Hi-Res Highlights,
Hi-Res Highlights - June 2018
This month’s Hi-Res highlights include Bruckner from the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Mariss Jansons, Strauss from Vladimir Jurowski and the London Philharmonic Orchestra, a fascinating exploration of choral music by a neglected English Renaissance composer on Delphian, and the world premiere recording of a new opera on the life of technology magnate Steve Jobs.
Jansons conducts the second version of the Eighth (from 1890) on this live recording from the Munich Philharmonie last November; the previous instalment of this series was described by Gramophone as ‘broadly based yet purposeful’, whilst BBC Music Magazine had particular praise for the ‘pastoral and contemplative passages’.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
A rare opportunity to hear the Serenade to Music in the composer’s own arrangement for four soloists rather than the original sixteen; Chandos regular Louis Lortie is the soloist in the Piano Concerto, Sarah Jeffrey in the Oboe Concerto, and Chinese-Canadian violist Teng Li joins the Elmer Iseler Singers for Flos campi.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Thompson and her Dutch ensemble pair two works inspired by Hungarian folk music: Bartók’s Divertimento of 1939 (which she says has ‘been on our bucket-list to record for some time’) and Brahms’s second string quintet of 1890, performed by the full string section.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Recorded live at the Southbank Centre in April 2016, Jurowski’s Alpensinfonie was described at the time by Classical Source as ‘a carefully considered interpretation of great conviction’; the Dance of the Seven Veils (taken from a concert three years earlier) won praise from The Independent for ‘the discipline of the LPO’s playing, [and] the severity and austerity of Jurowski’s direction’.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This year’s annual summer concert from the Schönbrunn Palace park in Vienna includes the overtures to Guillaume Tell and La forza del destino, and orchestral excerpts from Aida, Cavalleria rusticana and Manon Lescaut; guest soprano Netrebko continues in the verismo vein with arias from Tosca, Adriana Lecouvreur and Pagliacci.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The young Dutch quartet (who received a Borletti-Buitoni award earlier this year) explore music of love and loss by Mendelssohn, Gesualdo, Shostakovich, Josquin and Weinberg; reviewing the album last weekend, The Observer declared that the players ‘get right to the heart of [the Mendelssohn], unsparing in the frantic opening allegro and sweetly tender in the adagio’.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Savall and his ensemble traverse two centuries (and the courts of Rome, Venice, Madrid, Versailles and London) in this eclectic collection of music for viol consort, including works by Dowland, Gibbons, Samuel Scheidt, Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Giovanni Legrenzi, Pedro de Araújo and Juan Cabanilles.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Following their acclaimed recordings of Sheppard and Taverner, the Scottish choir explore the lesser-known music of William Mundy (c.1529-91), including the large-scale festal works Vox patris caelestis and (in a new reconstruction) Maria virgo sanctissima, plus the first-ever recording of In exitu Israel - which Mundy produced in collaboration with Sheppard and William Byrd.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Premiered at Santa Fe Opera last July, Bates’s opera on the life of the entrepreneur and co-founder of Apple mixes elements of electronic music, folk and Indian raga; reviewing the opening run, Opera Wire praised baritone Edward Parks’s ‘multi-faceted’ portrayal of the demanding title-role and described conductor Michael Christie as ‘phenomenal at multitasking the cornucopia of musical elements’.
Available Formats: 2 SACDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
One of our recent Recordings of the Week, the first instalment of the Swiss pianist’s projected Liszt triptych impressed James with the ‘torrid virtuosity and delicately expressive touch’ on show in the central Vallée d'Obermann and the ‘tender touch and sense of space’ in the closing Les cloches de Genève.
Available Formats: CD + DVD Video, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
BBC Music Magazine recently described this 1965 album as ‘one of the greatest complete recordings of the Beethoven cello sonatas’, whilst Classics Today declared that it remains ‘largely unsurpassed’; also includes the variations on Bei Männern, Ein mädchen oder Weibchen and See the conquering hero comes.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
David Smith - Head of Digital
