Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

The latest in their highly regarded Wagner opera series, Halle presents the live recording of their acclaimed Bridgewater Hall performance. Das Rheingold stands as the Varabent or "Preliminary Evening" of Wagner's epic Der Ring des Nibelungen, designed to be free of the traditional operatic concepts of aria and operatic chorus, and presented as the more epic Buhenfestspiel or "stage festival play," with the linking of dramatic elements through the use of musical motifs. The album was recorded at the Bridgewater Hall, capturing all the drama of the acclaimed live performance. The release was produced by Halle's award-winning engineer Steve Portnoi. "The Halle were the stars, responsive to every nuance of Elder's direction." (The Times on Halle's performance of Das Rheingold) "Elder's interpretation combined lyricism with drama in a way that only the greatest Wagner conductors can realize." (Opera Magazine on Halle's performance of Das Rheingold)

The Halle and Sir Mark Elder follow their previous highly acclaimed DeBussy albums, with a stunning orchestral collection including a world premiere recording. This collection features works from across the composer's career, from his early winning of the Prix de Rome, as a result of which he composed the delicate cantata La Demoiselle elue in 1887. Recorded following the highly acclaimed Proms performance and featuring stand-out soloists Anna Stephany and Sophie Bevan, hailed by reviewers. The enigmatic Nocturnes date from 1897-9 and show the composer at the height of his orchestral powers, in music that is highly evocative of mood and which displays deft instrumental writing. Mastery of instrumental writing is further evidenced in the technically demanding Premiere Rhapsodie, which calls upon the full range of emotions from the soloist; here the Halle's Principal Clarinet, Sergio Castello Lopez. The album features a world premiere recording of Colin Matthew's orchestration of the piano piece Les soirs illumines par l'ardeur du charbon, unknown until it's discovery in 2001. This arrangement follows Matthews' universally acclaimed orchestrations of the DeBussy Preludes.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Hallé and Sir Mark Elder are reunited with Sunwook Kim in long awaited studio recordings of repertoire with which he won the Leeds Piano Competition. London-based Sunwook Kim came to international recognition when he won the prestigious Leeds International Piano Competition in 2006, aged just 18, becoming the competition's youngest winner for 40 years, as well as its first Asian winner. His performance of Brahms's Concerto No. 1 with Hallé and Sir Mark Elder in the competition's finals attracted unanimous praise from the press. Since then, he has established a reputation as one of the finest pianists of his generation, appearing as a concerto soloist with many of the world's leading orchestras and in major recital venues in London, across Europe and in Japan. Sunwook Kim has also enjoyed an ongoing relationship with the Hallé Orchestra and Sir Mark Elder, performing in a variety of repertoire across a number of seasons. Here they return to Brahms' two masterworks; pieces which were separated by two decades and which display very differing musical and emotional outlooks, from the more ardent First to the more rhapsodic Second. Elder and Kim perform the Second Concerto together at the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester in April 2017.

Described as being "one of his most important utterances," Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 was written as a response to the sinister unsigned article which appeared in Pravda, the state newspaper, in January 1936, denouncing the composer and implying the ultimate threat, during the time of Stalin's "Great Terror." Whilst the messages of the Symphony have been subject to a variety of often conflicting interpretations, the music and vivid orchestral writing, to which the Halle live performance fully attests, have earned it a leading place in the composer's legacy. In coupling the Symphony with the Four Romances which immediately pre-date it, Elder sheds light on his interpretation of the meaning of the Symphony. The latter work quotes thematic material used in the first of the Pushkin settings in which faith is expressed that art can survive even the most brutal oppression and desecration, perhaps revealing an element of pride that the composer had been true to his art in the face of state threats. James Platt is one of the leading British singers of his generation who frequently appears in the major opera houses across Europe and in concert performances with leading international ensembles and conductors.