Latest News: Classical, LSO Live (label)
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Recording of the Week,
Colin Davis conducts the LSO in Haydn Symphonies 30th June 2014James listens to Colin Davis and the LSO's sparkling, poised accounts of late symphonies by Haydn.
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Recording of the Week,
Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex from the LSO 7th April 2014James takes a trip to Ancient Greece with John Eliot Gardiner and the LSO’s muscular renditions of Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex and Apollon musagète.
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Recording of the Week,
Presto Personal Favourites from 2013 23rd December 2013Schubert from the Pavel Haas Quartet, Pierre-Louis Dietsch’s opera on The Flying Dutchman, two Turnage premieres, and masses by Cipriano de Rore.
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Recording of the Week,
Valery Gergiev and the LSO begin a cycle of Szymanowski symphonies 3rd June 2013The richness of the London Symphony Orchestra’s string section is showcased to great effect in the tender, lyrical slow movements of both symphonies, whilst Gergiev responds to the music’s more volatile moments extremely well.
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Recording of the Week,
Weber's Der Freischütz from Sir Colin Davis and the LSO 6th May 2013Fresh, full-bodied and raucous when required, the conductor’s final opera recording is a fitting valedictory tribute to a great man, with Christine Brewer on sublime form as Agathe and Simon O’Neill a steely and secure Max.
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Recording of the Week,
Tchaikovsky’s Early Symphonies 17th September 2012Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra makes hugely persuasive cases for Tchaikovsky’s neglected first three symphonies, Winter Daydreams, the ‘Little Russian’ and the ‘Polish’, in live performances given in London and Zurich last spring.
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Recording of the Week,
Britten: War Requiem 7th May 2012Gianandrea Noseda leads an Italianate performance of Britten’s great depiction of ‘the pity of war’, with the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and soloists Sabina Cvilak, Ian Bostridge and Simon Keenlyside.
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Recording of the Week,
Bruckner and Mahler from Haitink and Pappano 14th November 2011Haitink conducts the London Symphony Orchestra in Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony, whilst Pappano and the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia tackle Mahler’s Sixth in their first-ever recording of the composer’s music together.
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Recording of the Week,
Gergiev and the LSO conclude their Mahler cycle 5th September 2011The Russian conductor’s painstaking attention to tiny issues of orchestral balance and uncharacteristic willingness to allow the music breathing-space make for a tremendously moving Ninth Symphony.
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Recording of the Week,
Nielsen Symphonies from Colin Davis and the LSO 10th January 2011At the grand old age of 83, the British conductor ventures into new territory by embarking on a complete cycle of symphonies by the Danish, whose music he has only rarely conducted in the course of his long and illustrious career.
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Recording of the Week,
Verdi's Otello from the LSO and Colin Davis 1st November 2010Simon O’Neill is the jealousy-wracked general, Gerald Finley his nemesis, and Anne Schwanewilms his ill-fated wife in this edge-of-the-seat live recording, made at the Barbican last year and full of ‘savage and terrifying playing’ from the LSO.
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Recording of the Week,
Strauss: Alpine Symphony 22nd February 2010Bernard Haitink and the London Symphony Orchestra celebrate the awe-inspiring force of nature and Strauss’s ability to depict that in his writing.
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Recording of the Week,
Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet 18th January 2010A ‘superb reading of Prokofiev's supreme masterpiece’ from Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra, two decades after the conductor’s landmark account of the piece with the Kirov Orchestra.
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Recording of the Week,
Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle 10th August 2009Sir Willard White is the bridegroom with skeletons in his closet, and Russian mezzo Elena Zhidkova his inquisitive new wife on this new live recording from Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra.
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Recording of the Week,
Elgar's Enigma Variations 4th June 2007Sir Colin Davis and the London Symphony Orchestra mark the 150th anniversary of the English composer’s birth with a marvellous new live recording of his tribute to ‘my friends pictured within’.