Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
33 products
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Johanna Senfter: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 9
$21.99CDCapriccio
May 15, 2026C5555 -
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Zygmunt Noskowski: Symphony No. 3
$21.99CDCapriccio
Aug 01, 2025C5547 -
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Johanna Senfter: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 9
Shostakovich: The Gadfly (Complete) / Fitz-Gerald, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Set in mid-nineteenth-century Italy during a turbulent period of pre-Unification political unrest, The Gadfly drew from Shostakovich one of his most dazzling and popular film scores, heard hitherto on record only in a suite arranged and reorchestrated by Levon Atovmian. This recording presents the full, original score for the first time, as closely as possible to shostakovich’s original conception. Reconstructed by Mark Fitz-Gerald from the original manuscript and the Russian film soundtrack, it calls for a large orchestra including church bells, an organ, two guitars and a mandolin, all excluded from the Atovmian suite. The excerpts from The Counterplan, which marked the fifteenth anniversary of the 1917 Revolution, include the infectious hit-tune The Song of the Counterplan.
Complete Symphonies, Concertos & Chamber Music
VIOLIN CONCERTOS
Schumann: Symphonies Nos. 1-4
Braunfels: Fantastical Apparitions & Sinfonia Brevis / Buhl, Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic
Walter Braunfels is a composer whose music died twice: Once when the Nazis declared his music “degenerate art”. Then again when post-war Germany had little use for the various schools of tonal music; when the arbiters of taste considered any form of romantic music – almost the whole pre-war aesthetic – to be tainted. This 7th release of Capriccio’s Braunfels Edition shows again his large range of colorful music and focus this time on his early great Orchestral work Fantastical Apparitions Of a Theme by Hector Berlioz, Op. 25 (1914-1917) - the first complete recording of this amazing composition, compiled with his last orchestral work, the Sinfonia brevis op. 69 (1948).
REVIEW:
Aside from hearing the Berlioz Variations in their splendid entirety, the interpretations here are also worthy. Buhl leads them with dramatic motion, pointing up their considerable orchestral flair.
– American Record Guide
Weigl: Symphonies Nos. 4 & 6
In terms of style, with his works linked to basic tonalities Weigl drew on the sound realm of late Romanticism, from whose aesthetics he never departed in favour of more progressive contemporary trends. Whereas Weigl’s Symphony No. 1, written in 1908, associatively evokes the mood of a composer thinking of new territory and inquiring into the future, the dissimilar pair of his Symphonies Nos. 4 and 6 shows the musician’s intellect at historically distinctive periods, allowing an assessment to be made as to whether what could be expected, intended and hoped for at the time of his early works was achieved or whether it developed in an entirely different manner. The background to Symphony No. 4 in 1936 was the emergence of dictatorial Austro-Fascism. Symphony No. 6 of 1947 is in a certain sense a continuation and a conclusion following the end of the Nazi terror and a war that did not remain without profound changes and far-reaching effects for almost all the countries in the world.
Krenek: Orchestral Works / Steffens, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie
From the outset, Ernst Krenek stood between the sometimes antagonistic musical worlds of his mentor Franz Schreker, on the one hand, who wrote in the world of late Romanticism, and Arnold Schoenberg, on the other, who broke new ground. So, his own development towards becoming a unique personality in modern music history progressed correspondingly slowly. In his subsequent travelling years, as a composer he was on a quest for new means of expression, finally culminating in two such contrasting works as the jazz opera Jonny spielt auf and the technically strictly twelve-tone opera Karl V. Afterwards, he occasionally resorted to these earlier stylistic devices like we can hear on this recording as example of the 1927 composed Potpourri and years later written Tricks and Trifles (1945)
Weigl: Symphony No. 1 & Pictures and Tales / Bruns, Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic
Braunfels: Works for Piano & Orchestra / Buhl, Blome, Rheinlands-Pfalz State Philharmonic
Walter Braunfels is a composer whose music died twice: Once when the Nazis declared his music “degenerate art”. Then again when post-war Germany had little use for the various schools of tonal music; when the arbiters of taste considered any form of romantic music – almost the whole pre-war aesthetic – to be tainted. This sixth release of Capriccio’s Braunfels Edition shows again his large range of colorful music and focus this time on his works for piano and orchestra from three different periods of his life: his first complete orchestral work, the Witches Sabbath, op. 8 (1906), the Concert piece for piano and orchestra op. 64 (1946) and one of his last compositions the Hebridian Dances op. 70 (1950/51). Tatjana Blome is the featured pianist on this release.
