Academy Leader Variations

The brilliant pianist and conductor Mikhail Pletnev, winner of the 1978 Tchaikovsky Piano Competition, is not only one of the best representatives of the Russian piano tradition, but is also a stunning and idiosyncratic interpreter of the standard repertoire. He is considered one of the greatest pianists of our time.

The 200th anniversary of Haydn's death arrived in 2009, and this mammoth box boasts one CD for every year that's passed! Well, not quite, but only a composer as prolific as this Viennese-classical master could even come close: 150 CDs of symphonies, concertos, operas, chamber music, oratorios and more beautiful music that have challenged performers and inspired composers for centuries.

When he was a boy, Kodaly taught himselfwith virtually no professional guidance-to play the piano, the violin and the cello, partly in order to take part in domestic music-making (his father, a station master employed by the Hungarian state railways, was an amateur violinist, his mother sang and played the piano), and his chamber music for strings all dates from relatively early in his working life, between 1905 and 1918. It includes three major works that feature the cello in a virtuoso capacity: the Sonata for cello and piano, Op. 4(1909-10), the Duo for violin and cello, Op. 7 (1914) and the Sonata for solo cello, Op. 8 (1915).