BACH / BEETHOVEN / BARTOK / DEBUSSY / RAVEL / COWELL / etc
Joseph Szigeti - The Complete Sony Recordings Joseph Szigeti (violin) with Myra Hess, Pablo Casals, Benny Goodman, Bela Bartok, etc [ Sony Classical / 17 CD Box Set - released 26/Mar/2021 ] "Full of immediacy - and star turns - these remastered recordings make for a compelling time capsule" The Guardian |
BEETHOVEN / BRAHMS / STRAVINSKY / HONEGGER / Prokofiev / DEBUSSY / etc
Joseph Szigeti - The Mercury Masters Joseph Szigeti (violin) with Roy Bogas, Artur Balsam, Mieczysław Horszowski (piano), various concductors & soloists [ Mercury Living Presense Australian Eloquence / 6 CD Box Set - released 17/Feb/2023 ] Issued internationally and complete, for the first time on CD in this Limited Edition original-jackets collection, these Mercury recordings were made in New York and London during the autumn of Szigeti's career, between 1959 and 1961. |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: The Complete String Quartets (the 1982 Live recordings) Juilliard String Quartet [ Sony Classical Masters / 9 CD Box Set - released 13/Nov/2020 ] The Juilliard String Quartet, which was founded in 1946 is one of the world's most prestigious string quartets in the world. In February 2011, the quartet received the NARAS Lifetime Achievement Award for its outstanding contributions to music. |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: The Complete String Quartets (the 1964-1970 recordings) Juilliard String Quartet [ RCA / Sony Classical / 9 CD Box Set - released 20/Jul/2020 ] On the 'Sony Classical' label - In celebration of Beethoven's 250th anniversary year, Sony Classical is pleased to release the internationally renowned Juilliard String Quartet's recordings of Beethoven's String Quartets recorded from 1964-1970. The... |
WAGNER
Gotterdammerung (complete opera) [Recorded in stereo live at the 1955 Bayreuth Festival] Jutta Vulpius, Elisabeth Schartel, Maria Graf, Wolfgang Windgassen, Georgine von Milinkovic / Bayreuth Festival Chorus & Orchestra / Joseph Keilberth [ Testament / 4 CD Box Set - released 1/Feb/2007 ] "Windgassen may be more vocally secure for Solti but nowhere else is he so tender, so moving as here. Josef Greindl is a far more saturnine, charismatic Hagen here than elsewhere. But it is Astrid Varnay who is the great revelation." Recording of... |
SAMUEL BARBER
Barber: Complete Orchestral Works [6 CD set] Karina Gauvin (soparno), Thomas Trotter (organ), Stéphane Rancourt (oboe), John Gracie (trumpet) / Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Marin Alsop [ Naxos American Classics / 6 CD Box Set - released 6/Dec/2010 ] "The RSNO positively glows in this extremely welcome and romantically rewarding and alluringly-priced set. It hardly matters that this is in fact the only such collection." (MusicWeb Sept 2010) |
SCHOENBERG / WEBERN / BERG
Second Viennese School (5 CD set incls 'Gurrelieder') Karita Mattila, Anne Sofie von Otter, Philip Langridge / Berlin Philharmonic Simon Rattle [ EMI Classics Budget Box Sets / 5 CD Box Set - released 10/Feb/2011 ] GRAMOPHONE AWARD WINNER 2002 - Choral (for Gurrelieder) |
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Schubert: Piano Trios, String Quintet, String Quartets Klavertrio Amsterdam / Brandis Quartet [ Brilliant Classics Quintessence / 5 CD Box Set - released 25/Sep/2020 ] "I really admire these heartfelt accounts for their warm expressiveness and sumptuous textures." MusicWeb [Quartets] |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN / FRANZ LISZT
Beethoven/Liszt: Symphonies Nos. 1-9 (Transcriptions) S464/R128 Konstantin Scherbakov (piano) [ Naxos Liszt Complete Piano Music Vol 21 / 5 CD - released 1/Dec/2006 ] "... one of the most capable, daring and interesting musicians of these days." (Peter Cossé) |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: Complete Violin Sonatas / Cello Sonatas Kristóf Baráti (violin) Timora Rosler (cello) Klára Würtz (piano) [ Brilliant Classics Quintessence / 5 CD Box Set - released 25/Sep/2020 ] Here are superb musicians from Hungary to add their own approach: on 'traditional' rather than 'period' instruments but interpretatively untrammelled by one or another performing dogma. |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: Complete Piano Concertos [3 CDs with Blu-ray Audio / Dolby Atmos & Blu-ray video] Krystian Zimerman (piano) / London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Simon Rattle [ Deutsche Grammophon / 5 CD/Blu-ray Disc - released 22/Apr/2022 ] Krystian Zimerman, Sir Simon Rattle, and Ludwig van Beethoven: three exceptional musicians and five great piano concertos brought together for this landmark recording. |
