BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Clarinettist Alexander Fiterstein introduces favourite recordings from his collection  Yona Ettlinger played principal clarinet in the Israel Phil, made a number of great arrangements and was interested in Baroque music. This is the first concerto t

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Violinist Chouchane Siranossian introduces us to some of her favourite recordings Musica Antiqua Köln/Reinhard Goebel (violin) DG Archiv 477 5001 I first heard this a few years ago, because I was interested in Reinhard Goebel, and I was really fascin

Independent on Saturday

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WHAT better way to enjoy a Valentine’s weekend than with an outdoor morning concert of fine music in a spacious garden in the heart of the Kamberg Valley in the Midlands? Four of Durban’s top musicians - Maggie Deppe (piano and oboe), Cathy Peacock (

BBC Music Magazine

5 min read

The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I Trevor Pinnock (harpsichord) DG 483 8436 117:32 mins (2 discs) In the booklet notes accompanying this recording, Trevor Pinnock rightly observes that the preludes and fugues of The Well-Tempered Clavier were not i

Pianist

1 min read

In 1789, Haydn composed an Allegro and Minuet, possibly intending them to stand as a two-movement keyboard sonata. The following spring he added an Adagio e cantabile to create a three-movement work, Sonata No 49. Although the autograph carries a ded

Country Life

1 min read

1835 Born on October 9; begins piano lessons aged two 1851 Wins the Conservatoire's top prize for organists 1852 First piece to receive an opus number: Trois Morceaux for harmonium 1863 Writes Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, his most loved con

BBC Music Magazine

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Much of the world’s music-making continues to be on ice and nowhere is that felt more keenly than in the US where, just recently, the Nashville Symphony announced it was suspending operations for a year. It’s bittersweet, then, to have them in the Or

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

St Pancras International (left) proved a very tuneful place to be on 8 March, as the London station marked International Women’s Day by hosting seven new minioperas by female composers. Titled ‘Lost and Found’ and conducted by Yshani Perinpanayagam a

Pianist

1 min read

Beethoven wrote several groups of bagatelles – short pieces without a fixed form – throughout his life. The seven Op 33 Bagatelles date from 1802, and, as we say a fond farewell to Beethoven’s big 250th anniversary year, we are delighted to feature t

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

I don’t suppose I was alone in eagerly waiting by the radio for Stephen Hough’s lunchtime performance from Wigmore Hall at the beginning of June. Yes, it was only a piano recital but, as the first broadcast since lockdown, it felt like so much more t

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

These little gems exist for several instrumentations, but it’s the cello version that grabs me, especially through Shafran’s heart-melting playing in this 1957 recording. Georgian composer Sulkhan Tsintsadze possessed this art of writing directly int

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Conductor Jonathan Berman began recording Franz Schmidt’s symphonies at the beginning of 2020, but for obvious reasons had to pause his plans. The first is out now (see review on p100), and Berman and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales will finally

Pianist

2 min read

Near the end of last year I attended an astounding recital by Arcadi Volodos. Oh, how it feels like half a lifetime away. Just a few months later, the world is a different place, and the doors to the Barbican and all our other culture palaces are fir

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Harpsichord Sonatas Mitzi Meyerson (harpsichord) Glossa GCD921810 78:49 mins A contemporary of Haydn, the Bohemian composer Joseph Anton Steffan (1726-97) fled his war-torn country to settle in Vienna in 1741 where he became the teacher of the futu

Indianapolis Monthly

4 min read

WAS THERE ANY HESITATION ABOUT JOINING THE ISO WITH MUSIC DIRECTOR KRZYSZTOF URBAŃSKI LEAVING SOON AND HIS SUCCESSOR UNKNOWN? I find that exciting, actually. I’m sad to see Krzysztof go, but 10 years is a long time for a musical director. Hopefully,

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Sharon Bezaly is renowned – and revered by flautists – for her powerful, full-bodied tone and iconic 24-carat gold flute. The Israeli’s technical abilities have inspired reams of major works including those by José Serebrier, Sally Beamish and Christ

