masonic Funeral Music, a serenade and divertimento as well as the C minor Mass, of which “Abbado’s performance is wide-ranging, delivering most satisfyingly on every aspect of this hugely varied score. He has an impressively unified team at his disposal, with a superb quartet of singers: in fact Bonney and Auger are as well matched as you could reasonably expect to find in the impossibly demanding Domine Deus duet” (Music-Web International).

Classical Music

For this his third volume of works by Antoine Reicha, the pianist Ivan Ilic turns to one of the composer’s most extraordinary works, L’Art de varier, Op. 57. ‘The Art of Variation’ consists of fifty-seven variations on a theme (that the number of variations match the opus number is not a coincidence) and was composed in 1802 – 03, at the beginning of the six-year period which Reicha spent in Vienna, where he studied with Haydn and re-kindled his previous friendship with Beethoven. The set is remarkable for its scale and invention. Ivan Ilic describes the work as the missing link between Bach’s ‘Goldberg’ Variations and Beethoven’s ‘Diabelli’ Variations, which was certainly influenced by Reicha’s work. The recording was made at Potton Hall in Suffolk, on a Steinway Model D grand piano.

REVIEW:

For almost 90 minutes [Reicha] subjects a simple, songful theme to the most kaleidoscopic imaginable treatment, and – thanks in part to the freshness and clarity of Ilić’s playing – the wonder is that I don’t get bored. The first variation is a demure little embroidery on the theme, and the second thunders in Beethovenian style. Then, after establishing these polarities, he’s off on a voyage full of drama and incident. Reicha’s invention never flags for a moment.

– BBC Music Magazine (5 out of stars)

Beethoven and Hummel’s relationship was one of fractious beginnings, but ultimately true friendship. Between 1825 and 1835 Hummel arranged his contemporary’s Symphonies Nos. 1-7 and Septet, Op. 20 for his favored combination of pianoforte, flute, violin, and violoncello. Beethoven would surely not have objected- arrangements were, after all, a perfectly normal part of the 19th-century musical landscape. To audiences today his symphonies need little introduction but, thanks to the musical sensitivity and sheer brilliance of Hummel’s arrangements, it is possible to experience the thrill of hearing these extraordinary pieces afresh.

Nicknamed ‘the poet of the piano,’ Nelson Goerner has an impressive discography, including his recent multi-award-winning Chopin and Debussy CDs. For this disc, Goerner tackles Beethoven’s Sonata No. 29 ‘Hammerklavier’, and his Bagatelles Op. 126. Of his Hammerklavier, the great composer said, “Here is a sonata that will make pianists work hard.” Goerner rises to this challenge beautifully, playing the forty-five minute work with passion and emotion.

-----

REVIEWS:

Goerner’s Hammerklavier is about flight, variety of shapes, sounds, ideas and precision of communication. Phrases are imbued with life and meaning but, equally importantly, they are separated by breath, lending them intelligibility. If ever there were an effortless Hammerklavier finale, this is it.

– Gramophone

The Hammerklavier has received several amazing recordings in recent years, and Nelson Goerner’s is one of them. It is also a highly individual though never quirky account.

– BBC Music Magazine

The programme of this triple album features 31 sonatas for solo violin that Giuseppe Tartini presumably wrote between 1745 and 1750 and are kept today in the archive of the Veneranda Arca del Santo in Padua. This collection contains the autograph manuscripts of these works that the composer kept editing throughout his lifetime, as the many marginal additions and corrections attest. However, many of these sonatas have come down to us also through other contemporary manuscript copies, which often differ substantially from the autographs, thus making it futile to look for a “final” or “correct” version. Quoting Giuseppe Tartini’s own words “in these small violin sonatas […] the bass is a formality; indeed, I play them without bass, which is the way I really intended them.” Although the first fifteen sonatas have a bass part, undoubtedly written for those who wished to perform them that way, the rest do not, this being a tangible proof that the continuo practice was being abandoned and the bass was no longer being included, not even as “a formality.” Further indications in Tartini’s manuscript suggest that the movements of a sonata had no predetermined position and could be interchanged with other ones from a work in the same or similar tonality. This flexibility was also extended to the order of movements, thus leaving the performer with freedom of choice. Crtomir Šiškovic, violinist from Trieste of Slovenian origin and a specialist in Tartini’s music, chose, for each sonata where there were alternative movements, those that he deemed best for his interpretation. Just as Tartini would have expected. Together with the previous release - Tartini Sonatas for solo violin, Vol. 1, published in 2012 – we are proud to have completed recording the cycle of Tartini’s solo violin sonatas in the year of the 250th anniversary of Tartini’s death.

