This is one volume in a multi-volume set. Find the complete box set here.

On the occasion of the Bruckner bicentenary, the Wiener Philharmoniker recorded its first ever complete Bruckner cycle under the baton of Christian Thielemann. In addition to the well-known canon of nine symphonies, the two earliest Bruckner symphonies in F minor and D minor, which are a world premiere on DVD and Blu-ray, were also recorded for the first time in the orchestra's history. This uniquely complete edition from the Musikverein and Salzburg Festival, featuring 11symphonies, also includes extensive conversations with Christian Thielemann about each symphony and insights into his rehearsal work.

Matthias Manasi is rated as one of the most sought-after and most outstanding conductors of his generation, earning himself a distinguished name both on the opera and concert podiums. With a diverse repertoire range he is recognized for his knowledgeable and insightful interpretations, encompassing the great symphonic and operatic repertoire, contemporary scores, and historically informed performances. He is celebrated for the extraordinary combination of precision and temperament of his conducting and the convincing depth of his musical understanding, The Austrian newspaper ‘Heute’ wrote after a concert: “Matthias Manasi delivered an outstanding performance in the legendary, heavenly acoustics of the Golden Hall of the Musikverein Vienna”. The ‘Factanet Rome’ wrote after a concert: “It was a great interpretation that added value to Manasi’s work and that proclaims him as one of the most important conductors of our time”.

Tosca is a melodrama of love, betrayal and death set in the revolutionary unrest of 1800. The story concerns the opera singer Floria Tosca who tries to save her lover, the painter Mario Cavaradossi, from the brutal chief of police, Scarpia. Through-composed and expertly orchestrated it contains some of Puccini’s best-known lyrical arias and remains one of his most performed operas. In this 2022 production, an eminent cast is directed by the acclaimed Australian director Barrie Kosky – ‘the Amsterdam audience was completely swept off its feet by Kosky’s stunning production’ (Opera News).

Coronation – Music for Royal Occasions spans 500 years of royal music – for celebration, for prayer and for commemoration – varying in scale from private devotion to full state coronation. The collection, featuring Tallis, Byrd, Gibbons, Purcell, Tippett and Britten, looks forward to the coronation of Charles III, and back to the ancient rituals of royal ceremonial. It also presents a new work, commissioned by the Genesis Foundation, from celebrated composer Cecilia McDowall commemorating the life of Queen Elizabeth II and celebrating her remarkable reign. Of course no such collection would be complete without examples from the four anthems Handel wrote for the coronation of George II at Westminster Abbey in 1727, of which Zadok the Priest has been performed at the coronation of every British monarch since. Much has changed since their first performance almost 300 years ago. Yet their dramatic impact and grandeur, underlined by mighty choral acclamations and regal trumpets and drums, remains supremely fit for the coronation of a new king.

Double-album project that represents the dualities in Mozart's music and life - light versus shade, human verses divine, life versus death, playful versus profound, disaster versus triumph. The 1st album focuses on the repertoire of a concert Mozart gave in Leipzig in May 1789 in a very difficult period in his life. The 2nd enters around a final trip to his beloved Prague (Aug. 1791) where his opera, Clemenza di Tito, was premiered and he conceived his Clarinet Concerto, having presented his Prague Symphony there some years earlier.

This is Martin Frost's 3rd recording of this work and is performed here on Mozart's favorite instrument, the Basset Clarinet. This also includes the first recordings of Frost conducting.

