Category: Reviews

2006 is a centenary year of Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) – a great Russian composer of the 20th century, and a complicated and tortured soul whose posthumous legacy has been a subject of heated ideological debates in recent years.

Two sets of madrigals, each the fourth book published by its composer, give complementary views of the state of madrigal composition in Italy in the years either side of 1600.

During the fifties and sixties, it was almost impossible (or horrendously expensive) to collect the hundreds of recordings of zarzuela outside Spain and some Latin American countries.

The recent Deutsche Grammaphone release of an insightful Metropolitan Opera double bill from 1994 provides a fascinating comparison of contrasting verismo worlds.

Even with a magnifying glass you won’t be able to find a date of this concert on either the DVD itself or in the sleeve notes.

Second only to soprano divas, history’s great tenors have received the most retrospective scrutiny.

Anyone who knows Giacomo Puccini only for his operas is in for a treat. Puccini: Sogno díor presents Puccini the songwriter, and what is fascinating about this little-known repertory is that it prefigures many of the delightful melodies that later appeared in his works for the stage.

All the excitement and activity in the classical recording company world now seems to be in the budget area.