Romantic Era
3839 products
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R. Schumann: Pieces pour alto, clarinette et piano
$20.99CDOuthere Music
Jan 23, 2026OMF707 -
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Liszt: Historical Transcriptions for Harp
$12.99CDBrilliant Classics
Jan 16, 2026BRI97519 -
Time in Flux…
$20.99CDGenuin
Oct 03, 2025GEN 25935 -
Geliebte Clara…
$20.99CDGenuin
Oct 03, 2025GEN 25930 -
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Sor: Pieces de societe, Op. 33 & Op. 36; Huit petit pieces,
$12.99CDBrilliant Classics
Jan 30, 2026BRI97395 -
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Ferdinand Ries: Symphonies Nos. 6 & 7
$18.99CDOndine
Oct 03, 2025ODE 1476-2 -
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Bruckner: Te Deum & Mass No. 3
$20.99CDSWR
Feb 13, 2026SWR19168CD -
Anton Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, WAB 109 - Live fr
$20.99CDProfil
Apr 17, 2026PH16063 -
Letzte Lieder
$20.99CDGenuin
Jan 30, 2026GEN 25920 -
Bizet: 20 Songs, Op. 21
$18.99CDOndine
Sep 19, 2025ODE 1458-2 -
Romeo et Juliette, Op. 17
$28.99CDSWR
Nov 21, 2025SWR19167CD -
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Faure: Requiem & Poulenc: Gloria
$20.99CDSWR
Jan 23, 2026SWR19166CD
Legendary Conductors - Symphonic Masterpieces / The Symphony Orchestras of the SWR
Donizetti, Jacob, Rota et al: Solo Clarinet / Botta
In this release, clarinetist Aldo Botta wanted to give his contribution in the popularization of solo clarinet pieces. It is a tribute to international renowned artists as well as others lesser-known, who have composed little musical masterpieces from both past and present literature. Some of them are from our own time, artists who are currently working on astonishing musical productions as clarinetists, performers and teachers. Their compositions – here available for the listener – all have a single common characteristic, which is the desire to convey the love for a very noble instrument: the clarinet.
Schubert: Symphonies - The "Unfinished" & "Great" / Janowski, Dresden Philharmonic
Marek Janowski presents his first purely-orchestral Schubert recording, together with the Dresdner Philharmonie, performing the composer’s two final, groundbreaking and most famous symphonies. While the two movements of the “Unfinished” symphony in B Minor reach a level of perfection despite the work’s apparent incompleteness, Robert Schumann praised the “Great” symphony in C Major for its “heavenly length”. Janowski’s interpretation combines a sense of tradition with vitality and intensity.
Marek Janowski is one of the most celebrated conductors of our time. After having recorded Schubert songs in orchestrations by Reger and Webern with the tenor Christian Elsner in 2015, Janowski now adds this symphonic Schubert album to his impressive Pentatone discography, following complete recordings of Bruckner, Brahms and Beethoven’s symphonies, several works by Richard Strauss, as well as Wagner’s ten mature operas. He works together with the Dresdner Philharmonie, with whom he already released complete recordings of Beethoven’s Fidelio (2021), Puccini’s Il Tabarro and Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana (both 2020).
R. Schumann: Pieces pour alto, clarinette et piano
Sonata Facile
Mendelssohn: Choral Works / Ahmann, MDR Radio Symphony Choir
The MDR Leipzig Radio Choir and its artistic director Philipp Ahmann present a collection of Felix Mendelssohn’s choral music, which arguably represents the pinnacle of German nineteenth-century religious music. Ranging across psalm settings, motets, Latin verses, the Deutsche Liturgie as well as the ethereal chorus Denn er hat seinen Engeln befohlen, which was later adapted and incorporated into his oratorio Elijah, the album highlights the unique stylistic range and expressive power of Mendelssohn’s choral output. A unique addition to the programme is the world premiere recording of Heilig, MWV 47. The music on this album seamlessly integrates stylistic traits of Palestrina and Bach, remnants of Jewish cantor practices, as well as the Romanticism of Mendelssohn’s time.
Generally considered one of the best choirs in the German-speaking world, the singers of the MDR Leipzig Radio Choir are proficient in this repertoire, written by a local musical giant whose music is deeply ingrained into the cultural soil of their city. The MDR Leipzig Radio Choir and its aristic director Philipp Ahmann return to Pentatone with this a cappella album following their acclaimed recording of motets by Anton Bruckner and Michael Haydn (2021). The choir has also taken part in a Pentatone release of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis (2017), as well as numerous opera recordings released by the label. A San Francisco Classical Recording Company production in association with MDR Klassik.
