Category: Recordings

Commemorating some of its outstanding concerts of the 1980s and Bernard Haitink, its principal conductor (from 1967-1979), the London Philharmonic Orchestra has released on its own label a single CD that includes several
pieces that brought notice to the ensemble.

Recorded in early May 2005 at Crear, an artists’ community in Argyll, Scotland, this CD contains selections of Lieder and songs that fit well the supple voice of the mezzo-soprano Ann Murray, who is accompanied facilely by the Scottish pianist Malcolm Martineau.

Connoisseurs of pretentious booklet essay verbiage will delight in the prose style of  Matthias Kellerin his musings for this EuroArts DVD of Ennio Morricone conducting his film scores with the Munich radio orchestra.

Dietrich Buxtehudeís Membra Jesu nostri is a large-scale Passion work dedicated to the Swedish chapelmaster, Gustav D¸bin, in whose notable collection, now at Uppsala, it holds a prominent place.

Was it so many years ago that lovers of Wagner’s titanic multi-part opus, Der Ring Des Nibelung, focused their passion principally on audio versions?

ìThese probably unique documents may well owe their existence to the presence of Joan Sutherland in the cast and represent the earliest recordings of the great diva.

Naxos reinforces its status as the classical recording world’s bargain leader by releasing a single CD highlights disc from its complete Don Giovanni, recorded in 2000 and originally released in 2001.

This new Naxos recording offers a rare opportunity to hear three little-known works by one of the 20th century’s greatest composers – The Execution of Stepan Razin op. 119, October op. 131, and Five Fragments for orchestra op. 42, by Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-75).

Is this the application of Peter’s Principle on Ruperto Chapi’s music as Chris Webber, editor of www.zarzuela.net preaches, or is this proof of Chapi being “undoubtedly the most important Spanish
composer of stage music of all time” as the sleeve notes tell us?

Its foundational interest in affective response made the early Baroque era a time rich in the nurture of highly impassioned music and text. Little surprise then that laments, with their characteristic emotional intensity, were particularly at home on the early seventeenth-century stage and in the chambers of the nobility.