Katharina Konradi writes: “The labels “Mozart soprano” and “Strauss soprano” are often said to be practically indistinguishable. Indeed, in terms of melodic style, the two composers are not that far apart. Mozart suits my voice well, and the same is true of Richard Straus’s light lyrical repertoire. Then Schubert, with his astoundingly vast lieder output and his variety of musical expression, holds a special place for me. Every time I prepare a recital, these almost inexhaustible treasures take me on a delightful journey of surprising discoveries, and that is what my life as a lieder interpreter is all about...... Every piece on this album has a special appeal for me.”

Julien Chauvin and Le Concert de la Loge join Alpha and launch a new cycle devoted to Mozart. This project is a natural continuation of Julien Chauvin’s work of rediscovery focusing on the interpretation of the music of Haydn and his contemporaries in Paris in the late eighteenth century. The first recording assembles the majestic and grandiose Symphony no.41 in C major, known as the Jupiter, the Violin Concerto no.3 in G major and the Overture to Le nozze di Figaro. Julien Chauvin is, of course, the soloist in the violin concerto and, with his Concert de la Loge (which is no longer ‘Olympique’, since the French National Olympic Sports Committee forced the ensemble to amputate its name in 2016, despite the fact that it dates from...1782), they embark on a Mozartian marathon that promises to be electrifying!

Much of Franz Joseph Haydn’s long career was in service as a court musician to the wealthy Esterházy family. It was early in Haydn’s time at the Esterháza palace that Prince Nicolaus took a liking to the hypnotic sound of the baryton – a bowed instrument with an extra set of strings that vibrate sympathetically or are plucked for tonal contrast. The baryton was considered the pinnacle of 18th-century aristocratic instruments, and the outstanding beauty of Haydn’s trios represent its final renaissance, placing this remarkable antique firmly into the poised and tasteful Classical style of the day. The Valencia Baryton Project comprises musicians from the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía opera house in Valencia and the Opéra Orchestre National Montpellier, who came together with the vision of performing the almost 160 works by Joseph Haydn written for the baryton, a cross between a viola da gamba and a lirone. At the heart of the ensemble is the traditional baryton trio – baryton, viola and cello – for which Haydn wrote 123 works of outstanding beauty during his time as court composer for Prince Esterhazy of Austria. Members of the Valencia Baryton Project have performed in chamber ensembles including Quarteto Radamés Gnattali, the Elan Quintet, Gogmagogs and Trio Vanguardia and with orchestras including the RTVE Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and the BBC Philharmonic. The Valencia Baryton Project is the first ensemble to record the baryton for Naxos.

Praised by The New York Times for her ‘clear articulation … unequivocal phrasing … [and] expressivity’, Ingrid Jacoby has established herself as one of her generation’s most poetic and admired pianists.Winner of numerous prizes and competitions, she has, since moving to England, performed with many major orchestras, including the LSO, the LPO and the RPO, as well as the London Mozart Players, and worked with many eminent conductors.Her new recording of Mozart’s Concertos K467 and K488, complete with the Rondo K386, and accompanied by the internationally celebrated ASMF conducted by Sir Neville Marriner, follows on from her acclaimed earlier recording of the Concertos K449 and K595 which received excellent reviews from Int’l Record Review, Gramophone and Fanfare magazines, among others.The accompanying booklet contains notes by Richard Wigmore and personal insights by Ingrid Jacoby on Mozart.

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

“Some pianists seem to have been born to play Beethoven. Mari Kodama has the tools, as well as the inclination, needed to interpret this composer: a well-centered, beautiful tone, a love of the full range of keyboard colors, and a sensitivity to distinctions in rhythm both great and subtle." -- Audiophile Audition

Hamburger Ratsmusik: an ensemble with a 500-year-old history. This contrast prompts a creative dialogue between tradition and the present day, about Early Music and vivid interpretation. The origins of Hamburg‘s “municipal music” go back to the 16th century. Under the motto “in praise of God and for the pleasure, delight and edification of Hamburg”, the city created an elite ensemble of eight city musicians, which was to be the equal of the princely court ensembles (Hofkapellen) to be found elsewhere. The Ratsmusik attained early excellence in the 17th and 18th centuries under such eminent musicians as William Brade, Johann Schop, Georg Philipp Telemann and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. Revived in 1991 by gambist Simone Eckert, the ensemble now performs in Germany, many European countries, the USA and China. More than 30 albums (largely with world premiere recordings of Early Music) and recordings for all German public radio stations and Austrian broadcaster ORF document its rediscoveries of music from the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. The ensemble received the Echo Klassik award in 2006 and 2010, and was awarded the 2016 RITTER Prize by the Oscar and Vera Ritter Foundation in Hamburg. The musicians will be responding to renewed invitations to China in 2021. Hamburger Ratsmusik is the Ensemble in Residence in the Komponisten-Quartier museum complex in Hamburg.

