Berlin

This, the first ever release on CD of the 1980 cult futurist / synth-pop album ‘Berlin Blondes’, collects together all of the electronic band Berlin Blondes’ commercially released studio output. The band only ever made one, albeit landmark, album. Notably, it was produced by the legendary Mike Thorne as a de facto career bridge between his celebrated work with post-punk band Wire on their first three albums and his subsequent career defining synth- pop productions, shortly thereafter, with pioneering electronic pop acts Soft Cell, Bronski Beat and B-Movie.

Simon Rattle: The Berlin Years [45CD Box Set] (2024)
MP3 320 Kbps | Run Time: 01:22:33:12 | 6.28 Gb
Genre: Classical | Label: PLG UK Classics

The chemistry between tradition and innovation powered Sir Simon Rattle’s relationship with the Berliner Philharmoniker, above all during his time as the orchestra’s Chief Conductor and Artistic Director (2002-2018). As the successor to Wilhelm Furtwängler, Herbert von Karajan and Claudio Abbado, his mission was to take this pre-eminent musical institution into the 21st century.

The Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and conductor Carlo Montanaro present a powerful interpretation of Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca, together with a cast of soloists including Melody Moore (Tosca), Ștefan Pop (Cavaradossi) and Lester Lynch (Scarpia). Tosca has been an audience favourite from the onset. Premiered in 1900, it marks the beginning of twentieth- century opera, in which sex, violence and the uncanny abysses of the human psyche would be explored, inspiring composers to expand the musical means of expression in all thinkable ways.

Simon Rattle: The Berlin Years [45CD Box Set] (2024)
MP3 320 Kbps | Run Time: 01:22:33:12 | 6.28 Gb
Genre: Classical | Label: PLG UK Classics

The chemistry between tradition and innovation powered Sir Simon Rattle’s relationship with the Berliner Philharmoniker, above all during his time as the orchestra’s Chief Conductor and Artistic Director (2002-2018). As the successor to Wilhelm Furtwängler, Herbert von Karajan and Claudio Abbado, his mission was to take this pre-eminent musical institution into the 21st century.

Johann Sebastian Bach and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin go back a long way together! This recording, made with the welcome participation of Isabelle Faust and Antoine Tamestit, follows the complete violin concertos (2019), which left a lasting impression. Returning regularly to the inexhaustible source of the Brandenburgs ever since a memorable first recording in the late 1990s, the Berlin musicians have achieved a sovereign mastery of what is not a single work, but six, which, under their fingers, are successive episodes of a piece of musical theatre in love with dance, transparent sound and freedom. An exhilarating experience!

Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin returns to Pentatone together with soprano Christina Landshamer, presenting La Passione, a collection of dazzling concert arias on love, longing and loss by Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn, paired with the latter’s “La Passione” Symphony. Ranging from pastoral simplicity to exuberant outrage, the programme offers some of the finest vocal writing around 1800, including some of Beethoven’s rare and little-known excursions to Italian bravura opera, as well as one of the most dramatic and expressive symphonies of the eighteenth-century.

A few weeks before his 90th birthday the legendary American film composer John Williams conducted the Berliner Philharmoniker for the first time! The Tagesspiegel summed up the event as simply “one of those great evenings”. Regardless of whether Star Wars, Harry Potter or Indiana Jones, the symphonic Hollywood sounds on the stage of the Berliner Philharmoniker thrilled the audience right from the start. The soundtracks of John Williams are among the most popular in the history of film and have received numerous prestigious awards, including five Oscars, five Emmys, four Golden Globes and twenty-five Grammys.

Perhaps best known for their 1986 worldwide hit single Take My Breath Away, Berlin built their core fan base from the release of the 1982 mini album Pleasure Victim. Containing the underground hits Sex (I'm A…), The Metro and Masquerade, each single managed to make an appearance on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Despite the modest chart placings of the singles and the album itself, Pleasure Victim remained consistently popular and eventually reached platinum status in the U.S. selling more than one million copies.