This special recording of the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart under Georges Pr�tre comprises two symphonic poems by Richard Strauss and his Rosenkavalier-Suite Op. 59. Richard Strauss was a pioneer in the genre of the tone poem. The tone poems that he wrote are still considered to be the high point of program music. He extended the boundaries of program music and took the concept of realism in music to an unprecedented level. He widened the expressive range of music, while depicting subjects many times thought unsuitable for musical depiction. French conductor Georges Pretre made his Paris debut at the Opera-Comique conducting the work of Richard Strauss, no doubt creating a special place in Pretre's heart for Strauss's music. This album is part of a new re-release series (Century Classics) consisting of SWR music bestsellers. The series is competitively priced, optically highly attractive and contains acclaimed SWR recordings mostly of the SWR orchestras and their chief conductors.

Classical Music

The Oslo Philharmonic and Vasily Petrenko present the first of a new series of recordings of Richard Strauss' orchestral music. This first release features the great tone poems "Also Sprach Zarathustra" and "Ein Heldenleben," both works the Oslo Philharmonic has a long history of performing at home and abroad. Vasily Petrenko, chief conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic since 2013, exploits the special intensity of the orchestra's string sound and it's magnificent wind and brass sections to full effect in this thrillingly virtuosic music. Vasily Petrenko is one of the most significant and galvanizing musicians alive, and has won numerous accolades for his recordings of Russian repertoire, including two Gramophone awards. With the Oslo Philharmonic, he has recorded works by Shostakovich, Szymanowski, Strauss and Prokofiev, as well as a major cycle of orchestral works by Alexander Scriabin. The Oslo Philharmonic was born in 1919 and over the next half-century, the orchestra's reputation grew steadily. In 1979, it changed forever with the arrival of a young Latvian arriving in Norway, Mariss Jansons, who transformed it to rival the great Philharmonics of Vienna, Berlin and New York.

Representing the most promising of the younger generation of performers, both German soprano Katharina Persicke and pianist, Nicholas Rimmer have garnered much attention and increasing acclaim with their respective performances and recordings with each of them in much demand with Persicke, slated to make her Bayreuth debut in 2016. Both prove equal to these youthful lieder of Richard Strauss taken from the first part of his impressively long composing career.

Classical Music

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Richard Strauss spent nearly a decade and a half writing Eine Alpensinfonie, a work describing the impressions of a mountain hike with such clarity that the score could almost be considered film music sans film. Don Juan's premiere (1889) established the reputation of the 24-year-old Strauss as the most important composer since Richard Wagner. Francois -Xavier Roth, one of the most charismatic and enterprising conductors of his generation, took on the role of Principal Conductor of the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg in September 2011.

This is the second installment in the recording of Richard Strauss' symphonic poems with Francois-Xavier Roth and the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden and Freiburg. His 'transparent orchestral balance' has been praised by BBC Music Magazine.

This CD marks the beginning of a new recording cycle of the complete symphonic poems of Richard Strauss as performed by the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg and their principal conductor, Francois-Xavier Roth.

- Richard Strauss' Sonata for Violin and Piano in E flat major op. 18 is a work with a Janus face, illustrating the past and the present and pointing ahead to the future. - It mirrors the composer's musical roots, such as in the second movement which contains references to Beethoven's 'Pathetique' and Schubert's Der Erlk�nig, whilst the first and final movements are influenced by Schumann, on the one hand, and express Strauss' current enthusiasm for Wagner's Tristan, on the other. - By contrast, the hidden allusions to his own tone poem Don Juan show the way the composer wanted to go in the near future.

These youthful chamber works by Richard Strauss, not widely represented on disc, are filled with sparkling inventiveness and lyricism. Written at the age of thirteen, his charming Piano Trio No. 1 follows the models of Mozart and Beethoven.

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Michael Tilson Thomas conducts the London Symphony Orchestra in this 2 DVD set of performances of Strauss works. Also included is extensive rehearsal footage and educational insight from a master communicator.

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Thomas Albertus Irnberger and the Israel Chamber Orchestra – they are an ‘entente musicale’ of the highest standard, as evinced by the previously released Violin Concertos by Hans Gál, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and Karl Goldmark. This new release, with conductor Martin Sieghart, features the rarely heard Violin Concerto in D minor op. 8 by the young Richard Strauss, followed by his Sonata for Violin and Piano in E flat major op. 18, completed only a few years later, in 1888. Mr. Irnberger’s accompanist on piano is Michael Korstick.