Antheil: Jazz Symphony & Other Works / Steffens, Dupree, Rheinland-Pfalz State Phil
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REVIEW:
Thanks in large part to Karl-Heinz Steffens’s interpretation, I’d argue that A Jazz Symphony, despite its blatant references to Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, are woven inextricably into the music’s narrative structure. Steffens underscores the work’s unifying characteristics rather than emphasizing its incongruities.
Pianist Frank Dupree’s finely chiseled performance in the First Piano Concerto maintains a tighter grip overall than any of his rivals.
– Gramophone
Kabalevsky: Pathetique Overture, Violin Concerto, Vesna & Colas Breugnon / Steffens, Deutsche State Philharmonic
Many of the today-distinguished Soviet composers in the second half of the 20th century knew how to steer a middle course, enabling them to supply what was officially desirable all the while remaining faithful to themselves, writing the music they wanted to write. Kabalevsky was a Jack of all musical trades and, as a specialist for children’s music especially, cultivated a highly personal style, keeping easily within the bounds of comprehensible tonal aesthetics. His works are characterized by some of the features typical of Kabalevsky’s overall oeuvre: a cornucopia of melodious imagination, dance rhythms, above all in the fast movements, expansive slow sections and a positive, often cheerful tone. The present release presents a selection of his orchestral works alongside his violin concerto.
Shostakovich: The Bedbug & Love and Hate / Fitz-Gerald, Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic
Shostakovich was still a young composer when he was hired to provide incidental music for The Bedbug, a surreal and farcical satire on Communist utopian dreams and bourgeois corruption and vulgarity. He produced a terrifically knockabout score that draws on local fireman’s bands and American dance music. Illustrated by Shostakovich’s powerful middle-period music, Love and Hate is a film about female fortitude set in a mining village during the 1919 Civil War. The innovative score, newly reconstructed by Mark Fitz-Gerald from rough piano sketches and the 1935 soundtrack, combines symphonic sections with popular songs.
Natanael Berg: Symphonies No 1 & 2 / Rasilainen, Et Al
Pejacevic: Symphony, Op. 41; Phantasie Concertante / Rasilainen, Banfield, Rheinland-pfalz State Philharmonic
PEJA?EVI? Symphony in f?. Phantasie Concertante for Piano and Orchestra • Ari Rasilainen, cond; Volker Banfield (pn); Rheinland-Pfalz St PO • CPO 777418 (62:42)
Cpo, a label noted for ferreting out obscure repertoire, has outdone itself this time by digging up not just another female composer—that alone wouldn’t be so rare—but a Croatian one to boot. Heretofore, I don’t think I could have named a single Croatian composer of any gender, but now I can. Short-lived Dora Peja?evi? (1885–1923) was actually born in Budapest, the daughter of a Croatian father and a Hungarian mother, the Countess Lilla Vay de Vaya, an accomplished pianist and Dora’s first teacher. On her father’s side, Dora was descended from a distinguished noble family in Slavonia, the eastern region of Croatia. In composition, she was largely self-taught, but she did receive some private instruction in Zagreb, Dresden, and Munich. She died at 38 following complications of childbirth.
During her short life, she produced 58 documented works. That number isn’t particularly noteworthy compared to other composers who died even younger and wrote much more, but what is worth mentioning is that like another female composer, the French Louise Farrenc (1804–75), Peja?evi? competed with the boys in the arena of large symphonic, concerted orchestral, and chamber works. In addition to the symphony and concert fantasy on this disc, known and/or published works include a piano concerto, sonatas for piano, violin, and cello, and a piano quintet. During her life, her music was not entirely unknown in the music capitals of Europe; it was heard in Vienna, Munich, Budapest, and Prague.
The works Peja?evi? left behind, to the extent they were acknowledged at all, must have seemed hopelessly outdated by a musical intelligentsia preoccupied with the latest compositional novelties. It’s not just that she embraced a musical vocabulary practically indistinguishable from any number of late 19th-century Romantic composers, but by the time she came to begin her F?-Minor Symphony in 1916, completing it a year later, the era of the big Romantic symphony was on life support, or at least on recuperative leave. Mahler had pretty much seen to that a decade earlier. Last-stand efforts by Rachmaninoff, Sibelius, Franz Schmidt, and a number of others didn’t change the fact that the symphony, as inherited from the 19th century, was about to take on new forms and modes of expression in the 20th.