REVIEW:
The Leipzig Radio Choir gives us 16 choral works like 16 suns, all consisting of sacred music...some of [Mendelssohn's] works were intended for the Protestant church, such as Op. 78, and others for the Catholic church, when he was in Rome, and some more for Anglican services, such as Op. 69. Taking as models Bach and Palestrina, all his work has something grandiose, and even more so when he combines the choir with the soloists, or writes for eight voices. The album offers, along with works with more versions available such as those published during the author's lifetime with an opus number, other works that are worth listening to because they do not detract in quality, such as Die Deustsche Liturgie MWV B 57, a sung mass with his Kyrie for double choir, Gloria for double choir and four soloists, and a Sanctus (Heilig) also for double choir.
The versions are wonderful, with the addition that the soloists are members of the choir itself. The balance of the voices, and how Ahmann allows the music to breathe so that it is intelligible, manage to make listening a delight, even when there is a reasonable doubt about how many voices the ideal choir should have for this style. And, as an added gift, a world first is included: a Heilig MWV B 47, for eight voices.
-- Ritmo
Dvořák: Slavonic Dances / Soos, Haag
To this day, the Slavonic Dances remain Dvořák‘s most popular work. They represent his own quintessential musical style, which competently plays with a masterly invented folklorism.
Liszt: Historical Transcriptions for Harp
Time in Flux…
Geliebte Clara…
Saint-Saens: Complete Concertos (New Talents Edition #1)
Bruckner: Symphonies 4 & 5 / Kempe, Munich Philharmonic
Bruckner's music embodies the visions of a devout, ordinary man. Parts of his expansive, shimmering musical landscapes are influenced by Wagner, but one can also detect Schubert, who began life in similar circumstances. The reposeful piety which runs through Bruckner's symphonic spectrum lends his music its unique power of attraction.
Recorded 1975-76.
Sor: Pieces de societe, Op. 33 & Op. 36; Huit petit pieces,
Brahms: Complete Symphonies / Kempe, Munich Philharmonic
For a long time Johannes Brahms was considered the epitome of conservatism, who, contrary to the disciples of Wagner and Liszt, fell back on old forms, which allegedly had no power anymore. Indeed, Brahms was an expert on music of the past, going back till the polyphonic composers of the 16th century. He made use of old patterns such as the variation and the interrelated passacaglia. He adopted the traditional four-movement symphony and its juxtaposition, respected the pattern of the sonata form and did hardly go beyond Beethoven when it came to instrumentation. However, the perception of Brahms as a “reactionary”, as it was initially argued by Nietzsche and later by the circle of Wagner and Richard Strauss, is unsustainable. No one less than Arnold Schoenberg has recognized the fundamentally different, which divided the composer Brahms, particularly as composer of symphonies, from the masters of the classical sonata and symphony in his famous paper “Brahms, der Fortschrittliche” (Brahms the Progressive)
Recorded 1974-75.
Ferdinand Ries: Symphonies Nos. 6 & 7
Verdi: Un ballo in maschera / Janowski, Monte Carlo Philharmonic
Maestro Marek Janowski, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and the Transylvania State Philharmonic Choir present Giuseppe Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera (1859), together with a stellar cast consisting of Freddie De Tommaso (Riccardo), Lester Lynch (Renato) and Saioa Hernández (Amelia). Un ballo in maschera is Verdi’s tragicomic masterpiece, in which the composer skilfully switches gears between the light and tragic, as well as between his earlier and more mature style. As such, it is both an entertaining and highly sophisticated work. The three main soloists are all seasoned Verdi interpreters, while Janowski approaches this ingenuous score with his eye for symphonic architecture, resulting in a performance that is lively and balanced.
Marek Janowski is one of the most celebrated conductors of our time, and has a vast Pentatone discography, mostly consisting of German operas and symphonic works. After Cavalleria rusticana and Il Tabarro (both 2020), this is his third Italian opera recording for the label. Lester Lynch also has a longstanding relationship to Pentatone, and starred in many opera recordings, including Otello (2017), Cavalleria rusticana and Il Tabarro (both 2020), as well as La Fanciulla del West, Madama Butterfly (both 2021), and La Traviata (2022). The Transylvania State Philharmonic Choir has featured on several opera recordings, while the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo appeared on Arabella Steinbacher’s Fantasies, Rhapsodies & Daydreams (2016). Freddie De Tommaso and Saioa Hernández make their Pentatone debut.