W. A. MOZART
Mozart: Complete Divertimenti & Serenades Kurpfälzisches Kammerorchester Mannheim, Czech Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra, Amati Chamber Orchestra [ Brilliant Classics / 9 CD Box Set - released 5/Apr/2024 ] A divertimento is defined as music intended for light entertainment, 'to please the ear' rather than arouse the emotions in the phrase of one early-19th-century theorist. The word was used interchangeably at the time with serenade and cassation, and... |
MICHEL-RICHARD DELALANDE
Delalande: Symphonies Pour Les Soupers Du Roy [Symphonies for the King's Supper] La Simphonie du Marais, Hugo Reyne [ Camera Obscura / Harmonia Mundi / 4 CD Box Set - released 1/Sep/1990 ] Hugo Reyne, known until then as the 'recorder-player of Les Arts Florissants', presented the first-ever completed recording of the Symphonies pour les soupers du Roy with his ensemble La Simphonie du Marais, founded three years previously |
ANTONIO VIVALDI
Vivaldi: Complete Concertos and Sinfonias for Strings and Basso Continuo L'Archicembalo [ Brilliant Classics / 4 CD Box Set - released 1/May/2019 ] "this is surely an indispensable set for Vivaldians... it is a treasure trove of irresistible, life-enhancing music, as good and convenient a place as any to discover these underrated compositions." MusicWeb |
LEONARD BERNSTEIN
Leonard Bernstein - The Harvard Lectures Leonard Bernstein (speaker / piano) [ Sony Classical / 13 CD Box Set - released 16/Aug/2018 ] The lectures were each given twice, first to the audience in Harvard Square, and afterwards before a small group of listeners at Boston's WGBH-TV, for broadcast by PBS in the US and by the BBC in the UK. |
FRANCESCO SACRATI
Sacrati: La finta pazza Leonardo García Alarcón; Cappella Mediterranea [ Château de Versailles Spectacles / 3 CD Box Set - released 27/May/2022 ] 1645: for the pleasure of the Queen Mother Anne of Austria, and attended by a young King Louis XIV, Cardinal Mazarin put on the first Italian opera in Paris. The Italian company, invited at great expense, performed Sacrati's La Finta Pazza. |
PYOTR Il'yich TCHAIKOVSKY
Tchaikovsky: Eugene Onegin (complete opera with libretto) Thomas Allen, Mirella Freni, Anne Sofie von Otter, Neil Shicoff / Staatskapelle Dresden, James Levine [ Deutsche Grammophon Originals / 2 CD Box Set - released 2/Feb/1988 ] "James Levine's 1984 recording is characterised by an appropriately full recorded sound and much gutsy playing from his orchestral forces." (MusicWeb) |
BACH / HANDEL / MENDELSSOHN / PARRY / etc
Sir Adrian Boult - The Decca Legacy, Volume 2 - Baroque & Sacred Music London Philharmonic & London Symphony Orchestra & Chorus / Kirsten Flagstad, Jennifer Vyvyan, Norma Procter, Kenneth McKellar, Joan Sutherland, etc [ Decca Australian Eloquence / 13 CD Box Set - released 7/Oct/2022 ] The second volume of Sir Adrian Boult's Decca legacy brings together the conductor's Messiah recordings of 1954 and 1960, plus Baroque and sacred music recitals from Kenneth McKellar, Kirsten Flagstad and Kathleen Ferrier. LIMITED EDITION. |
TCHAIKOVSKY / RACHMANINOV / PROKOFIEV / DOHNÁNYI / RIMSKY-KORSAKOV / MAHLER
Sir Adrian Boult - The Decca Legacy, Volume 3 - 19th & 20th Century Music London Philharmonic Orchestra, Wiener Philharmoniker, Paris Conservatoire Orchestra, Kirsten Flagstad, Julius Katchen, etc [ Decca Australian Eloquence / 16 CD Box Set - released 7/Oct/2022 ] The third volume of Boult's complete Decca recordings features Boult the insightful accompanist and inspired Russian interpreter, featuring many long-unavailable and newly remastered Decca recordings. LIMITED EDITION. |
DVORAK / RIMSKY-KORSAKOV / MOZART / VERDI / SCHUBERT / etc/
Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt Edition - Volume 2 London Symphony Orchestra, Concertgebouworkest, NDR-Sinfonieorchester, Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt, with Alfred Brendel, Henryk Szeryng, etc [ Decca Australian Eloquence / 15 CD Box Set - released 29/Sep/2023 ] Supplementary to his legendary Beethoven cycles for Decca are Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt's recordings for Philips, Mercury, Deutsche Grammophon and Accord. They date from 1944 (Sutermeister) to 1972, when he made his last recording, fittingly by Mozart. |