“Every performance of a work is its own statement, contains its own truth…. This release marks exactly 20 years, almost a generation, since my first recording of the work, and exactly 10 years since my second. The world has changed immeasurably in that time. I have changed, both as an artist and as a person. And we change as listeners.” - Martin Frost

Beethoven wrote in his diary that he wanted “to show the British what a treasure they have in God Save the King”, a reference to his set of variations on the national anthem, composed in 1803. Sarah Beth Briggs recorded the virtuoso set precisely one month before the passing of Queen Elizabeth II in 2022, and the recording heralds the coronation of King Charles III in May 2023. The lesser-known Variations on an Original Theme in F major (1802) represent Beethoven the revolutionary. Uniquely, each variation was written in a different key which would have jarred the ears of the composer’s contemporaries. Sarah Beth Briggs’ collection of Variations underlines a lineage of the genre through the classical and Romantic eras. Opening the program is 9 Variations on a Minuet by Duport by Mozart, whom Beethoven greatly admired. The work takes a theme by cellist Jean-Pierre Duport, chamber music director of the court of the Prussian King, Friedrich Wilhelm II, from whom the composer hoped to gain favor. Mendelssohn’s Variations Serieuses was written as a tribute to Beethoven, and was included in an album of works that raised funds for the now famous bronze statue of Beethoven in Bonn. Mendelssohn’s near contemporary Brahms paid tribute to his troubled friend Robert Schumann, using a melody from Bunte Blätter (“Colorful Leaves”) in his poignant Variations on a Theme by Schumann.

REVIEWS:

Briggs’ execution is fluidly graceful and well-modulated. She approaches this repertoire with a studied care that betrays a love for the period and composers.

-- Wild Mercury Rhythm

All nine of Mozart’s Variations on a Theme by Jean-Pierre Duport, K 573 are quite delicate, sounding here almost as if they were played on a toy piano. Only the finale includes authoritative sounds. Beethoven’s 7 Variations on `God Save the King’ is sturdier; I especially enjoy the lively, witty, chordal IV. Also included is Beethoven’s 6 Variations on an Original Theme. In Variations Serieuses, Mendelssohn managed to write 17 imaginative ones. That number only slightly outdoes Brahms, who came up with 16 Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann. Lovely music, elegant playing.

-- American Record Guide

This series marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Anton Bruckner, which falls in 2024. It’s dedicated to Bruckner’s symphonies, most of them recorded in new transcriptions for organ by Hansjörg Albrecht. The 7th recording was made on the church organ of Hofkirche in Luzern with the transcription of Bruckner’s 6th Symphony by Eberhard Klotz. The bonus track on this volume is the composition “Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini” for organ by the Italian composer Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini.

The French pianist Ismaël Margain, newly signed up with naïve, creates a sensitive and meaningful juxtaposition of two major composers of piano repertoire, Frédéric Chopin and Gabriel Fauré. In spite of its title, this first album by the French pianist recorded under the naïve label is anything but improvised: Ismaël Margain cleverly structures the meeting between two piano geniuses, Frédéric Chopin and Gabriel Fauré, highlighting an “obvious kinship between their styles and in their inspiration,” without confusing or misrepresenting their uniqueness. The impromptu form, common to both composers – four for the first, six for the second –, is the starting point for this logical comparison, organising diversity of atmosphere around similar tonalities.

In her third recital album for Signum Records, celebrated soprano Mary Bevan returns with a selection of French songs, featuring works by composers including Britten, Ravel, Debussy and Faure

“Over the years since the release of my debut album Voyages with Joseph Middleton in 2017, my passion for French mélodie has grown and deepened...The texts that composers of mélodie have set to music contain a depth and a mystery that I find fascinating and a source of repeated inspiration... My idea for the album began sim- ply with a desire to record Britten’s Les Illuminations, a work I feel closely connect- ed to, having performed it many times over the years and each time having found something new in it to interest me”

In Eine Winterreise, renowned director Christof Loy has created a memorable evening of music theatre in which Schubert's tragically short life is depicted by and extended through his immortal music and songs from Winterreise, Die sch�ne M�llerin and Schwanengesang. The soul of the composer is brought to life by the internationally celebrated mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter alongside acclaimed pianist Kristian Bezuidenhout. Drawing on nostalgia for Viennese Biedermeier intimacy the narrative explores extremes of human feelings from the joy of life to a longing for death, all portrayed through a cast that includes Schubert's disreputable friend Schober, among other shadows from his past and his imagined future. Track listing: Eine Winterreise (staged version by C. Loy) (Theater Basel, 2022) (Blu-ray, HD)

