Liszt dg

DG offers a terrific bargain here that anyone who follows this celebrated pianist will want to hear.

This is playing in the grand manner… Ozawa and the orchestra are behind the soloist in all this and the deciso element is fully realized. But don't let me imply a lack of finesse; not only do lyrical sections sing with subtlety, the big passages also are shapely… In the gorgeously grisly Totentanz, both music and playing should make your hair stand on end. - C.H.; Gramophone

World-renowned pianist Lang Lang continues his celebration of composer Franz Liszt’s 200th Birthday with Liszt Now. The new video features Live at The Roundhouse, a 60-minute live concert from the 2011 iTunes Festival in London and The Art of Being a Virtuoso, a 71-minute documentary following Lang Lang’s global celebrations of Franz Liszt’s anniversary. Also included is A Visual Journey with Franz Liszt, 55 minutes of bonus content featuring video projections used at the Roundhouse concert set to select studio recordings from Lang Lang’s latest album, Liszt: My Piano Hero.

Many collectors would agree that Sviatoslav Richter was the greatest pianist of the 20th century. His enormous recorded legacy hides hundreds of treasures, many of which are included in this beautiful 51CD set. Released to celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth (20th March 2015), the edition encompasses his complete Decca, Philips and DG recordings, including his Sofia Recital as well as his collaborations with Rostropovich, Karajan and Benjamin Britten.

Many collectors would agree that Sviatoslav Richter was the greatest pianist of the 20th century. His enormous recorded legacy hides hundreds of treasures, many of which are included in this beautiful 51CD set. Released to celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth (20th March 2015), the edition encompasses his complete Decca, Philips and DG recordings, including his Sofia Recital as well as his collaborations with Rostropovich, Karajan and Benjamin Britten.

I can’t help the feeling that Deutsche Grammophon have been keeping their young new signing Alice Sara Ott from us. For reasons best known to themselves, the label released this, her debut disc, in a number of countries in 2008, but held back in the UK until she had a second recording under her belt - of Chopin waltzes (DG 00289 477 8095). The double-whammy debut approach seems to have backfired a little, with many critics finding the Chopin too dry and emotionless and then projecting those criticisms, albeit in a milder form, onto the Liszt.

The Italian conductor Claudio Abbado is one of the most outstanding conductors of the 20th century. It was his unique ability to make sound and music shine (Deutschlandfunk Kultur), for which he was celebrated internationally by both the press and the audience. In addition to his long-standing relationship with the Berliner Philharmoniker and the Vienna Philharmonic, he has also been chief conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra for many years (1979 to 1986), with which he has recorded a rich discography over the years.

DG are set to honour the supreme artistry of Daniel Barenboim throughout the coming year as he approaches his 80th birthday next November. The anniversary celebrations of the great pianist and conductor’s remarkable legacy began on 31 December 2021 with the release of Debussy’s Clair de lune, one of the highlights of Maestro Barenboim’s first DG album of 2022. Specially recorded in Barenboim’s Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin, Encores features miniature masterpieces by Albéniz, Chopin, Debussy, Liszt, Schubert and Schumann.

Leslie Howard’s recordings of Liszt’s complete piano music, on 99 CDs, is one of the monumental achievements in the history of recorded music. Remarkable as much for its musicological research and scholarly rigour as for Howard’s Herculean piano playing, this survey remains invaluable to serious lovers of Liszt.