Box Set Selections,
Boxed Set Selections - November 2020
November heavyweights include a mammoth tribute to Karl Richter, David Goode’s complete Bach organ works on Signum, Ronald Brautigam’s complete Mozart piano concertos, and a deluxe celebration of Bernard Haitink on DVD.
Born in Reims in 1936, Heidsieck studied with Alfred Cortot, Marcel Ciampi and Wilhelm Kempff, with whom he specifically worked on Beethoven – this set includes a previously unreleased 1958 recording of the 'Hammerklavier' Sonata, made around a decade before his cycle of the complete piano sonatas. Eight of the 27 discs here are new to CD, including music by Handel, Hindemith, Couperin, Debussy, Roussel and Ravel.
Available Format: 27 CDs
This Bruckner cycle was recorded live at the Monastery of St. Florian (where the composer is buried) between September 2017 and September 2019; in his in-depth feature on the set in the latest edition of Gramophone, Peter Quantrill praises the ‘sense of the liveness of both the abbey acoustic and the occasion’, and declares that ‘the Fourth and Sixth are accounts to reckon with by anyone’s standards’.
Available Formats: 9 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Mozart: Complete Piano Concertos
Ronald Brautigam (fortepiano), Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens
The recordings of the solo concertos on this set were released individually between 2010 and 2016, and were acclaimed for their ‘ideal mixture of clarity and stylish effervescence’ in International Record Review, whilst BBC Music Magazine pronounced that ‘if you prefer your Mozart played on period instruments, you're unlikely to find better performances than these’. The box also includes the recordings of the concertos for two and three pianos which Brautigam made with Alexei Lubimov, Manfred Huss and the Haydn Sinfonietta Wien in 2006.
Available Formats: 12 SACDs, MP3, FLAC
Five years on from Sony’s original collection encompassing all of the repertoire which has featured on the New Day’s Day bill of fare in Vienna since 1941, this newly updated set includes three additional CDs of the works which have received their first performance at the concert in the interim, such as the Overture to Carl Michael Ziehrer’s Die Landstreiche and Beethoven’s Contredanse No. 7 WoO 14 which Andris Nelsons conducted this year.
Available Format: 26 CDs
The Chilean-born French pianist (whose pupils include Hélène Grimaud) was perhaps best-known for his recordings with the violinist Christian Ferras, and this 14-CD set includes their recordings of the complete Beethoven sonatas as well as works by Fauré, Brahms, Ravel and Enescu. There’s also a critically-acclaimed 1982 disc of solo pieces by Chabrier, Serge Nigg’s Piano Concerto No. 1, chamber works by Chausson, and the first CD release of his account of Schumann’s Piano Quartet with members of the Quatuor Parrenin.
Available Format: 14 CDs
Recorded on the organ of Trinity College Cambridge between 2016 and early 2020 and originally released digitally and on Presto CD, Goode’s survey of Bach’s complete organ works has been praised for ‘the flair, clarity and spontaneity that Goode brings to this timeless music’ (Gramophone) and his ‘unerring instinct for exactly the right tempi’ (Classical Music).
Available Formats: 16 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Chris O'Reilly - Chief Executive
