Box Set Selections,
Boxed Set Selections - January 2023
January heavyweights include the Emerson Quartet's complete recordings on Deutsche Grammophon, all of the Argo & L’Oiseau-Lyre recordings made by the The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral Oxford and Simon Preston, Jörg Demus's Bach recordings on Westminster, and Arnold Bax's complete symphonies and selected tone-poems from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and David Lloyd-Jones.
The Emerson String Quartet - The New Complete Recordings on Deutsche Grammophon
Emerson String Quartet
As the Emersons prepare to embark on their farewell tour (the quartet will disband in late 2023), Deutsche Grammophon reissue the Complete Edition which was originally released in 2016, complete with two recent additions: the live recording of their Carnegie Hall recital with Evgeny Kissin in 2018 (featuring works by Mozart, Fauré, Dvořák and Shostakovich) and the 2017 recording Chaconnes and Fantasias - The Music of Britten and Purcell, which was praised in BBC Music Magazine for its 'insightful nuances' and 'structural cogency'.
Available Format: 55 CDs
Comprising the Dutch conductor's complete recordings on Decca and Philips, this 43-CD box includes award-winning recordings of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4 & A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a celebrated Symphonie fantastique, and a 1946 account of Ravel’s Rapsodie espagnole which Gramophone described as 'the best recording we have had of this pungently evocative work'. Also included are a number of 78rpm recordings made for ‘Dutch Decca’, Telefunken & Deutsche Grammophon, which receive their first release in almost seventy years (and in new hi-res transfers) here.
Available Format: 43 CDs
The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford
The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, Simon Preston
This tribute to the English organist and conductor Simon Preston (who died last year) brings together all of the Argo & L’Oiseau-Lyre recordings which he made with the Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, where he served as Organist from 1970 to 1981; the repertoire includes Byrd's Masses for Four and Five Voices, Handel's Messiah and Israel in Egypt, Dvořák's Mass in D, Stravinsky's Canticum Sacrum and Symphony of Psalms, and discs devoted to Lassus, Vivaldi and Walton.
Available Format: 19 CDs
Arnold Bax: Complete Symphonies and Other Orchestral Works
Royal Scottish National Orchestra, David Lloyd-Jones
As well as the seven symphonies which Bax composed between 1921 and 1939, this set includes the tone-poems Tintagel, In the Faëry Hills, The Happy Forest, November Woods, Into the Twilight, The Tale the Pine Trees Knew and more; recorded between 1996 and 2003, the individual volumes have been praised for their 'uncompromising directness and fire' (Classic CD on Symphony No. 1) and 'color, energy, and briskness' (American Record Guide on Symphony No. 3).
Available Format: 7 CDs
This anthology comprises the nine solo albums which the Swiss pianist recorded for the Yellow Label in the early 1990s (shortly before taking an eight-year sabbatical from performing), plus the 1990 disc of Stravinsky's two-piano works with Vladimir Ashkenazy. Repertoire includes Bach's Goldberg Variations and French Suites, the Chopin Ballades and Piano Sonata No. 2, three Prokofiev sonatas, a selection of Grieg's Lyric Pieces, and Britten's Friday Afternoons and Holiday Diary.
Available Format: 10 CDs
In addition to the complete studio recordings which Klemperer made with Wiener Symphoniker for the VOX label in 1951, this set also includes a number of live recordings made between 1951 and 1963. A highlight is the 1963 all-Beethoven concert (comprising the Coriolan Overture and Symphonies Nos. 2 & 3) - Klemperer's final performance with the orchestra, which prompted Der Kurier am Morgen to hail him as 'without a doubt the most significant Beethoven musician of our time, perhaps the most complete there has ever been'.
Available Format: 16 SACDs
Chris O'Reilly - Chief Executive
