Grammophon Award of The Year

Max Richter - Infra (2017) {Deutsche Grammophon 0289 479 7006 rec 2010 - bonus track}
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© 2010, 2017 Deutsche Grammophon | 0289 479 7006
Classical / Contemporary Classical / Post-minimalism / Ambient / Piano / Electronica

DG presents the third physical release from Max Richter's Retrospective catalog, Infra. Written for piano, electronics and string quartet, Infra is an expansion on Richter's score for Wayne McGregor's ballet of the same name that was created as a response to the London bombings on 7/7. Infra follows Richter's latest album, Three Worlds: music from Woolf Works, an album featuring his score for another McGregor ballet, Woolf Works. This CD version of Infra features the bonus track, "Sub Piano."

Sven Helbig - Pocket Symphonies (2013) {Deutsche Grammophon 481 039 8}
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© 2013 Deutsche Grammophon / Sven Helbig | 481 039 8
Classical / Neo-Classical / Classical Crossover

While Sven Helbig's Pocket Symphonies is presented by Deutsche Grammophon as a collection of lavishly produced songs in symphonic guise, the style has more in common with adult contemporary or easy listening categories than with classical music. Despite the appearance of Kristjan Järvi, the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony, and the Fauré Quartet, who bring ample talent and commitment to the proceedings, the album actually consists of lush and occasionally lively instrumentals that no one would mistake for western symphonic music, except for the use of an orchestra.

Mozart - Piano Concertos K 503 & K 466 - Martha Argerich, Claudio Abbado, Orchestra Mozart (2014) {Deutsche Grammophon}
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© 2014 Deutsche Grammophon | 00289 479 1033
Classical / Viennese School / Concerto / Piano

The first new release for ten years from Martha Argerich and Claudio Abbado is their first ever album of concertos by Mozart. The legendary pianist and conductor add the sublime music of Mozart to their unrivaled, multi award-winning DG discography of concertos by Tchaikovsky, Chopin, Ravel, Prokofiev, Beethoven and Liszt. Both concertos were recorded with Claudio Abbado s Orchestra Mozart, at concert performances at the 2013 Lucerne Festival that had critics searching for new superlatives. The album contrasts two very different works. Written in D minor, the key of the Queen Of the Night and the opening of Mozart s Requiem, the darkly dramatic No.20, K.466 has a stormy, operatic temperament that looks forward eighteen months to the premiere of Don Giovanni. With its majestic and radiant opening and a march famously reminiscent of the Marseillaise, No.25 in C major, K.503 is the culmination of the twelve transcendent concertos Mozart wrote in Vienna between 1784 and 1786. This release is Martha Argerich s first recording of solo concertos by Mozart on Deutsche Grammophon.

Bartok - Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2 - Pollini, CSO, Abbado (1979) {Deutsche Grammophon 415 371-2}
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© 1979 Polydor / Deutsche Grammophon | 415 371-2
Classical / Concertos

Bartók's Piano Concertos are among the most difficult ever written; only a piano virtuoso of amazing dexterity, along with a virtuoso orchestra, can play them. Maurizio Pollini is that pianist, and the Chicago Symphony is that orchestra. The pianist's command of the music is consistently impressive, and Claudio Abbado leads the orchestra in extremely close sympathy with the pianist. The result is a set of performances that would be ideal except for two factors. One is that this LP reissue contains only two Concertos, when all three can fit on one CD. The other is that the recording balance so undervalues the orchestra that you can't hear everything. I'd love to hear these artists rerecord the same music with better engineering. –Leslie Gerber

Yundi - Chopin - Ballades, Berceuse & Mazurkas (2016) {Mercury Classics-Deutsche Grammophon}
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© 2016 Mercury Classics / Deutsche Grammophon | 00289 481 2443
Classical / Romantic / Piano

Yundi, the Chinese dazzling pianist acclaimed by the Wall Street Journal for his - poetic depth and patrician elegance - continues his award-winning exploration of the works of Chopin with a new recording of the Ballades, and by embarking on a major international tour. If precedent is a guide, both are expected to cause massive excitement among his fans. For his new all-Chopin recording, Yundi performs the Opus 17 set of four Mazurkas, the Berceuse (Op 57), and all four Ballades. The latter works were composed between 1831 and 1842, and contain some of the composers most operatic writing, as well as his most challenging technical demands.

When Pogorelich did not make the finals of the 1980 Warsaw Competition (where they play exclusively Chopin), his response was to sign with Deutsche Grammophon for his first recording and he made it an all-Chopin affair. From his stunning opening take on Chopin's Sonata #2, to a Funeral March restored to its grandeur, to the breaktaking final moments of the Scherzo #3, Pogorelich announced to the music world that he'd arrived.

This award winning set from 1991 will not be to everyone's tastes. The recording and the playing are perfectly suited to each other being exceptionally clear and precise and with wide dynamic range. The playing on this pair of discs is, as mentioned above, exceptionally clear and precise and came as quite shock to me when I bought it some 20 years ago. Everything is laid out for inspection without the slightest hint of softness or textural shading. It is like going into a room with all the main lights on rather than finding the room lit by numerous lamps on tables and other furniture. There are no subtleties of nuance attempted in the normal way allowing for shadows and half-lights metaphorically.