Peja?evi?’s symphony, like Rachmaninoff’s Second, may have been written in the 20th century, but it belongs to the 19th. It’s your standard-issue four-movement effusively romantic affair—a rich tapestry spun from strands of long-breathed chromatically enhanced melody, luxuriant harmony, and opulent orchestration. It doesn’t seem to be much influenced by the Mahler-Zemlinsky-Schoenberg axis, though perhaps that shouldn’t be a surprise considering the very complex cultural cross-pollination of Croatia’s history by Hungarian, Italian, and even Russian influences. In fact, isolated passages throughout Peja?evi?’s symphony remind me a bit of Glazunov. But there are so many other crosscurrents going on in the score, not least of which is a passage at 7:54 in the first movement that sounds like it escaped from Dukas’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice . But it quickly morphs into something that sounds like it was lifted from Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony.
If there’s any surprise at all in Peja?evi?’s piece it’s how upbeat and optimistic it sounds for a work ostensibly in a minor key. Her melodies have an almost Italianate character to them in their lithe and graceful manner, and if the title and notes didn’t identify the piece as being in minor, I’d bet the farm it was in major.
The piano Phantasie Concertante came two years after completion of the symphony. In a single movement lasting almost 15 minutes, the piece is a virtuoso vehicle that alternates between Gershwin-like bluesy harmonies and jazzy rhythms on the one hand and keyboard figuration right out of Rachmaninoff on the other. Just listen to the broad, lush melody beginning in the cellos at 6:12 and the florid passagework in the piano weaving around and entwining with it. It could have come from the first movement of Rachmaninoff’s Second Concerto. I hope someone from Hyperion is reading this, because Peja?evi?’s Phantasie and probably her piano concerto as well are ideal candidates for the next volume of the Romantic Piano Concerto series.
When you hear this piece you will wonder how Peja?evi? could have been forgotten. If the climax to the lengthy aforementioned passage doesn’t sweep you away, I can’t think of much else that will. The fact that Peja?evi? could develop, build, and sustain a musical paragraph of such length is evidence in itself that the woman could write circles around many of her peers, male or female.
Pianist Volker Banfield is stunning, as are conductor Ari Rasilainen and his Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic forces. Cpo has done it again. I thought I’d already settled on my annual Want List selections, but this dark horse entry is just going to have to push another pick aside. Urgently recommended.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
Nutcracker Unwrapped - Winter Tales from Around the World
Xiaogang Ye: Seven Episodes for Lin'an / Ollu, Malzew, German State Philharmonic of Rheinland-Pfalz
Szymanowski: Concert Overture, Sinfonia Concertante, etc. / Steffens, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie
The trouble with describing the music of an unfamiliar composer is that one reverts to comparisons with better-known ones – as if originality of voice is given only to those whose music has crossed the fickle threshold of popular taste.
With the Concert Overture which opens the disc, one can possibly be excused this, for if any music ever sounded like a Richard Strauss tone poem, this does. From its boisterous opening to its triumphal conclusion, it is a feast of Straussian gestures and ideas, a wonderful orchestral romp and a stirring musical journey. And this is what Szymanowski intended, for in 1904 when he wrote it, Richard Strauss was the dominant figure. If the booklet notes are to be believed, Szymanowski deliberately aped the style of Strauss “as a provocation to the, in his view, completely fossilized structures of Polish music”.
At this point we must break off to mention those booklet notes, tightly compressed into a distinctly unappealing booklet which seems designed to put off potential buyers. Christian Heindl’s German text is dense enough, striving to place Szymanowksi in some sort of context with Polish music at the start of the last century. But the English translation (claiming to be the work of one Ian Mansfield) is a disgrace. Seeming to have done little more than run the original German through a free online translator, and not even having made the effort to check the spelling afterwards, Mansfield comes up with such incoherent nonsense as; “he ranks as one of the many tone wolves and practically outsiders in music”, “the composer instrumented the cycle for chamber orchestra”, and “meaningful for the concert hall and fathoming it to the depths”.
Soprano Marisol Montalvo is, thankfully, infinitely more eloquent in the cycle of five songs, Slopiewnie, which bears the same opus number as Szymanowski’s great opera, King Roger but is otherwise unconnected. Exotic, sometimes harmonically brittle, sparsely orchestrated but highly effective, these are a world away from the lush world of Strauss’s orchestral songs and present a musical voice which is both distinctive and accomplished. There is nothing identifiably Polish about these settings of Polish texts by Julian Tuwim, but the booklet note suggests the musical idiom is derived from Gorals, an ethnic group which “has its area of distribution in the Polish Tatra and the Beskids, but also in parts of Slovakia”. It also observes some stylistic parallels with Stravinsky and Les Noces. Montalvo has a pure, shining vocal quality with an innately focused sense of pitch.
