Box Set Selections,
Boxed Set Selections - August 2022
August heavyweights include a set of Pablo Casals's late chamber music recordings for Philips (with partners including Wilhelm Kempff, Karl Engel and Sandor Végh), the complete Schubert piano sonatas from Elisabeth Leonskaja, Boston Symphony Chamber Players's complete recordings for RCA, and an anthology of French baroque music from the Orchestre de Chambre Jean-François Paillard and their eponymous founder.
This collection of chamber recordings which the great Catalan cellist made with long-standing friends and colleagues towards the end of his life includes the live accounts of Beethoven's Cello Sonatas Nos. 2 & 5 and the cello version of the Horn Sonata which were captured at the Beethoven-Haus Bonn in September 1958, plus the Cello Sonata No. 1 (with Wilhelm Kempff) and the Schubert Quintet from the 1961 Pablo Casals Festival (held at his adopted home in the French Pyrenees).
Available Format: 7 CDs
Gina Bachauer: The Mercury Masters
Gina Bachauer (piano), London Symphony Orchestra, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Antal Doráti
Born in Athens in 1913, Gina Bachauer studied with Rachmaninov and Cortot, and was particularly acclaimed for her interpretations of Romantic piano concertos - this newly remastered collection of seven Mercury albums features her accounts of the two Chopin concertos with Antal Doráti and the London Symphony Orchestra, and Brahms's PIano Concerto No. 2 with Stanislaw Skrowaczewski. Solo repertoire includes Stravinsky's Three Movements from 'Petrushka', Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit, and Debussy's complete Préludes.
Available Format: 7 CDs
Recorded in 2015 & 2017, Leonskaja's second complete Schubert survey prompted BBC Music Magazine to declare 'there is a lifetime's wisdom here - don't miss it', whilst Die Bühne observed that 'with her, the sun sometimes breaks out from behind the clouds and bathes the sounds in a peaceful, warm light in which every motif, every phrase gains a clear contour'.
Available Formats: 8 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Launched during Erich Leinsdorf's tenure as Boston Symphony's Music Director in 1964 and comprising the orchestra's first-chair string-players and principal winds, the Chamber Players recorded regularly with RCA Victor in the late 1960s, and this set presents the complete fruits of this partnership on CD for the first time. Highlights include Mozart's Oboe Quartet and Quintet for Piano & Winds, Webern's Concerto for Nine Instruments, the Poulenc Sextet, the Martinů and Spohr Nonets, and works by Elliott Carter, Samuel Barber and Walter Piston.
Available Format: 10 CDs
Newly remastered, this collection of live recordings from New York includes Mahler's Symphonies Nos. 1, 5, 6 and 9, the Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances, Stravinsky's Firebird and several Strauss tone-poems, plus numerous comparative rarities: Scriabin's Poème de l'extase, Skalkottas's Four Greek Dances, Guarneri's Prologo y Fuga, and the world premiere of Medea's Dance of Vengeance by Samuel Barber.
Available Format: 19 CDs
Founded in 1953 as the Jean-Marie Leclair Instrumental Ensemble and renamed after its founder six years later, the Orchestre de Chambre Jean-François Paillard was one of the Erato label's first signings and did much to champion French baroque repertoire which was largely neglected at the time. Recorded between 1953 and 1984, this collection includes music by Rameau, Lalande, Mouret, Dauvergne, Leclair and Charpentier.
Available Formats: 14 CDs, MP3, FLAC
Held in high esteem by Mozart and Charles Burney, the Bolognese composer and Franciscan friar Giovanni Battista Martini (1706-1784) counted Mysliveček, Grétry and Johann Christian Bach among his pupils, despite rarely leaving his home-town due to poor health. His compositions for organ include a set of twelve sonatas (showing French and Italian influences, and transferrable between harpsichord and organ), toccatas, and a large number of individual shorter pieces for liturgical use.
Available Format: 9 CDs
Instrumental Soloists For Capriccio's 40 Year Anniversary
Ton Koopman (organ), Christine Schornsheim (harpsichord), Tabea Zimmermann (viola), Tzimon Barto (piano), Linos Ensemble, Petersen Quartet
Capriccio's birthday celebrations continue with this collection of concerto, chamber and solo instrumental recordings, including Scarlatti keyboard sonatas from Ton Koopman, Schumann's Märchenbilder from Tabea Zimmermann, Ives's 'Concord' Sonata from Tzimon Barto, and works by Milhaud, Chausson, Ravel and Lekeu from the Petersen Quartett.
Available Format: 10 CDs
Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
Hans Hotter (Wotan/Wanderer), Wolfgang Windgassen (Siegmund/Siegfried), Astrid Varnay (Brünnhilde), Josef Greindl (Hagen), Wolfgang Windgassen (Siegmund), Gré Brouwenstijn (Sieglinde/Gutrune); Bayreuther Festspiele, Hans Knappertsbusch
This live 1956 recording from Bayreuth also features Gré Brouwenstijn as Sieglinde/Gutrune, Gustav Neidlinger as Alberich, Georgine von Milinkovic as Fricka, and Josef Greindl as Hunding. Reviewing a previous issue of the set, The Sunday Times's David Cairns observed that 'the cast would be hard to better at any time, let alone now... Knappertsbusch’s rare sense of Wagner’s scoring, as well as his mastery of the formal architecture, are splendidly apparent'.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC
Chris O'Reilly - Chief Executive