Charlie Siem returns with a new recording of Violin Sonatas, accompanied by his regular recital partner Itamar Golan – featuring Vaughan Williams' Violin Sonata in A Minor and Grieg's Violin Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13. Charlie Siem is one of today’s foremost young violinists, with such a wide-ranging diversity of cross-cultural appeal as to have played a large part in defining what it means to be a true artist of the 21st century. Siem has appeared with many of the world’s finest orchestras and chamber ensembles, including the Bergen Philharmonic, Camerata Salzburg, Czech National Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, London Symphony, Moscow Philharmonic, Oslo Philharmonic, Rotterdam Philharmonic, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He has worked with top conductors such as Charles Dutoit, Edward Gardner, Zubin Mehta, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Sir Roger Norrington, Libor Pešek and Yuri Simonov. International festival appearances to date include Spoleto, St. Moritz, Gstaad, Bergen, Tine@Munch, Festival Internacional de Santa Lucía, and the Windsor Festival.

Dora Deliyska: "It was an exciting and challenging process to record the complex structure of 24 études and préludes. Some of the etudes belong to the most difficult pieces in piano literature, and the préludes have intense musical potential. I decided to record the pieces over a short period of time, in order to keep the spontaneity of the interpretation. I am very thankful to the Teldex Team (René Möller and Jakob Bötcher) and the piano technician Gerd Finkenstein for sharing this musical experience together, and creating an exciting recording.“

REVIEW:

Encouraged by Camille Saint-Saëns, violist/composer Henri Casadesus founded the Société des Instruments Anciens in 1901. Casadesus played viola d'amore, his brother Marius played quinton, and additional Casadesus family members and friends played viols, keyboards, and plucked strings. Unlike other early period-instrument revivals, the Casadesus ensemble performed not only baroque pastiche, but also new works which they commissioned and composed for their rediscovered instruments. This disc presents the premiere recordings of music written in the first decades of the twentieth century by Henri Casadesus and Ottorino Respighi for a "quartet of viols."

The legendary conductor Neeme Järvi celebrated his eighty-fifth birthday in the summer of 2022, in Tallinn, giving a series of concerts with his beloved Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. This album serves not just as a commemoration of those wonderful concerts, but also as a personal calling card for this remarkable musician. The concert overture Polonia, published in 1836, may well have been inspired by Wagner’s encounters with defeated Polish nationalists in Leipzig in 1832. Wagner wrote several concert overtures during this period – whilst plans for his revolutionary operatic output were developing – including Christoph Columbus and Rule Britannia!!

Max Reger composed the Serenade in G major in 1905 – 06; it demonstrates the style and talent of this too-little-heard composer. Brahms set Schicksalslied (Song of Destiny), a poem by Friedrich Hölderlin, in two movements with chorus, but then added a third, an orchestral postlude. Ave verum corpus, possibly Mozart’s best-known setting for chorus, rounds off the program.

REVIEWS:

The quality of choral singing of the Latvian State Choir is rightly celebrated, and this is a beautifully shaped performance [of the Schicksalslied], with vocal warmth and blend, and the orchestral postlude bringing a radiant conclusion.

-- BBC Music Magazine

This is a marvellous recording...Although Brahms’s Schicksalslied enjoys numerous recordings, Järvi’s is distinguished by the radiance and depth of the first and last sections as well as the vehemence of the central allegro.

-- Gramophone

As well as being a thoroughly attractive concert conducted with characteristic élan by Chandos star conductor Neeme Järvi, this program represents for collectors a very useful way of acquiring a variety of pieces, some unfamiliar, some less so… this is a very tempting disc.

