Classical Recordings

Any time a “classical” CD starts off with fluttery piano arpeggios, added to which we get fluttery violin arpeggios, I know that I as a reviewer...

Jacques Arcadelt (1507–1568) remains so poorly served on CD that this is at present the only release in print I can find that is devoted solely...

I have already raved about the virtues of the music of Algernon Ashton (1859-1937) previously in this journal ( Fanfare 34:1, a twofer of mainly piano...

Russian-born, Juilliard-educated Lera Auerbach is an artist and composer who works in several disciplines. She is a most successful composer and one wonders how she also...

Tor Aulin is known almost exclusively today for his Third Violin Concerto, a work of great lyrical beauty. But among plenty of chamber music that he...

Here we have a collection of keyboard concertos, as pleasurable for the music and playing it offers as it is instructive for the juxtaposing of works...

Russian pianist Anastasia Injushina plays with the requisite elegance and clarity in this material, and the fine regional German chamber group backs her with clean, focused...

This appears to be a second release in what may eventually be another complete Bach cantata cycle. If so, all involved in the project would be...

Here begins the parade of repackaged reissues. All of the cantatas in this six-disc box were previously released in separate volumes and reviewed in these pages...

After reviewing Elmar Oliveira’s brilliant performance of Schumann’s Violin Concerto in conjunction with our interview, I have to admit that reviewing this CD of Bach’s violin...

In about 1725 Johann Sebastian Bach put together these six suites that his biographer Johann Nikolas Forkel alleged were “composed for an English nobleman.” Of course,...

The main reason for this set of two discs is to highlight venerable keyboardist Colin Tilney performing the French Suites , with four additional filler movements...

I was a bit reluctant to take on this assignment, but not because of any qualms I have regarding David Korevaar whose Brahms CD on Ivory...

As the excellent program notes by scholar Christoph Wolff point out, Johann Sebastian Bach was expected to establish himself as a keyboard expert for his new...

I’ve written about quite a few St. John Passion s recently, but as far as I can remember this is the first time it’s happened on...

In a sense I’ve always felt somewhat proprietary towards John Nelson’s career, rooting for him as he moved from triumph to triumph because I remember him...

Christina Busch recorded her complete set of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas on a baroque instrument, of Austrian 18th-century origin, with a bow made by...

Truth be told, I was more than a little reluctant to review this album upon receiving it in the mail. I guess you could say that...

Toccata Classics is to be commended for its efforts in bringing to disc many world premiere recordings, even if their arrival for review is belated. Here...

Performing the cello music of Samuel Barber requires a special identification with the ethos of the composer to do well. It also demands the maximum of...

In 35:6, Ehnes and Armstrong’s Volume 1 of Bartók’s violin and piano works earned Robert Maxham’s unhesitating recommendation. Here we have Volume 2, which contains the...

Claudio Arrau’s authoritative, energized playing in these newly issued live performances is often more exciting than in his studio recordings of these two concertos. He responds...

Wilhelm Furtwängler left five recordings of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, with three different soloists. There are two commercial studio recordings, both with Yehudi Menuhin, and three live...

I always get worried when performing musicians speak about their music-making in terms of metaphysics or democracy, as these do. Fortunately, these musicians are not French....

Who would ever expect Beethoven and Bizet to turn up as discmates? If for no other reason, you have to give David McGrory credit for imaginative...

This is Philippe Herreweghe’s second version on disc of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis ; the first, from a live performance in 1995, was reviewed in considerable detail...

Of course these magnificent works have been recorded many times over. We have the brilliant performances of the Budapest, Amadeus, Guarnieri, and LaSalle quartets, but every...

If ever there were a pianist who could be considered the aristocrat of the instrument for the 20th century it would surely be Artur Rubinstein, so...

Claudio Arrau’s playing in his later years had a rather fixed set of emotional characteristics—serious, pensive, searching, dramatic—and when the music that he played was in...

The man with the golden tone, one of the first modern pianists, the “little giant”—Emil Gilels has been described in these various ways and more. And...

Is it possible to really like an artist’s interpretations of the Beethoven sonatas without loving them above all others? Charles Timbrell, reviewing Roscoe’s Vol. 1 in...

Evgeni Koroliov has never disappointed me in the past—there may be many works in which I don’t agree with his approach, but he is such an...

The symphonies on this CD were recorded as part of Columbia’s complete set of Beethoven’s symphonies to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his death, in 1927....

This is one of those very good “A-Minus” releases that poses a challenge to reviewers. The evolution of Beethoven performance over several decades in the direction...

Malcolm Sargent rarely recorded the core German symphonic repertoire. That he did so beautifully should not be surprising, given his excellent accompaniments to Artur Schnabel in...

These releases represent a sonic update by Andrew Rose of the well-known and highly regarded Klemperer EMI Kingsway Hall releases from 1956-60, plus the Grosse Fuge...

Reviewing this CD is a simple delight. Joshua Bell has recently been appointed music director of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the first...

This one’s a bit of a head-scratcher. Try as I might, I can discern no logic in the joining of these three piano trios on the...

The variation medium is a fascinating one by which to judge a composer. Never is the sense of compositional exploration and freedom more discernible than in...

I requested to review this CD because I had recently reviewed, and been greatly impressed, by the playing of Maria Kliegel and Nina Tichman in their...

The recording of this performance on EMI was reviewed by Marc Mandel in Fanfare 27:5. It was the first complete opera recording featuring Callas. He complained...

I’m not sure I understand—in fact, I’m sure I don’t understand—the color theme of this album, titled Red , or the Amaryllis Quartet’s previous album, of...

The Amaryllis Quartet is a relatively new group. After winning prizes in two competitions (the Premio Paolo Borciani and the 6th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition)...

Berlioz’s overtures fall into two categories: orchestra-pit curtain-raisers for operatic stage productions, and stand-on-their own, concert platform pieces that are cognate to tone poems, which, at...

Steber and Mitropoulos performed Les nuits d’été with the New York Philharmonic in May of 1953 and eventually recorded it along with some other Berlioz pieces...