Beethoven: Piano Concertos Nos 4 & 5 'Emperor'

Chilean-born pianist Claudio Arrau made many recordings for Philips.

This recording features his virtuosic display of Beethoven's Fourth and Fifth Piano Concertos in which he is accompanied by the fresh sound of the Staatskapelle Dresden, led and inspired by Sir Colin Davis.

This terrific recording comes in 24 bits-96kHz sound, produced especially for the Philips 50 series.

For a complete list of this series type 'philips 50' into search

Fifty years on, and the mere mention of Philips Records is still enough to conjure qualities that were first acclaimed when the long-playing vinyl record was in its infancy. In those days, the Dutch Philips label was renowned for the warmth of its recordings and the supreme musicianship of its artists, many of whom went on to achieve legendary status.

Philips 50 brings the excitement of those days back to life on 50 CD re-releases, each of which is enhanced by a sophisticated audio restoration process (96kHz 24 bit technology) that extracts the maximum impact from the original tapes. And yet not everything on Philips 50 is "old". Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau's digital recording of Schubert's achingly beautiful song-cycle Winterreise with Alfred Brendel is as great a recording as any and enjoys the additional benefit of full digital sound. Valery Gergiev's rugged and spontaneous digital Kirov recording of Prokofiev's complete Romeo and Juliet ballet was widely acclaimed when it first appeared, and makes a welcome reappearance at mid-price. Then there's Mitsuko Uchida's atmospheric and immaculately sculpted reading of Debussy's 12 Etudes, classic recordings in every sense of the term, and a fine example of Philips' legendary piano sound. Zoltán Kocsis' benchmark Bartók recordings provide another.