Departments/Hall of Fame

21 interviews, and over 475 reviews of classical CDs, SACDs, DVDs, Blu-rays, and downloads in this 640-page issue!

Latest Music Reviews

This is less a Hall of Fame candidate than a candidate for reappraisal. To my mind it is very good and worth any collector’s consideration. I...

Even if he lacked the wondrous Italian squillo of Mario del Monaco, Jon Vickers was a truly great Otello—in fact, one for the ages. He made...


Recent Music Reviews

This is a bittersweet review, as after submitting it I was informed that Jonathan Harvey (1939-2012) had died. I’ve reviewed several of his releases over the...

The piano concerto—like the symphony—formed an integral part of Mozart’s catalog throughout his all-too-brief life. When he died in 1791 Mozart had succeeded in transforming the...

In the 1940s and ’50s, when I was growing up to music in England, there were two homegrown pianists of consequence: Solomon and Curzon. Solomon, born...

Carmen may be the most-recorded opera of all time, although La bohème has always given it a run for the money—but Carmen came first, as far...


More Music Reviews

Fred Gaisberg, artists and repertoire director of His Master’s Voice, was a pretty astute man. Among his many achievements were recording tenor Enrico Caruso before anyone...

Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679–1745) was born in Louňovice pod Blaníkem, a small market town southeast of Prague, in what was then Bohemia. He was the eldest...