Quintessential mezzo-soprano, Marilyn Horne, treats us to a program of great songs from ‘The American Songbook’ – a veritable quilt of many-coloured delights. The arrangements range from the delicate to the lush and the mood ranges from racy fun to religiously uplifting. This CD, one of Decca’s first releases on compact disc, has been excerpted […]
Two of Dvorák’s sunniest inspirations on CD together. The rare recording of the Violin Concerto with German violinist Edith Peinemann is once more made available and Kubelík’s recording of the Serenade was always one of the most highly recommended.
A beautiful collection of Purcell favourites, both from recent times with artists of the calibre of Emma Kirkby and Christopher Hogwood, to such Purcell champions of the mid-20th century as Benjamin Britten, whose rousing arrangement and performance of the ‘Chaconne in G minor’ is here included.
Being born in Romania and surrounded from childhood by folk melodies and fiery popular dance music certainly helps in forming an inspired musician, provided the talent is there. In the case of the exceptionally gifted Gheorghe Zamfir, who was born to a family of vine-growers in 1941 in Gaiesti near Bucharest, these fortunate circumstances led […]
Collectors’ ears will prick-up at the inclusion of the Bavarian Radio/Sir Colin Davis recording of a chorus from ‘Messiah’, otherwise unavailable.
Mozart’s sublime masterpiece for violin and viola, the Sinfonia Concertante, was recorded on a few occasions by Marriner, but strangely enough, this version with two of the Academy’s foremost musicians – Alan Loveday and Stephen Shingles – has lain buried in the archives. Now, it receives its first release on CD and likewise its coupling, […]
Colin Davis and the English Chamber Orchestra made several Mozart recordings for L’Oiseau-Lyre. All five symphonies and both Divertimenti that he recorded are collected here on a 2CD set (the Concertone has also been re-issued). Crisp and tender, they are classic performances from the 1960s and will be warmly welcomed in these CD transfers by […]
Daniel Barenboim’s sumptuous performances of English music have long been favourites and here they are beautifully remastered with state-of-the-art technology for this release. Pinchas Zukerman’s performance of ‘The Lark Ascending’ is surely a stand-out among recordings of this work (‘beautifully played, highly sympathetic performance’ said Gramophone). What’s more, the addition of Vaughan Williams’s Tuba Concerto, […]
Overshadowed by his father, Michael Haydn penned some delectable music and here are father and son on a single disc of Violin Concertos, completed with two Mozart ‘movements’.
Britten’s stately and clear-sighted readings of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos begin a program that continues with a group of rarities. Much requested and finally available on CD, is the complete 1953 Opening Concert of the Aldeburgh Festival in which Britten and Imogen Holst shared the conducting honours. In addition to the anthems (in which the soloists […]
One of Couperin’s most important, varied and profound compositions, ‘Apothéose de Lully’ is cast in a programmatic form. Each movement tells a section of the story of the acceptance of Lully into Parnassus, his meeting there with Corelli (the founding fathers of the rival French and Italian styles) and Apollo’s persuading of them to bring […]
A generous disc (nearly 80 minutes) of some of Raymond Leppard’s pioneering L’Oiseau-Lyre recordings of French Baroque music with the English Chamber Orchestra. The brilliant realisations of Rameau’s ‘Temple de la Gloire’ suites have seldom been more strikingly realised. ‘Le Temple de la Gloire’ was a theatrical entertainment to a text by Voltaire, written to […]
