New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 28th September 2018
Today’s new releases include Berlioz from the Seattle Symphony (winner of the inaugural Orchestra of the Year prize at this month’s Gramophone Awards), Mahler’s Second Symphony from Mariss Jansons, Pagliardo with puppets, and vintage Klemperer performances of Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms from the archives of Richard Itter.
Mahler: Symphony No. 2 'Resurrection'
Symphonieorchester und Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Mariss Jansons
The fourth instalment of Jansons’s live Mahler series on BR Klassik was recorded at the orchestra’s Munich home in May 2011, and features soprano Anja Harteros and mezzo Bernarda Fink. Earlier volumes in the series have been acclaimed as ’exquisitely moulded’ (The Telegraph on No. 9) and ‘ clear and luminous’ (BBC Music Magazine on No. 7).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Dausgaard’s Brahms cycle goes from strength to strength: BBC Music Magazine praised the ‘superbly incisive playing’ on the first volume, and the ‘burgeoning weight and warmth’ of their Symphony No. 2, and this new account of the Third shares the same virtues. Anna Larsson joins for the Alto Rhapsody, and she and baritone Johan Reuter share half a dozen of Brahms’s orchestrations of Schubert songs.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Scriabin: Symphony No. 1 & Prometheus
Kirill Gerstein (piano), Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic Choir, Vasily Petrenko
The third and final instalment of Petrenko’s superb Scriabin cycle (which Katherine reviewed last week) pairs the late-Romantic First Symphony with the far more overtly modernist Fifth - aka Prometheus - from ten years later. Kirill Gerstein, who recorded the Piano Concerto with the same forces last year, returns to bring his jazz training to bear on the improvisatory solo part.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Vaughan Williams: A Sea Symphony
Elizabeth Llewellyn (soprano), Marcus Farnsworth (baritone), BBC Symphony Orchestra & BBC Symphony Chorus, Martyn Brabbins
Following a London Symphony which was described as ‘fabulously assured’ (The Guardian), ‘superbly involving’ (Gramophone), and ‘unmissable and deeply moving’ (The Arts Desk), Brabbins marshals the BBC forces in A Sea Symphony. It’s coupled with another Walt Whitman setting: Darest thou now, O soul, composed in 1925 and scored for unison voices and string orchestra.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Mullova (who has programmed Pärt’s music regularly over the past few years and met with the composer on numerous occasions to discuss her interpretations) performs some of his best-known works here, including Fratres, Spiegel im Spiegel, two excerpts from Tabula Rasa, and Darf ich…. The composer was present at the recording-sessions.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The Romantic Piano Concerto 77 - Bronsart & Urspruch
Emmanuel Despax (piano), BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Eugene Tzigane
The two composers featured here moved in the same circles as Franz Liszt in Weimar: Hans von Bronsart studied with him and gave the first performance of his Second Piano Concerto in 1857 (his own concerto, composed sixteen years later, shows Liszt’s influence), and Anton Urspruch also received tuition from Liszt as well as from Ignaz Lachner and Joachim Raff.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Chopin: Cello Sonata & Schubert: Arpeggione Sonata
Chopin: Cello Sonata & Schubert: Arpeggione Sonata Steven Isserlis (cello) & Dénes Várjon (piano)
The British cellist tackles two nineteenth-century sonatas for the first time on record, with Dénes Várjon performing on an Érard piano dating from around the time of the Chopin sonata’s composition. The programme also includes a nocturne by Auguste Franchomme (who edited Chopin’s Sonata), Chopin’s Introduction and Polonaise brillante, and Isserlis’s own transcriptions of his 'Nie Ma Czego Trzeba' and Schubert’s 'Nacht und Träume'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Berlioz: Grande Messe des Morts
Kenneth Tarver (tenor), Seattle Symphony, Seattle Symphony Chorale, Ludovic Morlot
Gramophone’s Orchestra of the Year presented a mini Berlioz Festival last season, and their account of the Grande Messe was lauded by BachTrack for its ‘clarity and exciting momentum’. Tenor Kenneth Tarver has impressive form in Berlioz, having recorded Roméo et Juliette with Valery Gergiev, Pierre Boulez and Colin Davis and sung Bénédict on the latter’s recording of Beatrice et Bénédict.
Available Format: CD
First staged in 1672, the Genoan composer’s comical-fantastical opera on the life of the dissolute Roman emperor is brought to life here with an army of marionettes choreographed by the celebrated Italian actor and puppeteer Mimmo Cuticchio.
Available Format: Blu-ray
The second ICA Klemperer collection from the invaluable Itter archives features a 1958 live broadcast of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony from Edinburgh’s Usher Hall, a 1955 BBC broadcast of Mozart’s Symphony No. 25 (significantly faster than his studio recording from four years later), and a Brahms Deutsches Requiem from the same year with Hans Wilbrink and Elfriede Trötschel as soloists.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC
This 13-CD collection of newly remastered recordings from the 1930s, 40s and 60s includes two performances of Munch’s signature-work, Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique (with the Orchestre de Paris in their 1967 recording debut, and the Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire) and music by Ravel, Debussy, Honegger, Dutilleux, Delannoy and Roussel.
Available Formats: 13 CDs, MP3, FLAC
Chris O'Reilly - Chief Executive