REVIEWS:
The Transylvanian choir is in fine fettle, and as always with Pentatone the quality of the recording is beyond reproach. The prerequisites for a successful performance are, in other words, favourable.
No opera performance stands or falls completely with the singing and acting of one specific soloist, but...[tenor Freddie De Tommaso's] entrance [as Riccardo,] Amici miei… Soldati…ai deputati (CD 1 track 3) is like a fresh summer wind: lyric beautiful tone, elegant phrasing and that special Italian warmth and youthfulness. This is a happy governor and just a minute or so later he intones that wonderful love theme, which we first encountered in the prelude and which also returns in the last act, La rivedrà nell’estasi. He never forces, he never distorts the phrases with lachrymose gulps in the Gigli manner. He is tasteful and full of life. Di’ tu se fedele (CD 1 track 14) in the Ulrica scene is again elegant, sung with appropriate swagger and he takes that giant downward leap to the bass register with confidence. In the long duet with Amelia on the gallows hill he is palpably in love with her; his tone glows, and the whole scene becomes the highpoint it should be. Forse la soglia attinse – Ma se m’è forza perderti in the last act also glows and Ella è pura is so tender. The recording is worth its price for De Tommaso’s achievement alone – but there are further reasons for acquisition as well.
Saioa Hernández’ Amelia is one. In both her arias as well as the duet on the gallows hill she sings with feeling. Her horror in Ecco l’orrido campo – Ma dall’arido stelo (CD 1 track 20) when the bell rings at midnight is moving, and so is the prayer that rounds off the aria proper. Her second aria Morrò, ma prima in grazia (CD 2 track 4) is even more heartrending. She has the voice also for the more dramatic outbursts, maybe with a certain hardness of tone at fortissimo, but there is a thrill in her singing.
Annika Gerhards’ Oscar is charming and glittering and Elisabeth Kulman’s Ulrica impresses greatly. Here is a contralto of the old school with solid chest notes (CD 1 track 9). The basses Samuel and Tom are also forces to be reckoned with, in particular Kevin Short’s Samuel. Jean-Luc Ballestra is also an expressive Silvano in the Ulrica scene.
And how does this production stand the test against existing competitors? Very well, I would say. Leinsdorf-Bergonzi will never be redundant, but this Janowski-De Tommaso recording is an admirable newcomer that should be heard by all admirers of Verdi.
-- MusicWeb International
Beginnings
The Young Friedrich Gulda
Friedrich Gulda was born in Vienna on May 16, 1930. He began his musical education at the Grossmann Conservatory and subsequently took private lessons from Felix Pazofsky. From 1942 to 1947 he studied piano at the Vienna Academy of Music under Bruno Seidlhofer and Music Theory and Composition under Joseph Marx. He gave his first public performance in 1944 and, two years later when just 16 years old, won the Geneva International Music Competition. Starting after the Second World War, as a 20-year-old, Gulda established himself as a piano soloist with an excellent international reputation and even performed at Carnegie Hall in New York City in 1950. In the 1950s he was celebrated and considered the leading interpreter of Beethoven in his generation. He founded his own Klassische Orchester Gulda for chamber music with members of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to Beethoven, Gulda’s repertoire encompasses works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Schubert, Frédéric Chopin, Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel and Richard Strauss, whose Burleske in D minor and lieder are included in this release, with Gulda accompanying soprano Hilde Güden. Gulda was essentially an out-and-out contrarian who showed that a great genius can sometimes be only a step away from a certain madness. While Karl Böhm or Rubinstein admired him as a magnificently talented interpreter of Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, Gulda could also be provocative – including inciting his fellow concert pianists. Asked about Vladimir Horowitz, Gulda once responded: “Horowitz is a master. Because he is able to do – whatever he wants,” but also added: “But what he is after doesn’t interest me” (Joachim Kaiser).
REVIEW:
Friedrich Gulda (1930-2000) was certainly never a conformist pianist. But he was less flamboyant in his youth than in his later years, and he did present new perspectives at the beginning of his career, which helped to provoke a change in thinking. The recordings in this CD box set date from this period.
He recorded the freshly perky Mozart Sonata K. 576 in 1948, and both Concertos K. 503 and 537 in 1955 with the New Symphony Orchestra under Anthony Collins. Gulda’s fresh yet nuanced playing compensates for the weak orchestra’s playing. The Beethoven sonatas Nos. 4, 7, 8 and 19 show the still searching Gulda of 1955 on his way to the 1967 complete recording. The 3rd CD includes the concerto piece by Carl Maria von Weber and the Strauss Burlesque, as well as a set of Strauss songs that Gulda recorded with Hilde Güden in 1956. These are wonderful interpretations of rare freshness and suppleness. Güden’s silvery timbre and her confidently controlled, light vocal line coupled with Gulda’s spontaneous and sensitive playing make for an uncommonly natural performance.
