Lars Vogt (1970-2022) early recordings collected here provide a document of an artist who always remained authentic, both to himself and to music. Lars Vogt never sought absolute truth, but truthfulness instead meant all the more to him. The man and the artist were always very close, never currying favour and never detached from the world. He was, instead, open and natural. "It's incredibly gratifying when you notice that you can perhaps light a little spark, a little flame for music in people, and when music helps you to find the path to your own soul."

KEILBERTH ICON (50TH ANNIVERSARY OF DEATH JULY)

ARTIST: Itzhak Perlman TITLE: Brahms: Piano Trios Nos. 1 - 3 Warner Classics/Parlophone. Perlman, Harrell and Ashkenazy - formidable soloists who make a committed team of chamber musicians - followed their recorded collaboration in Beethoven and Tchaikovsky with this collection of Brahms's four piano trios. Happy Birthday, Mr. Perlman! Warner Classics is proud to celebrate Itzhak Perlman's 70th birthday with several releases. Itzhak is adored by audiences around the world and is a musician whose powerful but sympathetic artistic personality provides a model for the players who have followed him. All 59 albums will are also being released individually and all recordings from the analogue era have been carefully remastered in 24-bit/96kHz sound at Abbey Road Studios. The box set also includes a 96 page hardback book. The celebration also includes the 3 CD set The Perlman Sound, a single LP also titled The Perlman Sound, and The center piece is the 77 CD box set Itzhak Perlman: The Complete Warner Recordings. This 59 album set contains all the recordings he made for EMI Classics and also for Erato and Teldec.

For five decades Wolfgang Sawallisch (1923-2013) held a central position in the musical world. That centrality was reflected in a series of top orchestral and operatic posts and in his interpretations, free of self-regarding eccentricities. His modest but highly effective conducting technique also made him the ideal recording artist. Sawallisch was a Bavarian born in Munich, city of orchestras and a great opera company, which he headed for 21 years. He started his career as an outstanding pianist and remained a sought-after accompanist to great Lieder singers and instrumentalists. Volume 1 of a complete conspectus of his Warner Classics recordings (made for Electrola and EMI Classics between 1954 to 1997) includes wonderful Lieder and song collaborations, as well as famous concerto accompaniments for eminent soloists and a heartwarming traversal of Schubert's secular vocal and sacred choral music with Bavarian Radio colleagues. But the main focus among the 65 discs is on his symphonic achievements: Beethoven, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Bruckner and Dvor�k - the latter's Eighth Symphony was his first published recording, from 1954. Richard Strauss, an early influence, is strongly represented. This 65CD-box brings together all the non-operatic recordings that the German conductor and pianist Wolfgang Sawallisch (1923-2013) made in the years from 1954 to 1997 for EMI Classics and Electrola (now Warner Classics).

The Catalan cellist Pablo Casals (1876-1973) was first to bring to wider notice the works that open this set, J.S. Bach's solo cello suites. Thereafter we hear his celebrated partnership with Horszowski in Beethoven and the groundbreaking piano trio formed with Thibaud and Cortot in Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn. From the symphonic repertoire come the concertos by Dvořák (with George Szell) and Elgar (Adrian Boult). Finally, an enchanting disc of encores and - with Casals's own street-band or cobla - seven examples of the sardana, the national dance of the great artist's beloved homeland.

This box set comprises all the operas and sacred works Otto Klemperer conducted for EMI Columbia and HMV. Oratorios by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms and Handel are accompanied by operas of Beethoven, Mozart and Wagner. There are also rehearsals and listening playback sessions for the recording of Mozart's Don Giovanni and a Bonus CD with recollections from artists who sang in Klemperer's opera performances. Otto Klemperer deeply loved both the theatricality of opera and the spirituality of oratorios, and these performances from his great Indian Summer represent the fruits of his lifetime of thought and experience in this repertoire.