-- CDChoice.co.uk

With this recording of Book VII of Claudio Monteverdi’s madrigals (1619, Venice), Rinaldo Alessandrini and his Concerto Italiano devote themselves to a love theme with a very pastoral edge the composer particularly savored. The Italian harpsichordist and conductor once again offers us a collection of Monteverdi madrigals of the highest quality, in which the poems not only lead the singing, but also determine the arrangement of the madrigals by poet. Inspired by “the hitherto unpublished stamp of a literary intention” indicated by the composer at the start of the collection, Rinaldo Alessandrini and his ensemble, accustomed to enlightening dramatics, offer a sparkling polyphony varying from one to six voices, in a wide range of pitches.

REVIEWS:

Claudio Monteverdi’s Seventh Book of Madrigals have been recorded well by several early music groups, but one expects superior readings from harpsichordist Rinaldo Alessandrini and his vocal-instrumental ensemble Concerto Italiano, and indeed, one gets them here. He presents the madrigals not in the order in which they were published, instead grouping the texted pieces by poet. This points to the stylistic features an audience of Monteverdi’s time would have been interested in, and Alessandrini supports these features with readings that differentiate the pieces sharply from one another. This is an ideal recording of music by the later Monteverdi.

-- AllMusic.com (James Manheim)

This is Book 7, but not as you know it. A must-read booklet essay by Alessandrini himself frames the new recording as a philosophical and dramatic undertaking rather than an exercise in completism. This is opera without the stage – a riveting and incredibly stylish account of this vast and varied book of music.

-- Gramophone

This is one volume in a multi-volume set. Find the complete box set here.

On the occasion of the Bruckner bicentenary, the Wiener Philharmoniker recorded its first ever complete Bruckner cycle under the baton of Christian Thielemann. In addition to the well-known canon of nine symphonies, the two earliest Bruckner symphonies in F minor and D minor, which are a world premiere on DVD and Blu-ray, were also recorded for the first time in the orchestra's history. This uniquely complete edition from the Musikverein and Salzburg Festival, featuring 11 symphonies, also includes extensive conversations with Christian Thielemann about each symphony and insights into his rehearsal work. “Orchestra and conductor impressed with Anton Bruckner's Second.” (Der Standard on Bruckner 2) “Only the highest musical perfection sounds like this.” (Die Presse)

As core members of the ensemble Wigmore Soloists, Michael Collins, Isabelle van Keulen and Michael McHale present four works for clarinet trio composed over a period of some 130 years. Mozart’s Kegelstatt Trio was long believed to have been composed during a game of bowling. The writing is reminiscent of a conversation between three friends in which contrasts are not excluded: we hear affection, divergences and even disagreements. This atmosphere of friendly, playful, and sometimes very intimate exchange also pervades Schumann’s Märchenerzählungen (Fairy Tales). While its spirited conviviality might give the impression that this work was the product of idyllic times, it was actually composed during Schumann’s last full year of sanity before his final mental collapse in 1854. There is a similar atmosphere of warm intimacy in Max Bruch’s Eight Pieces, written in 1910. Four of them are presented here, giving not a single hint of the approaching First World War. Based on a Russian folk tale, Stravinsky’s stage work L’Histoire du Soldat may be less good-natured than the preceding works. But the music is wonderfully entertaining, borrowing from various genres, including jazz. The composer’s trio version consist of five movements and has deservedly become his most frequently performed chamber composition.

REVIEW:

As expected, the performances are excellent. The Mozart is wonderfully lyrical; the Stravinsky crackles with energy; and the Schumann and the Bruch have the intensity and heartfelt phrasing the composers require. Collins leads with his clear and resonant timbre, dazzling fingers and articulation, and superb musicianship; and McHale lends splendid tone, touch, technique, and sensitivity. Van Keulen demonstrates terrific versatility all through, from warm contralto utterances to spunky fiddle playing, though sometimes her viola lines are a little thin and scrappy. Even so, the profound devotion to each score makes this album very worthwhile.

