The Tchaikovsky ballet score recordings conducted for Decca and Philips by the Ukrainian-born Anatole Fistoulari (1907-1995) are prized ‘among the finest ever made’ (Gramophone). As a companion issue to his first, abridged versions of Swan Lake (4825225) and Sleeping Beauty (4827223), this newly remastered set offers another trio of complete LP albums, all stereo recordings […]
The Tchaikovsky ballet score recordings by the Ukrainian-born conductor, Anatole Fistoulari, are prized ‘as being among the finest ever made’ (Gramophone). As a companion issue to the abridged ‘Swan Lake’ and extended excerpts from ‘The Nutcracker’ on Eloquence (482 5225), this newly remastered set offers another pair of complete Decca albums both appearing for the […]
The complete published Decca recordings of a fine but forgotten Russian pianist, previously unreleased on CD. A student of the legendary pedagogue Konstantin Igumnov, Nikolai Orloff, became a professor of piano himself at the Moscow Conservatoire in 1917, at the age of just 25. Having emigrated to Paris in 1922, he soon began to make […]
According to legend, Anatole Fistoulari (1907–1995), conducted an orchestra for the first time at the age of seven. Having moved to France in his twenties, he escaped to England after the fall of France in 1939 and based the rest of his career in the UK as a ballet specialist who became something of a […]
One of the most significant violinists in gramophone history, Alfredo Campoli enjoyed tremendous success in the 1930s as a purveyor of light music both in concerts with his own salon orchestra and on Decca. A series of six, 2CD reissues from Eloquence focuses on the violinist’s postwar reinvention of himself as ‘Campoli’, the classical soloist. […]
‘In every way the most transcendentally gifted young piano student I have heard in the last 25 years’ was Percy Grainger’s pronouncement of the young Eileen Joyce (1908–1991) when he first heard her play in 1926. From the goldfields in Western Australia whose capital city is the most remote in the world, Joyce defied incongruous and […]
Newly remastered and compiled for the first time, the complete Decca recital albums of Irma Kolassi are now available on this 4CD set from Eloquence. Born in Greece but raised in Paris,she began her career as a pianist until her ‘richly regal’ (The Times) mezzo-soprano was discovered. As a vocal coach in Athens, she worked […]
Unlikely in theory, fruitful in practice: for the first time on CD, Eloquence presents a duet recording of the Greek-born, French mezzo-soprano, Irma Kolassi and French-Canadian tenor, Raoul Jobin. Kolassi was no creature of the stage: her brief recording career centres around Decca recital albums which have also been newly remastered and reissued by Eloquence […]
Among the Concertgebouw Orchestra’s first stereo recordings, these Decca sessions were taped in February 1961 and the performances and sound engineering are still as vivid as ever – in fact, quite overwhelming.
Ruggiero Ricci is in his element in these virtuoso concertos and showpieces, with both the Tchaikovsky Concerto (with Sargent) and the Scherzo plus the Sibelius Violin Concerto, being released internationally on CD for the first time. The perceptive booklet notes by Tully Potter include a biography of Ricci and (sometimes wry!) comments by the violinist […]
The music on this pair of CDs falls into one of two categories: ballet music from an opera, or ballet music that was not originally intended for dancing at all, but that was subsequently adapted for that purpose. (The exception is Don Quixote, a full-length ballet with an original score.) Many famous conductors had unusual […]
Many famous conductors had unusual lives, but the life of Anatole Fistoulari (1907-1995) was more unusual than most. When he was just seven, he conducted a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony in his native city of Kiev. At thirteen, he conducted Saint-Saëns’s Samson and Delilah in Bucharest. While a young man, he travelled throughout Europe […]