Today one of the most highly respected string quartets, the Belcea were established in 1994 at the Royal College of Music in London and studied with the Chilingirian, the Amadeus, and later the Alban Berg quartets. Today one of the most highly respected string quartets, the Belcea were established in 1994 at the Royal College of Music in London and studied with the Chilingirian, the Amadeus, and later the Alban Berg quartets. They recorded for EMI Classics across nearly a decade, between 2000 and 2009, bringing about tremendous versions of quartets by Schubert, Britten, Bartók, and Mozart, to name a few.

"The Belcea Quartet throw every fibre of their beings into the most vivid projection of the masterpieces they undertake." - The Independent "These recordings form a crucial part of our life as a quartet and we hope that over the ensuing years they haven't lost their freshness and sense of adventure." - Krzysztof Chorzelski, violist of the Belcea Quartet

Intense, passionate, and impeccable in its musical disciplines, the Berlin-based Artemis Quartet "consistently finds a balance between projecting musical structure and conveying immediacy." Confirming that verdict from the New York Times is this 23CD collection, encompassing all the recordings the ensemble made between 1996 and 2018.

The Artemis Quartet began life in 1989 and developed a particular reputation in the central Austro-German repertoire. If Beethoven justly asserts a powerful presence, the scope of this collection extends as far as Eastern Europe and South America and well into the 20th century. Over the period of nearly a quarter of a century documented in this box, there were changes in the Artemis Quartet's lineup, but as founding cellist Eckart Runge explains, this "brought new inspiration - an opportunity to broaden horizons and introduce fresh ideas."

The ensemble suffered a tragic loss with the untimely death of violist Friedemann Weigle in 2015. Just days earlier, the Artemis had completed a recording of Dvořák's lyrical and poignant 'American' Quartet; it is now released for the very first time. This landmark box is completed by a comprehensive booklet which includes reminiscences from members of the Artemis Quartet and from sound engineers who collaborated with them.

His exceptional touch and sense of phrasing, his deep and personal understanding of the most varied repertoires, or even the legendary trio he formed together with Jacques Thibaud and Pablo Casals, made Alfred Cortot the greatest pianist of his time. Master of many disciples, notably the brilliant Dinu Lipatti, Samson François and Clara Haskil, Cortot also had a lasting influence on the Russian piano school through Samuil Feinberg and Heinrich Neuhaus, the latter himself being the revered teacher of Sviatoslav Richter.

All of the recordings in this set had undergone careful sound restoration in 2012, in order to respect as closely as possible the original sound. The remastering was carried out under the expert control of Mr. Guthrie Luke, a former disciple of Alfred Cortot who attended many recording sessions by Cortot. These recordings do not represent a "complete" edition: the many rolls engraved by the artist for Duo-Art, Aeolian and Pleyela labels have not been reproduced here, most of them doubling the 78-RPM repertoire. The first recordings are acoustic; and the ones with an electric microphone appeared as early as 1926.

Though founded only in 2003, the Yale Schola Cantorum harks back to the small university student choirs that, in the early and middle 20th century, did much to introduce the choral music of earlier eras to the American public. Under the auspices of the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, the Schola Cantorum has performed in concerts and church services internationally. Their repertory focuses on historically informed performances of music of the Renaissance and Baroque, and they have collaborated with historical instrument groups from the Yale and Juilliard Schools of Music. They have also, however, performed later music up to that of the present day. The Yale Schola Cantorum was founded in 2003 by it's first conductor, Simon Carrington, who remained in his post until 2009. The group has attracted internationally known music directors; Masaaki Suzuki, director of the renowned Japan Bach Collegium, held the post from 2009 to 2013, and that year he was succeeded by David Hill, chief conductor of the BBC Singers among other top British groups. The Schola Cantorum has also hosted domestic and international guest conductors from the top of the A-list: Dale Warland, James O'Donnell, Helmuth Rilling, Paul Hillier, Stephen Layton, Nicholas McGegan, and Krzysztof Penderecki, among others. The choir maintains a regular concert schedule in New Haven and New York City, and has toured in Britain, China, Estonia, France, Greece, Hungary, India, Italy, Latvia, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, and Turkey. The Schola Cantorum immediately attracted the attention of recording companies, releasing a live performance of Heinrich Biber's 1693 Vesperae longiores ac breviores with the Yale Collegium Musicum, and then featuring the little-known Missa Resurrectionis of Antonio Bertali (1605-1669) on the Rezound label in 2007. These albums received wide critical acclaim. The choir has also recorded for Naxos, Delos, and, in the late 2010s, Hyperion, issuing a performance of Palestrina's Missa Confitebor tibi Dominum on that label in 2018. The Schola Cantorum is one of the most selective choirs in the international academic world. Membership, by audition, is open to Yale students from any department of the university, although many of it's singers are music students. - James Manheim

