Classical Recordings Pg. 6

This is an altogether remarkable release. Russian violinist Mikhail Tsinman, here playing all of Prokofiev’s violin sonatas with his son Igor and daughter Nika, is a...

Having already given us Britten’s three cello suites, Daniel Müller-Schott here turns his attention to the composer’s Cello Symphony, putting him in a now four-way contest...

I am by no means a proponent of piano reductions of almost anything originally conceived for an orchestra or chamber ensemble (I detest all of Liszt’s...

Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot has always been as much about spectacle as it is about storytelling, its exotic oriental locale and exotic, ear-pleasing music striving to overcome...

Often thought (certainly by me) to be Henry Purcell’s unfortunate younger brother, Daniel Purcell is now thought to be the greater composer’s cousin. I am not...

I really wanted to like this recording. For one thing, it appealingly combines the two great orchestral scores of Rachmaninoff’s maturity with The Rock , his...

This concert concluded the Berlin Philharmonic’s 2010 world tour. Under artistic director Simon Rattle’s leadership the orchestra has become truly international; neither of these works, by...

I’m beginning to think that Vasily Petrenko conducts Rachmaninoff with two little Vasilys sitting on his shoulders: the “angel” Vasily, telling him to play it straight,...

Neeme Järvi is on track to becoming one of the most recorded conductors in history. If and when he gets around to Zemlinsky, it can truly...

Joachim Raff was a popular and prolific 19th-century composer. His Symphony No. 2 is his opus 140! Raff composed 11 well-crafted symphonies that sound remarkably similar...

Violinist Lena Neudauer and pianist Paul Rivinius play Maurice Ravel’s “complete works” for violin and piano (although the collection includes arrangements), and she’s joined by cellist...

This disc, which bears the title Rapsodie espagnole, is played with grace and elegance by Trio Hoboken, founded in 2003. They named themselves after the Dutch...

My very first experience of Alexis Weissenberg’s pianism came with his rendition of Stravinsky’s Three Movements from Petrushka . Needless to say, I was speechless upon...

Collections of this sort are difficult to deal with if one wants to make some sort of decisive recommendation. The problem is not just the performance...

Obviously, this is not a new recording. The Romantic Suite was recorded in 1967 and the Böcklin Poems in 1972, a year before Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt’s death...

Let’s be clear, the score of Blossom Time consists mainly of the melodies of Franz Schubert, only appropriate considering the story is about the famed Austrian...

Having previously reviewed at least three other CDs of music by Johann Rosenmüller (1619–84) in these pages, I will dispense with the discussions of biographical and...

Gioachino Rossini’s opera Adelaide di Borgogna was completed quickly even for that quite prolific composer, premiering less than seven weeks after his previous work, Armida,

Return with us now to those glorious days of yesteryear, when Rosinas and Almavivas still dressed in 18th-century garb, when the sets didn’t look like a...

This was the very first opera composed by Rossini, who at that time was about 14 years old. Rossini’s friends, the Mombelli family, hired him to...

Orfeo has done it again: The label has released a disc that we should all want. The first two pieces are special indeed, as they mark...

Pier Luigi Pizzi’s production of Tancredi had its debut in 1999, with Daniela Barcellona in the title role. This filming of it took place six years...

It was purely a coincidence, I think, that I began listening to this CD on the day that the Vatican announced ‘Habemus Papam,’ and Pope Francis...

Since his student days at London’s Royal Academy of Music, oboist Christopher Redgate has specialized in the performance of contemporary music and he is known as...

This disc is another in Delos’s series of reissues from the catalog of the defunct Russian Disc label, of which I have already reviewed several. In...

The fifth and last of Anton Rubinstein’s piano concertos was composed in 1874. Dedicated to the French pianist and composer Charles-Valentin Alkan (misspelled “Arkan” in Centaur’s...

Saint-Saëns’s Piano Quartet in B♭ may be the most unusual 19th-century chamber work of its type, partly because it was written not for an established chamber...

Hännsler and the John Neumeier Foundation are to be commended on their continuing project of recording music that originated under the aegis of Serge Diaghilev and...

With this ninth volume in their survey of the repertoire of the renowned Diaghilev troupe, Hännsler Classic and conductor Richard Reimer move into lesser-known music—except for...

Think you know Schnittke’s music? Think again. This disc offers a range of new perspectives on his diverse output, some of which tally quite closely with...

Alfred Schnittke, once the record industry’s best-loved enfant terrible , has fallen from favor among recording artists in recent years. In the 1980s and ’90s, he...

It is not clear why Wergo is issuing this 1960 recording (which appeared on a 1964 Wergo LP) at this time. The notes say nothing; perhaps...

Available from bpo.org The items on this disc, deriving from two different concert programs, might seem unlikely bedfellows, but they do have at least one trait...

Konstanze Eickhorst began piano and recorder lessons at the age of five. By the young age of 11 she had been accepted into the studio of...

It gives me great pleasure to welcome a long-awaited and long-overdue first installment in a new survey of Schubert’s complete string quartets, and if this first...

This is not the first release in which a classic of the piano literature is played on several different instruments. A fascinating Bridge disc (Bridge 9169),...

Barbirolli greatly admired the professionalism of post-World War II Germany’s many orchestras. (And as someone who had endlessly browbeaten and pleaded with the Manchester City Council...

This CD is the latest release in what will eventually be a “complete” Schubert symphony cycle. Consider the quotation marks a sort of disclaimer since I...

Almost as puzzling to this reviewer as the mystery of the Schubert “Unfinished” itself, is the historical tendency of Schubertian scholars to tack ill-fitting music onto...

This remarkable and unusual performance of Winterreise, recorded between February 23 and March 13, 1945, in Berlin at the time when the city was being bombed...

Robin Schulkowsky (b. 1953) has been known for decades as a percussionist specializing in the performance of avant-garde music, in the U.S. and Europe, and especially...

This is now the third occasion on which I’ve been privileged to review a new release by the outstanding Swiss Piano Trio. The ensemble’s Mendelssohn trios...

What is it that makes a good Schumann pianist? There have been many approaches to his music over the course of the last century. Some stress...

Korean pianist Song-Suk Kang studied in Singapore before travelling to the U.K. to study at the Royal Northern College of Music (Manchester) under the respected teacher...

Hong Kong native and a finalist and award winner at a number of prestigious competitions, Agnes Wan (aka Agnes Wan-Patterson) holds degrees from the Hong Kong...