First releases on Decca CD for a pair of underrated Nielsen recordings. No less than Sibelius or Shostakovich, Nielsen became the custodian and the renovator of the classical symphonic tradition in the first half of the last century. Both the Third and Fifth symphonies make strenuous demands upon even the world’s great orchestras but at […]

Sergei Rachmaninov began his Third Symphony in August 1935 at Senar, his Swiss villa, while riding a final wave of popular success. His ‘Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini’ had enjoyed a successful premiere the year before, and subsequent performances had gone far to mute criticism that the composer’s well of inspiration had dried up. […]

Receiving its first ever release on CD, this legendary performance of Rachmaninov’s super-romantic Second Symphony conducted by Paul Kletzki will be seized up by collectors and bargain hunters alike. From Ashkenazy’s remarkable survey of the Rachmaninov orchestral works comes ‘The Isle of the Dead’. Reviewing it, Gramophone magazine writes: ‘a searingly powerful reading of ‘The […]