Andris Nelsons, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig

Lang Lang presents a treasure trove of musical discoveries in this album: Saint-Saëns’s Piano Concerto No. 2, recorded with the Gewandhausorchester and Andris Nelsons, is a true romantic masterpiece for Lang Lang that rivals the great concertos by Rachmaninoff or Tchaikovsky. Pairing it with Carnival of the Animals, a whimsical menagerie that has captivated young hearts for generations, Lang Lang continues his heartfelt wish to promote the love of classical music to young people and it also gives him a chance to collaborate with his wife, pianist Gina Alice. These two large scale orchestral works are complemented with solo compositions, including hidden gems by five female French composers as well as beloved French Classics.

Andris Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig conclude their award-winning Bruckner cycle. Starting in 2017 with Symphony No. 3, the cycle has received countless superlatives and garnered the 2017 Edison Klassiek Award. Each symphony has been considerately paired with music by Wagner. In this final instalment of the cycle, Nelsons complements Symphonies Nos. 1 & 5 with the Prelude and Liebestod from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde".

Grammy-winning conductor Andris Nelsons and his "superb" (The Guardian) Gewandhausorchester Leipzig continue their acclaimed couplings of Bruckner symphonies and Wagner masterpieces with Symphony No. 6 and Symphony No. 9. The symphonies are accompanied by the Wagner's Prelude to his last complete opera, Parsifal, and the Siegfried Idyll.

Continuing his Bruckner cycle on Deutsche Grammophon with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Andris Nelsons presents the Symphony No. 7 in E major, paired with an excerpt from Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, "Siegfried's Funeral March" from Götterdämmerung. While this symphony is outwardly one of Bruckner's most approachable, particularly in its lyrical opening movement, its energetic Scherzo, and its jubilant Finale, its long, funereal Adagio makes the connection to the gloomy Ring selection more apparent, since this slow movement was composed in anticipation of Wagner's death. It also marks the first time that Bruckner used a quartet of the novel "Wagner tubas," and unusually wrote parts for cymbals, triangle, and timpani at the movement's climax, perhaps symbolizing Wagner's apotheosis.

Andris Nelsons, Kristine Opolais, and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig form a Dvorák sound from the middle, singing the melodies that the composer concealed in all of the layers of his music with tender, warm, soft colors. Nelsons’ tempos remain calm and relaxed, allowing the omnipresent beauty of Dvorák’s music to unfold and flood the Gewandhaus. This is the first DVD and Blu-ray release of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig under the baton of its new music director Andris Nelsons. Recorded at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig, May 2017.

Nelsons is the guiding spirit in what is surely, listened to in order, one of the most remarkable musical and spiritual journeys ever conceived.

Andris Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig continue their award-winning Bruckner cycle. This time the Symphonies are coupled with Wagner’s Meistersinger Prelude. The Orchestra and the Latvian Maestro recently announced the extension of their acclaimed partnership until 2027. In 2019 The Times (UK) raved about Andris Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester’s visit to the BBC Proms, “He [Bruckner] really does have to be played very, very well if the spaces that suddenly open up around the notes are not to seem a slackening of tension. It was one of the outstanding features of Nelsons’s reading – among the best Bruckner interpretations I’ve heard – that they never did. Every standstill was pregnant with consequence; and, while one could relish the beauty of sound […] one felt the pacing hidden in the background. Detail was luxurious, but architecture paramount, and Nelsons’s unshowy approach profoundly impressive. One could almost believe one had come across that impossible thing: the ego-less conductor. No exhibitionism here. He revealed Bruckner, with a relentless vision that takes us into the strangest places, as greater than ever.”

Over the last few years, Andris Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester have recorded a Bruckner symphony cycle, pairing each work with orchestral music by Wagner. DG now presents their complete Bruckner/Wagner recordings in a 10-CD box and digitally, including Dolby Atmos versions. The set also features the artists’ previously unreleased recordings of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 0 (the so-called “Nullte”) and the overtures to Wagner’s Rienzi and Der fliegende Holländer.