Abbey Simon, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra And Leonard Slatkin Rachmaninoff: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 4

The premiere of Rachmaninov’s Symphony No. 1 in D minor was a notorious failure. It took until the 1940s for the work to gain recognition, and it contains much that is recognisable from the composer’s later works – brooding intensity, lyricism and yearning, orchestral colour and grandeur, written in a profoundly Russian manner. Unperformed during his lifetime, Prince Rostislav exudes Rachmaninov’s familiar qualities of melancholy and voluptuousness; and both works feature his pervasive use of the Dies irae theme. These acclaimed VOX recordings conducted by Leonard Slatkin were originally issued in 1977 and 1982.

Rachmaninov’s final work – and the only one composed fully in the United States – was the Symphonic Dances. It embraces jazz elements and ecstatic expressiveness and is both a valediction and a summation of his creativity. The Isle of the Dead is a lamentation utilising a variant of the Dies irae – it is a stirring, transformative work that begins and ends in stillness. The early Caprice bohémien and Scherzo in D minor complete this programme of Leonard Slatkin’s admired Rachmaninov recordings on VOX, heard here newly remastered from the original tapes. The Elite Recordings for VOX by legendary producers Marc Aubort and Joanna Nickrenz are considered by audiophiles to be amongst the finest sounding examples of orchestral recordings.

Noriko Ogawa and the Malmö Symphony Orchestra return to the works of Rachmaninov with a disc featuring his first and fourth piano concertos and Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Rachmaninov’s first concerto was written while he was a student at the Moscow Concervatory, but underwent considerable revisions up to 1917. His fourth piano concerto was written after a considerable break from composition as he was kept busy as a touring performer in the USA. The unsuccessful first performance again led to considerable revisions.

Erik Chisholm is a Scottish-born composer and friend of Bartók whose music has experienced a substantial revival. It's not quite correct to call him a Scottish composer, for the last two decades of his life were spent outside Scotland (mostly in South Africa), and Scottish nationalism is only one of the unique mix of influences in his music. It's not that he's "eclectic" in the modern sense.

Sergey Rachmaninov was better known in his day for his pianistic virtuosity than for his compositions, but his creative output has long been acknowledged as the enthralling legacy of a major creative artist. A thrilling masterpiece based on Edgar Allan Poe’s famous poem, The Bells is a choral symphony in all but name, its theme giving Rachmaninov the opportunity to explore his fascination with bell sounds. Spring is a dramatic portrayal of rebirth in a land gripped by ice, while the Three Russian Songs are folk-song settings that became a hit at the premiere under the baton of Leopold Stokowski. The Elite Recordings for VOX by legendary producers Marc Aubort and Joanna Nickrenz are considered by audiophiles to be amongst the finest sounding examples of orchestral recordings.

The new medium of film with sound was developing at around the time Prokofiev returned to the Soviet Union, where in 1933 he composed the music for his first film, Lieutenant Kijé. Prokofiev’s remarkable perception of the medium’s requirements was enhanced by his collaboration with Sergey Eisenstein on Alexander Nevsky. The music was of epic proportions and the resultant cantata remains one of Prokofiev’s most brilliantly conceived and popular works. Leonard Slatkin’s classic VOX recordings of these works have been praised for their “powerful and compelling performances”. (ClassicsToday.com) The Elite Recordings for VOX by legendary producers Marc Aubort and Joanna Nickrenz are considered by audiophiles to be amongst the finest sounding examples of orchestral recordings.