Browse: CD

With the exception of the ‘Black Pearl’ variation, which lasts almost ten minutes, this is one of the fastest sets I have ever heard, yet it’s also one of the most enjoyable. Ólafsson draws on... — BBC Music Magazine, December 2023, 5 out of 5 stars (Performance) / 4 out of 5 stars (Recording) More…

It is the attention Pappano pays to crafting the contrasts between passages of intense sensuality and of mechanistic brutality, casting new light on a familiar score in the process, which really... — BBC Music Magazine, May 2023, 5 out of 5 stars More…

the most striking aspects of Podger’s playing throughout this recital (compared to most 20th-century ‘golden-agers’), is her enhanced range of tone and articulation, her vastly more flexible... — BBC Music Magazine, December 2022, 5 out of 5 stars More…

Other recordings of Daphnis et Chloé may offer bolder colours, a more obviously upfront panache, but the delicacy and detail of this performance put it in the top class, and the Sinfonia of... — Financial Times, 3rd November 2023, 5 out of 5 stars More…

Best of all are the Masques, recorded in Copenhagen in 1994…Indeed, the middle-period Masques also leap out with more imagination than anything else here, the pianist’s command of colour magnificent... — BBC Music Magazine, January 2023, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Powerful and beautifully crafted, this recording – the first from the relationship between DG and the Boston Symphony under Nelsons – is a hugely impressive sign of just what this ensemble/maestro... — Gramophone Magazine, August 2015 More…

Ibragimova is the latest to make you think you’ve never heard [the First Concerto] played better, and her intense relationship with Vladimir Jurowski and the current incarnation of Yevgeny Svetlanov’s... — BBC Music Magazine, July 2020, 5 out of 5 stars More…

This crack squad of first-rate period-instrument musicians gives lithe, polished and devoted performances that make a convincing case for a one-to-a-part "orchestra". Indeed, so full-bodied is... — Graham Rogers, bbc.co.uk, 30th November 2010 More…

I expected this to be good; but just how good it was was still a surprise…Ólafsson creates a ravishing musical sequence. Every track has its own allure, and many reflect a virtuosity which is... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2018, 5 out of 5 stars More…

One of his many virtues is that he’s not afraid of making his orchestra play very, very quietly; another is that, where a composer has not noted dynamics, Roth feels free to invent them, and... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2023, 5 out of 5 stars More…