-- American Record Guide

After two stylistically diverse anthologies – In Motion and Renewal – the United Strings of Europe and their director Julian Azkoul have chosen to devote their latest project to a single composer: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. They open with the composer’s Serenade, a tribute to Mozart’s divertimentos, but infused with Tchaikovsky’s characteristic pathos and melancholy. It is one of his most popular works, with the especially beloved Waltz as its second movement, and a finale featuring Russian folk songs. The other works included on this recording are arrangements tailor-made for the ensemble by Julian Azkoul. Andante cantabile, the slow movement of Tchaikovsky’s First String Quartet, is a piece of great emotional power, based on an old folk song which Tchaikovsky reportedly heard in the Ukrainian town of Kamenka. Composed following a stay in Florence, the Sextet is brooding in temperament and despite its title arguably more Russian than Italian in character. Like the Serenade, it makes use of classical forms and devices but also includes passages evoking traditional Russian music. After completing the work, Tchaikovsky – who was otherwise his own harshest critic – wrote: ‘it’s frightening to see how pleased I am with myself’. The album closes with At Bedtime, an early composition for mixed choir with a meditative quality reminiscent of Eastern Orthodox chant that lends itself well to the string orchestra textures.

Robert Trevino’s first album together the Basque National Orchestra featuring orchestral works by the great French-Basque composer Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) received an excellent response. The program in this second volume is perhaps more ‘French’ in nature, but the Basque orchestra is giving dazzling performances of these works by their own national composer. While the first album was focused on some of Ravel’s most popular orchestral works, this album includes some rarities, including Ma mère l’Oye (Mother Goose) in its complete ballet version, as well as one world première recording: Pierre Boulez’s orchestration of Ravel’s World War I-era piano work, Frontispice.

REVIEW:

Can we ever have enough Ravel? Certainly not when the performances are this good. For the second disc in his traversal of Ravel’s orchestral works, Robert Trevino and the Basque National Orchestra offer an enticing mix of familiar and unfamiliar items. You get an aptly crystalline performance of the elusive Valses nobles et sentimentales, fortified by an appealing lightness of rhythm, followed by the zillionth version of the unkillable Menuet antique. Frontispice, a tiny “avant-garde” work originally written for piano five-hands, and here orchestrated by Pierre Boulez, comes off sounding very much like, well, Pierre Boulez. So now we know where he got much of his own inspiration.

The Shéhérazade Overture, Ravel’s first big orchestral work, seldom gets played and the reasons aren’t surprising. It’s long (14 minutes here), kind of formless, and lacking in memorable ideas, but of course the orchestration is marvelous and it’s good to have such a vivid new recording and performance. Finally, there’s the complete Mother Goose ballet, one of Ravel’s major masterpieces. This version is gorgeous, nicely flowing in the main numbers, and full of atmosphere in the evocative interludes between them. Trevino wisely refuses to sentimentalize the concluding “Fairy Garden,” which sounds so much more touching for just that reason. In short, this is a lovely, interesting program that offers far more than the “same old Ravel.” It’s a keeper.

-- ClassicsToday.com (David Hurwitz)

When Handel composed his Judas Maccabaeus in 1746 he had brought to an end his activity for the (Italian) opera in London and begun a second career as an oratorio composer, which at first got off to a very successful start but then soon experienced a decline, for which there had been various causes. Judas Maccabaeus is the evidence that Handle had recovered from this setback, and to this day the work is considered one of his most successful. Rafael Kubelík relies, without ifs and buts, on the Handel Edition by the North German musical scholar Friedrich Chrysander that appeared in the second half of the 19th century and represents a monument of the scholarly musical historicism that probably could appear only in Germany and not in England, Handel’s artistic home. Apart from the old-fashioned German translation, most astonishing is the drastic cuts that Chrysander made. This historical live recording from 1963 presents Fritz Wunderlich as Judas together with Agnes Giebel, Julia Falk, Naan Pöld and Ludwig Welter.

