Eugen Jochum’s complete recordings of choral / sacred music for Philips collected together for the first time. Includes the rare Rudolf Mengelberg Magnificat. Born into a Catholic family of Bavarian musicians, Eugen Jochum was playing the organ and conducting his father’s choir as a child. Late in life he became renowned as a Bruckner specialist, […]

Newly compiled for the first time, the Decca career of a pre-eminent Mozart conductor, complemented by his recordings for Deutsche Grammophon and Westminster. Peter Maag began his career as a pianist, but turned to conducting with the encouragement of Wilhelm Furtwangler. He made his first Decca recording having lately turned 30, with the Suisse Romande […]

Ferdinando Paer (1 July 1771 – 3 May 1839) was an Italian composer of Austrian descent known for his operas and oratorios. Using the same subject matter as Beethoven did for his ‘Fidelio’, Paer’s opera is called ‘Leonora’ and received its world premiere recording under Peter Maag for Decca with a star-studded cast that included […]

On 11th June 1944, Karl Böhm conducted ‘Ariadne auf Naxos’ at the Vienna State Opera. It was, in his own words, ‘despite the dark shadows cast by the war which was already long since lost, a feast for musical Vienna’. The occasion was the 80th birthday of Richard Strauss ­which would have undoubtedly been celebrated […]