The major work on the disc is the Fourth Symphony, subtitled Sinfonia Concertante, but which is, to all intents and purposes, a fully-fledged piano concerto. Szymanowski wrote the work for himself to play (although he dedicated it to Artur Rubinstein) and called it a Symphony to disguise his shortcomings as a concerto soloist. Ewa Kupiec is the fleet-fingered soloist, delivering the almost Ravelian delicacy of the first movement with a refreshingly light touch supported by the kind of clear-textured orchestration which seems such a feature of Szymanowski. Even as the movement builds up to its great climax, the feeling of delicacy and suppleness Kupiec brings to the performance is never lost, and Karl-Heinz Steffens seems to have an instinctive feel for the balance which comes across even when the recording engineers have done little to assist. A gentle, fluttering second movement introduces all manner of magical orchestral effects, much in the manner of a Bartók night-music movement but built around Polish rather than Hungarian folk songs. And in the final movement it is the spirit of Polish dances which seems to dominate in music that sounds like Ravel and Bartók holding hands but is, in reality, uniquely the voice of Szymanowski – stunning orchestral writing, impeccably crafted moments of climax and repose and an exotic musical language which is utterly enthralling. Steffens maintains a wonderfully incisive rhythmic momentum which his German players throw themselves into with great gusto.
The Nocturne and Tarantella is an orchestration, made two years after Szymanowski’s death by Grzegorz Fitelberg, of a work originally written for violin and piano. It draws attention to Szymanowski’s fondness for the exotic, combining Spanish and Italian elements in a scintillating dance-like display, where only the final cadence seems indicative of a composer not quite of the very first rank, but with a voice all his own.
– MusicWeb International (Marc Rochester)
Brandl: Symphonie Concertante, Op. 20 & Symphony in C Major / Griffiths, Deutsche Philharmonic
When Johann Evangelist Brandl wrote his Symphonie concertante op. 20, he had more time to concentrate on composing free of court occasions and to exploit in full his own capabilities rather than focusing on the planning and performing of concerts. Therefore his Symphonie concertante, like the one by Mozart, can be viewed as a sort of visiting card, and with it Brandl wanted to put out his feelers in quest of new appointments. Like Mozart, in his work with two solo instruments Brandl has the dimensions of the first movement noticeably expand in view of the solo concerto and in this way gives both soloists space and time to present all the themes and motifs in succession as well as to elaborate them with great virtuosity. What our two soloists, the Castro-Balbi brothers, display in breathtaking virtuosity is simply sensational. Brandl had composed his four-movement Symphony in D major with a dazzling finale as a “Grande Simphonie à grand Orchestre” some ten years earlier. Already then Brandl anticipated a lot of Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony op. 60, which first was completed in 1806. Something of the quest for new sound worlds that the Rhinelander Beethoven envisioned is also in evidence in Brandl, who was ten years his senior. Today musicologists are discovering in Brandl an artist whose musical language above all toward the end of his creative career surmounted the style of Classicism and instead favored a sharpened chromaticism and already exhibited Early Romantic characteristics.
Vaughan Williams: Orchestral Works / Steffens, Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic
Together with his friend Holst, at the beginning of the 20th century Ralph Vaughan Williams deliberately took the course of liberating himself from ''German influence'', as they called it, working for original British music. He found models and inspiration in original English folk music. Most of the works recorded here rank among the less known pieces by the composer, but all of them very clearly reflect the personal hue, the absolutely ''personal style'' of Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Reger: Orchestral Songs / Buhl, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
In order to take a respite and, in his own worlds, “to recuperate,” from his own compositions, Max Reger frequently engaged in “piece work,” in which he would arrange works by other composers. This release includes Reger’s original work 5 Orchestral Songs, as well as Reger’s arrangements of songs for voice and orchestra from Edvard Grieg, Johannes Brahms, Hugo Wolf, and Franz Schubert. Conductor Gregor Buhl has made his mark as an opera conductor. He also frequently performs on the concert stage with the Radio Symphony Orchestras of Berlin, Hamburg, and Leizip, and the Helsinki Philharmonic.
Sutermeister: Orchestral Works, Vol. 2 / Held, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Heinrich Sutermeister (1910–95) belongs to the generation of Swiss composers after Bloch, Honegger, Martin and Schoeck. His operatic version of Romeo and Juliet soon spread his reputation far afield, and conductors as prominent as Bohm, Karajan and Sawallisch championed his works, although since his death his music has not had the attention it deserves. These four big-boned works – a powerful setting of Boethius, an extract from Romeo und Julia and two sets of moving love-letters from genuine historical figures in Renaissance, Baroque and Enlightenment Germany and Switzerland – attest to the acuity of his ear in balancing voice and large orchestra and confirm his instinct for drama.
