Latest News: Classical, Recording of the Week
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Recording of the Week,
Carmen from Berlin with Kaufmann and Kožená 20th August 2012
The light-voiced Czech mezzo and heavyweight German tenor are an appropriately chalk-and-cheese pairing as the free-spirited gypsy and her obsessive soldier lover, with Kožená’s husband Simon Rattle conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker in a performance which emphasises the score’s opéra comique pedigree.
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Recording of the Week,
Mahler Symphony No. 1 from Iván Fischer 13th August 2012
The Hungarian conductor and his Budapest orchestra bring a wonderfully rustic, unrefined flavour to Mahler’s völkisch central movements, in an interpretation which benefits from Fischer’s ear for balance and attention to the smallest details of orchestration.
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Recording of the Week,
Rhapsody in Blue – Grosvenor and Kempf 6th August 2012
Two former BBC Young Musician of the Year prize-winners record Gershwin’s best-known work – Kempf as part of an all-Gershwin programme, Grosvenor alongside Saint-Saëns Piano Concerto No. 2.
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Recording of the Week,
Hans Rott’s First Symphony 30th July 2012
Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra make a great case for the sole symphony by a composer who was described by his friend Gustav Mahler as ‘the founder of the new symphony as I understand it.’
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Recording of the Week,
L’Olimpiade: The Opera 23rd July 2012
The Venice Baroque Orchestra and a fine line-up of singers present a pasticcio setting of a libretto by Metastasio, with contributions from composers including Caldara, Vivaldi, Galuppi, Hasse and Paisiello.
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Recording of the Week,
Holst and Delius on Naxos 16th July 2012
JoAnn Falletta conducts the Ulster Orchestra in Holst’s Cotswolds Symphony, and David Hill directs Delius’s Nietzsche-inspired Mass for Life with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.
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Recording of the Week,
Richard Strauss round-up 9th July 2012
Elektra from Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra, Die Frau ohne Schatten from the 2011 Salzburg Festival, and the Four Last Songs from Anne Schwanewilms.
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Recording of the Week,
New Shostakovich discovery - Orango 2nd July 2012
Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the world premiere recording of an embryonic opera which Shostakovivch abandoned partway through the Prologue, fleshed out and orchestrated here by Gerard McBurney.
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Recording of the Week,
Vivaldi from Rachel Podger 25th June 2012
Following her Gramophone Award-winning recording of La stravaganza in 2003, the British baroque violinist tackles La cetra with Holland Baroque Society.
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Recording of the Week,
Two terrific Italian Renaissance reconstructions 18th June 2012
A new Venetian Coronation from Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort, and a reconstruction of a typical Italian Vespers programme from circa 1612 from Robert Hollingworth and I Fagiolini.
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Recording of the Week,
Shostakovich Symphonies from Petrenko and the RLPO 11th June 2012
The seventh instalment of the Russian conductor’s acclaimed Shostakovich cycle finds his Liverpool orchestra on top form in the Second and Fifteenth Symphonies.
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Recording of the Week,
Bach's St Matthew Passion 4th June 2012
Peter Sellars’s ‘ritualization’ of the work with Simon Rattle conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker packs a powerful punch, thanks in no small part to Mark Padmore’s harrowing central performance as the Evangelist.
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Recording of the Week,
Bruckner Symphonies from Rattle and Barenboim 28th May 2012
Daniel Barenboim conducts the Staatskapelle Berlin in the Seventh Symphony, whilst Sir Simon Rattle and the Berliner Philharmoniker tackle the Ninth.
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Recording of the Week,
Handel in England 14th May 2012
The Edinburgh-based Dunedin Consort record Esther, Christian Curnyn and the Early Opera Company make a fine case for the incidental music for Smollett’s Alceste, and a legendary Glyndebourne Theodora makes its first appearance on CD.
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Recording of the Week,
Britten: War Requiem 7th May 2012
Gianandrea Noseda leads an Italianate performance of Britten’s great depiction of ‘the pity of war’, with the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and soloists Sabina Cvilak, Ian Bostridge and Simon Keenlyside.
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Recording of the Week,
Hamilton Harty’s Chamber Music 30th April 2012
The Goldner String Quartet and Piers Lane bring out all the charm and flamboyance of the Irish composer’s two string quartets and piano quintet, dating from the early 1900s and composed shortly after Harty relocated to London.
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Recording of the Week,
Kathleen Ferrier 23rd April 2012
On the centenary of Ferrier’s birth, Katherine pays to tribute to the great Lancashire contralto and explores her legacy on disc via two comprehensive commemorative sets from Decca and EMI, which includes folksongs, Bach and Mahler.
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Recording of the Week,
Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique from Ticciati and the SCO 16th April 2012
Now several years into his tenure as principal conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the young British conductor presides over a ‘deliriously orgiastic’ account of Berlioz’s ‘episodes in the life of an artist’.
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Recording of the Week,
New and forthcoming Opera DVDs 9th April 2012
Angela Gheorghiu and Jonas Kaufmann in Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur from Covent Garden, Juan Diego Flórez, Diana Damrau and Joyce DiDonato in Rossini's Le Comte Ory from the Metropolitan Opera.
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Recording of the Week,
Claude Debussy 2nd April 2012
James explores three collections marking the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth, with highlights including Boulez’s Pélleas et Mélisande, Michael Tilson Thomas’s Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien, and Jean-Yves Thibaudet’s Préludes.