To mark their 30th Anniversary, Britten Sinfonia and Thomas Adès are releasing their acclaimed Beethoven and Barry cycle as a box set. The works were recorded between 2017 and 2019 at Barbican Hall, London and Theatre Royal, Brighton. Thomas Adès: “This collection is the fruit of two parallel passions. After twenty years of performing and often premiering Gerald Barry’s works, I was frantic to record as much of it as possible. I had also loved working on Beethoven Symphonies with Britten Sinfonia, and suddenly an idea was born: why not dare the two firebrands to join hands? As soon as this idea took hold, everything fell into place. I believe Ludwig van Beethoven must be treated as a living composer, and I find Gerald’s music to be entirely classic. So the two complement each other ideally.” Gerald Barry: “Tom Adès decided on this pairing. It startled me. The first record I bought when I was about 13 was Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto. We didn’t have a record player so all I could do was study the cover and advertisements on the back. I could look and see but not hear. I would take the record out and smell it. I used my nose as a stylus going round and round.”

Ravel's status as one of the most popular composers of all time rests to a large extent on the phenomenal success of Bolero. Yet there is much more to this endlessly intriguing man's work than the "seventeen minutes of orchestral tissue without music": childhood fantasy, Spain, the Orient, American jazz, the theater, clockwork toys and all the things mechanical, preoccupied Maurice Ravel throughout his life, and echoes of each can be found in all corners of his music.

Ravel grew up in Paris during la belle epoque, the thirty-odd years prior to 1914 when Paris was the unquestioned artistic center of the world. The fin de siecle years saw him enter the Paris Conservatoire. He was an immensely gifted youth, and one by one his early compositions began to show a real mastery of conception and execution-before the 1800s were out, he had produced such assured works as Habenera, Menuet antique, several fine songs, and Pavane pour une infante defunte.

The celebrated Dover Quartet, the young, Grammy-nominated ensemble brimming with prestigious awards and residencies, concludes its critically acclaimed, three-volume Beethoven cycle with the composer’s five monumental, revolutionary Late Quartets and imposing Grosse Fugue. The triple-album release comprises Beethoven’s very last compositions — remarkable and often daunting works that upended the concept of the string quartet. Many critics and scholars consider them the ultimate expression of Beethoven’s artistry. At the same time, lyrical, songlike “vocal” writing pervades the Late Quartets, delighting the same audiences who flocked to Rossini’s operas. The Dover’s first two Beethoven installments were greeted with ecstatic reviews: “Beethoven would find it hard to believe that his quartets could be played with such perfection of execution, such beauty of tone, such nuance of expression, and such keen understanding of his music’s meaning and intent.” (Fanfare) “Their Beethoven is, simply, perfection.” (Classical CD Reviews)

Celebrating its fiftieth anniversary in 2022, the Brodsky Quartet has performed more than 3000 concerts on the major concert stages of the world and has released more than seventy recordings. A natural curiosity and insatiable desire to explore have propelled the group in many artistic directions and continue to ensure it not only a place at the very forefront of the international chamber music scene but also a rich and varied musical existence. As they comment in their booklet note: ‘It seems fitting to mark the milestone by recording this epic and most celebrated of chamber works, Schubert’s String Quintet in C major, a piece which we have lived with since childhood, and which we have played with a long line of illustrious cellists. One of our earliest performances took place with Terence Weil, our mentor at college, at his retirement concert, just as we were starting out on our professional journey. Now the wonderful young Laura van der Heijden, who comes to this recording with a maturity which belies her years, represents with respect to us a similar age gap, proving that age is insignificant where there is a meeting of musical minds. Now we look forward to whatever our sixth decade might bring.’

REVIEW:

In this exceptional interpretation of Schubert’s C major Quintet, there are plenty of moments where the players individually or collectively make something happen – a tiny inflection in the phrasing here, an applied touch of color there. Yet nothing is overdone, and the music always flows as it wants to.

-- BBC Music Magazine