Nelson Freire - The SWR Recordings
Zygmunt Noskowski: Symphony No. 3
Rózsa: Sinfonia concertante / Bühl, Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Labor: Left Hand Piano Concertos / Triendl, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Besides the well-known Left Hand Piano Concertos by Korngold, Prokofiev, Ravel and others, this very first Concert of Josef Labor marks the beginning of this genre in 1915.
One-Handed pianist Paul Wittgenstein ordered it already during his captivity in Russia where he lost his right arm but determined to forward his pianistic career. Labor was part of Johannes Brahms’s close circle of friends. At the age of three, he lost his sight due to smallpox. For him composition was a luxury, insofar as he had to rely on the help of a scribe who had to commit the work to paper. Labor’s music is very skillfully composed, always sensuous, and first and foremost melodious; it does not require a too complete concentration on itself. These World Premiere Recordings marks an highlight of Capriccio's Labor-Edition which focused already since years on this sensitive Music of an mostly forgotten composer.
Rózsa: Orchestral Works / Bühl, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Miklós Rózsa feared that success as a film composer might overshadow his reputation as a composer of classical concert fare. He was right. Three Oscars and 17 Academy Award nominations tends to do that. The two worlds were strangely incompatible and forced Rózsa into what he called his “Double Life” – the title of both a film for which he won an Oscar and that of his autobiography. The three orchestral works presented here, from his early, middle and late phases, provide a charming introduction to his alternative side.
REVIEW:
Works like the ones on this album ought to appeal to lovers of any of Rosza’s many film scores; the musical language is not that far off. The orchestra, an underrated regional group, gives crisp performances under conductor Gregor Bühl on a release that should appeal to both film buffs and fans of 20th century music generally.
— AllMusic.com (James Manheim)
Noskowski: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 "Elegiac" / Wit, Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
Although he had famous students (i.e. Szymanowski) and teachers (Moniuszko), few listeners know much, if anything, about Zygmunt Noskowski (1846–1909). And yet, for most of the 19th century, he was the primary exponent of modern symphonic music in Poland. As a conductor and concert organizer, he had himself championed the causes of forgotten Polish composers. Now it is Antoni Wit, Noskowski’s successor at the helm of the Warsaw Philharmonic at a distance of 94, who helps out his late-romantic colleague – just as he has already done with the music Zygmunt Stojowski on a previous Capriccio recording (C5464).
REVIEW:
When you listen to the music of Zygmunt Noskowski, you can’t help but notice that all of the elemental characteristics of late 19th century orchestral music are present. The intense seriousness of Brahms, the romantic idealism of Schumann, as well as the folk-influenced melodic writing of Dvorák. And within its overall sunny disposition, it even points to some of Bruckner’s more lighthearted scherzo movements.
There’s a heartwarming ease and charm to the inner slow movements of these symphonies, as well as dramatic and rhythmic fervor to the outer movements. All aspects that Polish conductor Antoni Wit brings to the forefront. The members of the Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz perform this music with enthusiasm and the same attention to expressive details they would apply to any and all repertoire standbys and warhorses. Makes you wonder why Zygmunt Noskowski’s name doesn’t come up to the surface more often.
-- Classical Music Sentinel
Weigl: Symphony No. 3; Symphonic Prelude / Bruns, Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
The two works recorded on this disc both come from a creative period at the beginning of the 1930s. In terms of style, with his works linked to basic tonalities, Weigl drew on the sound realm of late Romanticism, from whose aesthetics he never departed in favour of more progressive contemporary trends. Weigl’s knack for orchestration shows both in the hymnic climaxes as well as the chamber music-like passages. Weigl never lived to hear any performances of either his Third Symphony or the Symphonic Prelude. Like so many of his larger works, these scores were not (re-)discovered until interest in Weigl’s music resurged decades later. This release allows audiences to hear both works for the first time on record.
REVIEW:
Stylistically, the pieces clearly show Weigl’s own voice, even as they remain close to the late-Romantic symphonic style.
The symphony's rich palette of development and treatment leads from intimate moments of chamber music to grand climaxes. The large orchestration of the Symphonic Prelude indicates that it was intended for the concert hall rather than as incidental music. Overall, the works remain rooted in traditional sounds.
Weigl was unable to experience performances of these works. The new interest in his music is also reflected in these premiere recordings. The Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz and conductor Jürgen Bruns illuminate these works with successful commitment.
— Pizzicato (Uwe Krusch)
