Albert Sammons, Peers Coetmore, Bbc Symphony Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult Moeran: Symphony

Released to celebrate his 75th Birthday, this 25CD Limited Edition encompasses the complete recorded legacy of Stephen Kovacevich for the Philips label. It includes his acclaimed interpretations of works by Beethoven, Bartók, Brahms, Chopin, Debussy, Dvorák, Grieg, Mozart, Schumann and Stravinsky. Every album is presented with original covers and programming. Following his triumphant debut in London, 1961, Stephen Kovacevich embarked on a brilliant international career and made many acclaimed recordings for Philips Classics, including his legendary Beethoven Piano Concertos and Diabelli Variations.

Released to celebrate his 75th Birthday, this 25CD Limited Edition encompasses the complete recorded legacy of Stephen Kovacevich for the Philips label. It includes his acclaimed interpretations of works by Beethoven, Bartók, Brahms, Chopin, Debussy, Dvorák, Grieg, Mozart, Schumann and Stravinsky.

This recording presents two comparatively rarely heard but striking works by Frederick Delius, performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Sir Andrew Davis with entirely idiomatic results. Both works are prime examples of Delius’s highly individual and ground-breaking use of voices in predominantly orchestral works.

Johann Sebastian Bach - The Conductors' Transcriptions (Damrosch, Gui, Klemperer, Ormandy, Wood & more)
BBC Symphony Orchestra / Leonard Slatkin
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 305 MB | Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Chandos # CHSA 5030 | Country/Year: Europe 2004
Genre: Classical | Style: Baroque

…The point is that Bach is the most indestructible of all composers, in the best sense of the term. And as with all great music the work is always greater than any one performance of it, so these wonderfully imaginative reincarnations of Bach’s originals bring with them a great deal of satisfaction. Part of the intention in every case, surely, was to realise the nature of Bach’s music in new ways through the potential offered by a great orchestra in performance. In that crucial and important way Leonard Slatkin and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, along with the Chandos engineers, have triumphed…

With the season 2005/06 Deutsche Grammophon launched its visionary initiative for recording and releasing orchestral concert performances - the DG Concerts series collaborates with some of the best orchestras around the globe, making their most acclaimed concert performances available to music lovers worldwide via digital download.

Excelling in recordings of Delius, Elgar, and Holst, Sir Andrew Davis here presents a spirited programme of works by Sir Arthur Bliss. It follows a recording of Morning Heroes that made the top recommendations of 2015; likewise recorded in surround-sound, it conveys the energy of both the exceptional soloists and the impeccable BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. Premiered along with Britten’s War Requiem at the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral in 1962, but hardly ever heard since, The Beatitudes is remarkable for its dramatic intensity, ‘full of contrast and striking orchestral effects’, as The Times noted after a recent Barbican performance given by the same forces. The reviewer added that ‘soprano Emily Birsan was silvery clear, well supported by the tenor Ben Johnson. And the biggest round of applause should go to the BBC Symphony Chorus, full of passion.’ To complete the album are an arrangement of the national anthem having all the flair that made the tenure of Bliss as Master of the Queen’s Music distinctive and successful, as well as the virtuosic Introduction and Allegro, dedicated to Stokowski and inspired by the powerful sound of American orchestras post-World War I.

John Adams’ 2005 opera explores the personal and moral issues surrounding the invention of the atomic bomb. Captured live in concert, it has colossal power and conviction. At its center is Gerald Finley’s commanding performance as Robert Oppenheimer, a scientist wracked by doubts. Having sung it at the premiere and many times since, he produces a magnificently characterized creation. Julia Bullock, Brindley Sherratt, Samuel Sakker, and Andrew Staples are all superb in supporting roles and Adams himself draws virtuoso playing from a truly galvanized BBC Symphony Orchestra. A major recording of a modern operatic classic.