Leto Kirill

Tchaikovsky - almost alone - saw the possibilities of specially-composed music for the classical ballet, which was hugely popular in nineteenth-century Russia. His secret was to work closely with his choreographer and link music and dance routines at the outset: this proved vital to the stage action and the final success of the whole production. Swan Lake was the first, and Nutcracker the last of Tchaikovsky’s three ballet scores. Following the success of Sleeping Beauty came the request for another ballet, which eventually formed a double-bill with his opera Yolanta. Tchaikovsky agreed, unusually, that some of the Nutcracker music could be played at an orchestral concert before the ballet opened in St Petersburg. At the concert, an enthusiastic audience encored almost every number.

The Berliner Philharmoniker played under the baton of their new chief conductor Kirill Petrenko for the first time at the New Year’s Eve concert – presenting a vibrant facet to Petrenko’s repertoire. The program takes us on a musical journey to the USA: with dances from Bernstein’s West Side Story and Gershwin’s An American in Paris. Moreover, it features star soprano Diana Damrau in captivating musical songs.

Supported and guided by Sir Yehudi Menuhin at a young age, Kirill Troussov is now widely recognised as one of the leading violinists of his generation. The international press describes his playing as "…impressive elegance, irreproachable technique, an exceptional musical sensitivity and sonorities of immaculate beauty…". Kirill Troussov is a regular guest at prestigious concert halls and renowned international music festivals, all over the world.

“It is an amazing psychological drama” – that is how Kirill Petrenko, chief conductor of the Berliner Philharmoniker, describes Dmitri Shostakovich’s Eighth Symphony. The Ninth and Tenth also vividly reflect Shostakovich’s struggle with the Stalinist regime – and his self-assertion. Berliner Philharmoniker Recordings is now releasing the recordings of Symphonies 8–10 as the orchestra’s second major hardcover edition with Kirill Petrenko.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Trio in A minor, Op. 50, was written in Rome between December 1881 and late January 1882. It is subtitled À la mémoire d’un grand artiste [In memory of a great artist], in reference to Nikolai Rubinstein, his close friend and mentor, who had died on 23 March 1881. It is scored for piano, violin, and cello.

The Berliner Philharmoniker’s contribution to the great Russian composer’s anniversary year places a landmark performance of his perennially popular C minor Concerto by Kirill Gerstein and Kirill Petrenko in the illuminating context of his solo music.

When Kirill Petrenko performed Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony with the Berliner Philharmoniker in March 2017, one critic was ''stunned at how beautiful and breathtakingly exciting this music can be''. This first audio release of the orchestra and its new chief conductor reflects the whole sonority and intensity of the interpretation - and offers a taste of an exciting new beginning.

The title of ECM's release of works by three composers born in the former Soviet Union perfectly captures the mood of the CD – it is truly mysterious. Although more than half a century separates the first of these pieces from the most recent, they share a sense of otherness that defies easy explanation. The pieces are not so much mysterious in the sense of being eerie (although there are several moments that might raise the hairs on the back of your neck if you were listening alone in the dark); they are unsettling because they raise more questions than they answer.

Even with 15 other versions of Rimsky's masterpiece of orchestral virtuosity to choose from — some in the top flight — this was recognized from the first as one of the most rewarding, thanks largely to Krebbers's exceptionally sweet, gently appealing and bewitching personification of the story - spinning Scheherazade and to Kondrashin's skill in pacing and shaping movements as a whole, relating the diverse tempos and building up tension and dynamics by careful control so as to create climaxes of thrilling intensity and power. the 'shipwreck' finale, in particular, was overwhelming; and this was achieved without resorting to the ultra - fast tempos adopted by some conductors to whip up excitement. The Concertgebouw's crisp, sonorous and sensitive playing (full marks both to the splendid strings and to the wind soloists) was caught with the utmost fidelity; but the Compact Disc's total exclusion even of minimal extraneous background now marks a still further improvement, as can be judged by the dead silence against which Scheherazade's pleadings are heard. The final coda is ravishingly beautiful.