Richter Russian

Deutsche Grammophon, home to the greatest pianists, presents a collection of the most essential piano masterworks – a collection of the most beautiful, exciting and moving pieces for piano; presenting the world’s best composers, popular works, and outstanding performances from Deutsche Grammophon’s unrivalled roster of pianists: from the greats – Horowitz, Gilels, Richter, Argerich – to the younger generation: Seong-Jin Cho, Alice Sara Ott, Vikingur Ólafsson, Hélène Grimaud, Yuja Wang. Also represented are the new faces of composition – Max Richter and Ludovico Einaudi.

Vladimir Sofronitsky - Chopin
Polonaise No.1 / Ballade No.3 / Etudes / Preludes / Waltzes / Mazurkas
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 241 MB | Full Artwork: 41 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Denon # COCQ-83672 | Country/Year: Japan 2003, 1946-1953
Genre: Classical | Style: Romantic, Piano, Historical Recording

…Although little known in the West, never having toured or recorded there, Sofronitsky was held in the highest regard in his native land. Sviatoslav Richter and Emil Gilels looked up to Sofronitsky as their master, and famously, when Sofronitsky once drunkenly proclaimed that Richter was a genius, in return Richter toasted him and proclaimed him a god. Upon hearing of Sofronitsky's death, Gilels was reputed to have said that "the greatest pianist in the world has died."…

Ilja Richter was born to parents Georg and Eva Richter. Georg was a Communist, who named Ilja after the Russian journalist Ilja Ehrenburg, and Eva was a Jew who survived the Third Reich under a fake Aryan identity. Georg spent nine and a half years in the penitentiary and concentration camp during the Third Reich. After the family was in political difficulties in the GDR, they moved to West Berlin in 1953. There, the Richters leased a restaurant. In 1955, Ilja's sister Janina was born, and in 1959 they moved to Cologne.

The Karajan Official Remastered Edition comprises 101 CDs across 13 box sets containing official remasterings of the finest recordings the Austrian conductor made for EMI between 1946 and 1984, and which are now a jewel of the Warner Classics catalogue.
For many, Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989) – hailed early in his career as ‘Das Wunder Karajan’ (The Karajan Miracle) and known in the early 1960s as ‘the music director of Europe’ – remains the ultimate embodiment of the maestro.

This is a wonderful collection of all the great composer's known works, and is a must buy for anyone who enjoy's Rachmaninoff. While most of the recordings are not perhaps the absolute best that are out there, they are all still, for the most part, quite good. The only real issues I can find with this set are two rather small ones. On the recording of the symphonic poem The Isle of the Dead, there is an odd static-like sound that starts at about 17 minutes into the piece, which then disappears briefly, before reappearing once more. It is rather irritating, especially considering that the rest of the recording is very nice.

Karajan was unquestionably a great Tchaikovsky conductor. Yet although he recorded the last three symphonies many times, he did not turn to the first three until the end of the 1970s, and then proved an outstanding advocate. In the Mendelssohnian opening movement of the First, the tempo may be brisk, but the music's full charm is displayed and the melancholy of the Andante is touchingly caught.

Mstislav Rostropovich - The Complete Decca Recordings (2012) {5CD Set, Decca 478 3577 rec 1962-1969}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.40 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 812 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (png) -> 127 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1962-69, 2012 Decca Music / Universal | 0289 478 3577 6
Classical / Contemporary / Impressionist / Modern / Romantic / Cello

In the early 1960s, when Rostropovich was just beginning his international career, he made a handful of recordings for Decca. This 2012 box – issued for what would have been his 85th birthday – brings those albums together. It includes all of the works Benjamin Britten specifically wrote for Rostropovich: the two suites, the sonata, and the Symphony for cello and orchestra, accompanied or conducted by the composer himself, making these definitive versions. There are also other sonatas they collaborated on, including Schubert's "Arpeggione" Sonata, which was apparently one of Rostropovich's favorites of all his recordings.