With this latest release on EMI Classics from Sir Simon Rattle and the Berliner Philharmoniker the team returns to the 19th-century Germanic repertoire on which the orchestra's heritage has been based since it's formation 125 years ago. Following in the historic footsteps of Klemperer, Celibidache, Tennstedt, Fischer-Dieskau, Schwarzkopf and many other distinguished EMI artists, Simon Rattle brings to the label Brahms's most substantial yet intimate large-scale work.

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Brahms: Violin Concerto (2015) Itzhak Perlman, Carlo Maria Giulini, Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Heroic, dramatic, reflective and joyous, Brahms's Violin Concerto - written for the great Joseph Joachim, a close friend of the composer - is one of the monuments of the Romantic repertoire. In a performance of epic sweep, Itzhak Perlman and Carlo Maria Giulini do full justice to it's ambitions.

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Zubin Mehta has long been a constant in Munich's musical life. Mehta has enjoyed an artistic relationship and deep friendship with the Munich Philharmonic in particular for decades. Since he conducted his first concert with the orchestra in 1987, he has been a regular guest and was appointed the orchestra's first and so far only "conductor emeritus" in 2004. Twenty years later, the orchestra celebrated this milestone anniversary with a Brahms cycle, including all four symphonies and both of the piano concertos performed by one of today's most acclaimed and admired pianists: Yefim Bronfman.

Zubin Mehta has long been a constant in Munich's musical life. Mehta has enjoyed an artistic relationship and deep friendship with the Munich Philharmonic in particular for decades. Since he conducted his first concert with the orchestra in 1987, he has been a regular guest and was appointed the orchestra's first and so far only "conductor emeritus" in 2004. Twenty years later, the orchestra celebrated this milestone anniversary with a Brahms cycle, including all four symphonies.

Neither Georgian, a pupil of Rostropovich, nor Gililov had come my way before but I hope such persuasive musicians will soon do so again. Their sympathy for Brahms struck me as of the unforced, intuitively perceptive kind. The two cello sonatas are keenly contrasted: (Op.99) Adagio is played with a totally committed intensity by both and the songful finale has an endearing spring-like freshness (Gramophone).

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Both sonatas recorded here are the work of the young Brahms, who was still a teenager when he wrote Op.2. They are paired with, and perfectly complement the much later rhapsodies. These are magisterial accounts from Garrick Ohlsson, a pianist noted for his mastery of the Romantics.

This final release in the Complete Songs of Brahms series, featuring soprano Sophie Rennert, epitomizes all the familiar virtues that have distinguished the project: Perfectly judged performances, intelligently planned recitals, informative booklet notes and brilliant accompaniments from Graham Johnson, a true master of the art.

Soprano Harriet Burns makes her recording debut on volume eight of Hyperion's Complete Brahms Songs series. The program's selections provide the ideal showcase for Burns's voice and Graham Johnson's customary scholarly booklet notes are an indispensable companion.

This is the first recording of pianist Igor Levit, conductor Christian Thielemann and the Vienna Philharmonic with Brahms' two Piano Concertos. The release is a triple-CD album with Levit's recording of Brahm's late solo piano works opp 116-119. As a special encore Levit and Thielemann also play the four-hand Brahms Waltz op. 39/15 together.

REVIEW:

Levit’s utterly compelling accounts of the late sets are the more impressive element in this collection. He does not put a foot wrong in any of them; each piece is perfectly shaped, its subtly varied emotional charge instantly identified. It’s hard to think of many better recordings of these 20 gems, and certainly not of all four opus numbers together.

— The Guardian

Piano Concertos

Complete String Quartets

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