Vienna Philharmonic’s annual Summer Night Concert is a highlight for classical music fans all over Europe. This year’s concert, recorded June 19, 2026 before an audience of 50,000 enthusiastic fans, is now available on all streaming platforms. In other orchestral news, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and its music director Jader Bignamini present Carl Orff’s monumental scenic cantata Carmina Burana, with soloists Andrzej Filończyk and Chen Reiss. Douglas Bostock and the South West German Chamber Orchestra continue with their fifth volume of carefully curated British composers. Finally, violinist Elena Urioste and pianist Tom Poster present a treasure-trove of lesser-known French and Belgian repertoire, while pianist Adam Laloum surveys works by the brilliant Robert Schumann.
New Releases July 14: The 2026 Summer Night Concert and more
Sony Classical presents the Vienna Philharmonic’s 2026 Summer Night Concert recorded June 19, 2026 before an audience of 50,000 enthusiastic fans. This open-air concert has been held annually since 2008 on the grounds of the UNESCO World Heritage Site at Schönbrunn Palace. Lorenzo Viotti led a varied program featured music from Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé,Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, Massenet’s Thaïs, Boito’s Mefistofele, Verdi’s Falstaff, and Wagner’s Das Rheingold. The evening’s soloist was Welsh bass-baritone Sir Bryn Terfel, who added a very special note of his own with Tevye’s “If I Were A Rich Man” from Fiddler on the Roof. The concert included Viennese favorites from the Strauss family — signature repertoire for this ensemble.
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra and its music director Jader Bignamini present Carl Orff’s monumental scenic cantata Carmina Burana for soloists, chorus and children’s chorus, and orchestra. Recorded live in concert, DSO is joined by the vocal ensemble Audivi and the Detroit Opera Youth Chorus. Orff tasks the baritone with the majority of the solos — an athletic, high-lying, and lusty part. Detroit’s soloist is the young Polish Kavalierbariton Andrzej Filończyk, who recently triumphed in the title role of Mason Bates’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay at the Metropolitan Opera. Israeli soprano Chen Reiss joins for the solos in the final “Court of Love” scene and American countertenor Reginald Mobley sings the Song of the Roasted Swan.
Over the past few years, conductor Douglas Bostock has prepared and recorded an unrivalled selection of British works for string orchestra in which international luminaries (Edward Elgar, Hubert Parry, Ethel Smyth) and lesser-known national figures join together in an enlightening and uplifting way. The fifth volume marks not only the conclusion of the series, but also the end of an era. After seven years in the role, Douglas Bostock is stepping down as principal conductor of the South West Chamber Orchestra Pforzheim. Once again, the sons and daughters of Albion rise up and soar over their unique musical landscapes – Imogen Holst draws inspiration from an old picaresque novel, Gordon Jacob delivers brilliant variations on a theme by Purcell, the conductor Eugene Goossens demonstrates his creative imagination, and finally, despite his “progressive” tone, the Welshman William Mathias leaves no doubt as to where he was born.
Violinist Elena Urioste and pianist Tom Poster present a treasure-trove of lesser-known French and Belgian repertoire spanning a forty-year period, from 1892 to 1932. A number of unifying threads run through the program, perhaps the most significant of which is the influence of a composer whose music is not heard here at all: César Franck. Franck taught and championed Guillaume Lekeu and Mel Bonis; and Bonis in turn taught Charlotte Sohy, whose principal composition teacher was Vincent d’Indy, one of Franck’s most devoted acolytes. Despite Franck’s background influence on the album, the artists decided against including his Violin Sonata in favor of the work by his fellow Belgian Lekeu, much more rarely recorded, and hardly ever heard in the concert hall. A number of shorter works surround this sonata including Charlotte Sohy’s Thème varié, three works by Mel Bonis, two Élégies by Saint-Saëns, Messiaen’s Thème et variations, and the world premiere of the haunting Nocturne by Elsa Barraine, Messiaen’s contemporary and lifelong friend.
Following his acclaimed albums surveying works of Schubert and Brahms, pianist Adam Laloum turns his focus to the kaleidoscopic world of Robert Schumann. His fourth solo album – and sixth overall – on Harmonia Mundi features Schumann’s famous Kreisleriana with its outbursts of passion and reverie heard alongside the rarer Novelletten, a theatre of the intimate and fantastic. Celebrated for his poetic sensitivity, Adam Laloum is considered among the best French pianists of the moment.