Barbirolli made two earlier recordings of Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique in 1947 (mono) and 1958 (early stereo), both with the Halle Orchestra. This new live recording with the SWF orchestra in Baden-Baden from 1969 is in state-of-the-art stereo sound and does full justice to Berlioz's wonderful score. Likewise, Haydn's Symphony No.83 the Hen always remained a Barbirolli favorite. He first recorded it in 1949 in mono but here it is captured in excellent stereo 20 years later and released in 2013 for the first time.

Composed in the summer and autumn of 1781, Haydn’s Op. 33 Quartets were dedicated to the Grand Duke Paul of Russia and premiered on Christmas Day that year in the apartment of the Duke’s wife, the Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna. Nicknamed ‘the Russian quartets’, Op. 33 were some of Mozart’s favourites among Haydn’s works, and inspired Mozart to write his own set of six quartets, of 1785, dedicated to Haydn. Generally light in nature, the Op. 33 are extremely tuneful works, all set in major keys (apart from No. 1, in B minor), and all written in four movements. Founded in 1998, and exclusive Chandos recording artists since 2010, the Doric String Quartet has established itself as one of the leading quartets of its generation, receiving enthusiastic responses from audiences and critics alike. Previous releases in this series of Quartets by Haydn have been acclaimed by critics around the world.

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

From the Queen of the Night’s vocal pyrotechnics to Papageno’s chirpy birdsongs, The Magic Flute is one of Mozart’s most charming and engaging operas. However, its fairytale surface conceals the mysteries of an initiation ritual and a multi-layered plot, packed with allegories to fire up the imagination. This celebrated production by artist William Kentridge joyfully bursts onto the stage of Teatro alla Scala in Milan, featuring the dazzling Russian coloratura Albina Shagimuratova as the Queen of the Night, and Italian bass Alex Esposito as Papageno, one of the most sought after artists of his generation.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE (Blu-ray Disc Version)

Sarastro – Günther Groissböck
Tamino – Saimir Pirgu
Queen of the Night – Albina Shagimuratova
Pamina – Genia Kühmeier
Papagena – Ailish Tynan
Papageno – Alex Esposito
Monostatos – Peter Bronder


Milan La Scala Chorus and Orchestra
Roland Böer, conductor

William Kentridge, stage director

Recorded live at La Teatro alla Scala, 20 March 2011

Bonus:
- Overview of The Magic Flute
- Illustrated synopsis

Picture format: 1080i High Definition
Sound format: LPCM 2.0 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish
Running time: 150 mins
No. of Discs: 1

*** This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD or HD DVD players. ***

The NDR Philharmonie and Andrew Manze continue their exploration of Mozart’s late orchestral works with a recording of the composers 38th and 39th symphonies. Nicknamed after Prague, where it was first performed in 1787, the 38th shares with its successor a solemn, “Romantic” slow introduction to the first movement, followed by lighter music that shares a kinship with the playful arias and ensembles of Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni, composed in the same period. By playing all repeats, Manze underlines the ambitious, expansive character of these works, but the NDR Radiophilharmonie never drags, offering the same energy and sense of urgency as in their acclaimed interpretation of Mozart’s 40th and 41st symphonies, released in 2019. In their collaboration, Andrew Manze brings his experience in the field of historically-informed performance to the polished symphonic sound of the NDR Radiophilharmonie, resulting in a prize-winning complete cycle of Mendelssohn symphonies (2017-2018), as well as highly-praised interpretations of Mozart’s 40th and 41st symphonies (2019) and Beethoven’s 5th and 7th symphonies (2020), all released on PENTATONE.

REVIEW:

This recording completes the set of the last Mozart symphonies by these forces conducted by Andrew Manze after their superb coupling of Nos. 40 and 41 from 2019 (PTC5186757). I was surprised that that recording didn’t garner more admiring reviews. I hope this new release gets the plaudits its companion didn’t get but certainly deserved.

Manze is one of the most interesting conductors around at the moment. Whether it is his excellent Vaughan Williams symphony series (Onyx) or his positive contributions to the dazzling Martin Helmchen’s recordings of the Beethoven piano concertos (Alpha), whatever Manze is up to is always worth listening to.

Pentatone continue their current run of state-of-the-art recordings and, as I have indicated, the NDR Radiophilharmonie play like a dream for Manze. This is wonderful Mozart. Unless you have an absolute need to hear this music played on period instruments, this is a recording to get.

– MusicWeb International