Recorded in 1954, Chopin’s compositions, the 4 Ballades and the 1st Piano Concerto, are among Gulda’s ‘immortal’ recordings. In the 1st Piano Concerto, Gulda collaborates with the more traditional Adrian Boult, but it is precisely the contrast in temperament that leads to special tension and dynamics. This recording has been available several times on various labels, but here it definitely sounds in the best quality so far. Also very exciting are the four ballads, which he plays dramatically and narratively.
Debussy and Ravel, the composers represented on CDs Nos. 5 and 6 of this box, have been Gulda’s recurring preoccupation. The early recordings from 1953 and 1955 may not yet be as stylistically tested on the hard, sharp and pithy of jazz as the late recordings, but their analytically modern style, with clear, precise lines and contours and good transparency, shows the intellectual brilliance of these interpretations.
The bottom line is that this encounter with the young Gulda is a very important one that should help one understand the older musician and could help bring respect to Gulda among those who did not appreciate his later work as much.
-- Pizzicato
Elective Affinities
Liszt: Consolations / Saskia Giorgini
Consolations is Saskia Giorgini’s second Liszt album, after her critically-acclaimed rendition of the composer’s Harmonies poétiques et religieuses. Named after Liszt’s six Consolations, the album also contains the Caprices-Valses, Valse Impromptu, Légendes and the world-famous Liebesträume. These introspective pieces shed light on love in all its forms and manifestations, showing us human nature in all its different aspects, as well as a different side of Liszt’s colourful musical persona. Saskia Giorgini is one of the most promising pianists of her generation, has won several competitions and is hailed for her technical command and the beauty and poetry of her sound. Her recording of Liszt’s Harmonies poétiques et religieuses received a Diapason d’or, while BBC Music Magazine praised her “formidable technical ability, matched by the architectural sense, harmonic sensibility and coloristic range”, and Gramophone lauded her “masterful authority”. She also released Schubert’s Die schöne Müllerin (2020) and Respighi Songs (2021) – both with Ian Bostridge – on Pentatone.
Ries: Symphonies in Es & No. 3
Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 / Furtwängler, Bayreuth Festival Orchestra
Seventy years ago, on the 29th July 1951, Wilhelm Furtwängler conducted Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 at a concert marking the reopening of the Bayreuth Festival after seven years of silence following the Second World War. It was a momentous occasion, and the concert was broadcast by Bavarian Radio and transmitted across the world, for instance by Swedish Radio. Using the analogue mono tape as digitized by Swedish Radio, the present disc reproduces the broadcast as it would have been heard by listeners in Sweden: we have chosen to not change anything, not to ‘brush up’ the sound, not to clean and shorten the pauses or omit audience noises within the music, but to keep the original as it was. In this way we hope to recreate the feeling of actually sitting in front of an old radio in 1951, listening to this concert – a true historical document.
REVIEW:
Nothing else in the realms of recorded music is quite like it and I would urge you to share the experience...I’m not claiming that this performance will suit every mood or even every taste, but if and when it does hit target it will leave you changed for ever.
-- Gramophone (Editor's Choice, March 2022)
Bruckner: Te Deum & Mass No. 3
Mendelssohn: Sacred Choral Works
Anton Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, WAB 109 - Live fr
Letzte Lieder
Bizet: 20 Songs, Op. 21
Romeo et Juliette, Op. 17
Schubert: Lebensmuth / Signum Quartett
Lebensmuth is the final episode of Signum Quartett’s acclaimed Schubert trilogy, in which early and late string quartets are combined with song arrangements created by the group’s violist Xandi van Dijk. Schubert’s First String Quartet in G Minor, written when he was 13, already reveals his inclination to bold and unexpected moves. His last String Quartet in G major, D. 887 veers between a profound examination of personal trauma and a blazing triumph over adversity, and it is this resilience of spirit which is further highlighted by songs such as ‘An die Musik’ and ‘Lebensmuth’, pieces that courageously embrace life and all the beauty it offers. The Signum Quartett is frequently hailed as one of the most adventurous and outstanding ensembles of today. The quartet’s first Pentatone recording Aus der Ferne (2018) won an Opus Klassik 2019 award, as well as a diapason d’or, and was followed by Ins stille Land (2020).