BBC Music Magazine

3 min read

Which living British composers will have their music played a century from now? As I type that question, I realise that answering it will bring me only scorn on social media. And to what end? The bumpy career and wildly fluctuating reputation of Malc

Hi-Fi Choice

1 min read

CD LAWO THESE COLOURFUL SHOWPIECES have long been popular demo pieces due to their glittering orchestration. Petrenko and a very fine Oslo Orchestra deliver vivid, extrovert, highly musical performances. The orchestra plays with precision and stunnin

BBC Music Magazine

2 min read

Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra/Mariss Jansons BR Klassik 900185 53.48 mins If you want a testimony to what it was we lost when Mariss Jansons died, listen to this disc. In big symphonic works Jansons always had a flair for bringing out both the

The Global Filipino Magazine

1 min read

UAE’s representative Clarence Miguel Cresencia, dearly called ‘Miggy’, has recently won the first prize at the first round under the regional category of the ongoing Worldvision music competition. The Filipino national, 13, is gearing up for the nati

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Dvorák Slavonic Dances, Op. 46 Aloys and Alfons Kontarsky (piano) Deutsche Grammophon 449 5502 Victor Borge A Mozart Opera by Borge Sony G010001222314F Charpentier Te Deum – Prélude Orchestre de Chambre des Concerts Pasdeloup/Louis Martini Warner

BBC Music Magazine

3 min read

Great institutions sometimes have strange beginnings. Take the Royal Academy of Music, Britain’s oldest conservatoire, celebrating its 200th birthday this year. Three unlikely men were responsible for its genesis. Two were military commanders who pla

Hi-Fi Choice

1 min read

2x CD and DVD Deutsche Grammophon AS EVER, THE masterly Sokolov plays with a commanding authority that is unmistakable. His playing is strong and assertive, but unselfconscious. Beethoven’s Sonata Op 2 No.3 is delivered with patrician nobility, while

Hi Fi News

1 min read

Harmonia Mundi HMM902420 (downloads to 96kHz/24-bit res) The two early Beethoven Symphonies here are each prefaced by short three-movement ones by CPE Bach, which prove far less conventional and extremely adventurous (for which they were disliked by

Stereophile

1 min read

• Ferron Shadows on a Dime (engineer) • Kronos Quartet Nuevo (engineer) • Rosemary Clooney Dedicated to Nelson (engineer) • Laura Karpman & Langston Hughes Ask Your Mama (engineer) • Unbreakable, Original Cast Recording, featuring the San Francisco G

Hi Fi News

1 min read

Bavarian RSO/Mariss Jansons BR Klassik 900183 (downloads to 48kHz/24-bit resolution) Schnittke’s 1967 adaptation of Bizet’s Carmen (with bits of L’Arlésienne and Maid of Perth impudently thrown in) was scored for strings and 47 percussion instruments

BBC Music Magazine

1 min read

Cecilia Bartoli is to be the new artistic director of Opéra de Monte-Carlo. The Italian mezzo-soprano, who has won considerable acclaim for both her immaculate scholarship and sense of adventure in her recitals and recordings, says that her new post

Hi-Fi Choice

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CD Champs Hill Records THIS WELL-FILLED CD mixes well-known Strauss with pieces that are extremely rare – including an early string quartet. The disc begins and ends with late pieces – the silvery prelude to Capriccio and the moving Metamorphosen, wr

The Big Issue

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Dustin O’Halloran Post-classical pianist-composer Dustin O’Halloran usually divides his time between Reykjavík and LA, but when the pandemic hit he was unable to return to California as planned. O’Halloran took the opportunity to rework music from hi

New Zealand Listener

1 min read

Midday Report (RNZ National, noon, weekdays). RNZ National has revamped Midday Report and it now also features the first Māori presenter to host a regular weekday news programme. Māni Dunlop has settled into the hot seat at quite a moment in history.