Curating the best new classical recordings
There’s always wonderful music to discover, from instrumental to vocal music, new recordings of old favorites, or albums featuring cutting-edge contemporary works. Discover more about each selection below.
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Brandon Patrick George: Flute Sonatas & Solo Works
This is the solo debut recording from Brandon Patrick George, flutist of the Grammy-nominated Imani Winds. The album spans 300 years of music history and features works by J.S. Bach, Pierre Boulez, Kalevi Aho, and Sergei Prokofiev. George describes his album as “a dialogue between the past and the future.” Recorded in collaboration with pianists Steven Beck and Jacob Greenberg, ...
Montéclair: Beloved and Betrayed
Michel Pignolet de Montéclair (1667–1737), a noted bass violin player in Paris, composed a small but exquisite body of innovative works in a variety of forms, including an opera-ballet. He was also an important figure in the composition of music for flute at a time when innovations in design brought it to prominence as a solo instrument. This album traces his ...
Aquarelles: Bonita Boyd, Steven Doane, Barry Snyder
“Aquarelles” brings together three world-class musicians – Bonita Boyd, Steven Doane, and Barry Snyder, performing four classics from the flute, cello, and piano repertoire. Bonita Boyd began her career with the Rochester Philharmonic under David Zinman, becoming the youngest principal flutist of a major American orchestra. Steven Doane and Barry Snyder have recorded extensively for Bridge, their recordings receiving rave ...
La Rêveuse: London circa 1720, Corelli’s Legacy
Founded by Benjamin Perrot and Florence Bolton, La Rêveuse is a flexibly sized ensemble of solo musicians which aims to bring back to life works of the 17th and 18th centuries. In their first recording for Harmonia Mundi, La Rêveuse explores the musical scene in London in the 1720s. The period witnessed a feverish demand for music that led many ...
Beethoven: Complete String Quartets, Volume 1 – Dover Quartet
The Dover Quartet, “the young American string quartet of the moment” (The New Yorker), launches its emerging, three-volume complete Beethoven quartet cycle with the six Opus 18 quartets, often cited as the epitome of the classical string quartet as developed by Haydn and Mozart while foreshadowing Beethoven’s future innovations.
Purcell: Royal Welcome Songs for King Charles II – The Sixteen
Henry Purcell’s genius abounds in this, the fourth volume in The Sixteen’s series devoted to the composer. Purcell grew from young childhood to established professional adulthood in the service of Charles II. He identified strongly with the court, but he was well aware of Charles’s unreliability as a patron. Wisely, Purcell made an early decision to diversify, flaunting his court ...
Igor Levit: Encounter
Pianist Igor Levit has released a very personal double album marked by a desire for encounter and togetherness. The program includes rarely played arrangements of Bach and Brahms by Ferruccio Busoni and Max Reger, as well as Palais de Mari – Morton Feldman’s final work for piano. “Encounter” is the pianist’s sixth disc released on the Sony Classical label and ...
Ground Floor: “Il genio inglese”
The figure of the prodigiously gifted violinist Nicola Matteis, who left his native Italy for London, looms large in this program featuring composers active during Restoration England. He was one of a host of artists and performers from across Europe who flocked there and made a crucial impact on the country’s musical culture. The artistry of violinist Alice Julien-Laferrière, joined ...
Kastalsky: Requiem – Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Leonard Slatkin
This is the world-premiere recording of Alexander Kastalsky’s Requiem in its complete and revised version for orchestra, choir, and soloists. The album was recorded live in Washington’s National Cathedral in 2018 during a performance commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Armistice. Kastalsky was director of the Moscow Synodal School until the Bolshevik regime banned all sacred music, including the extraordinary ...
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 4 – Kristian Bezuidenhout, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra
In their own way, Beethoven’s five piano concertos each relate to a part of their composer’s life. In the previous volume of this complete series, pianist Kristian Bezuidenhout, conductor Pablo Heras-Casado, and the musicians of the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra explored the beginning (Concerto No. 2) and the end of the story (Concerto No. 5). For Volume 2, they turn to ...
Ives: Complete Symphonies – Los Angeles Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel
Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic present a rare complete set of the symphonies by Charles Ives. These critically acclaimed live performances were recorded at Walt Disney Concert Hall in February 2020. Ives was an American original, an artist ahead of his time who explored novel combinations of traditional classical forms and American vernacular music, pioneering and exploiting techniques ...
Jake Runestad: Sing, Wearing the Sky
The prolific young composer Jake Runestad has won numerous awards for his music, ranging from opera to works for chamber ensemble. He is particularly valued for his choral compositions, which exemplify a desire to write expertly crafted, socially conscious, and emotionally potent music. On this album, Runestad explores a profound life journey in The Secret of the Sea and projects a ...
Mozart: Violin Concertos – Baiba Skride
Mozart composed his violin concertos in 1773 and 1775. These five works and the three single movements recorded here have been passed down complete and verified as authentic. Violinist Baiba Skride says about her new album: “I know that there are so many different and super recordings of Mozart, but I think it is important to enjoy the music you ...
Alexandre Kantorow Plays Brahms, Bartók & Liszt
In 2019, at the age of 22, Alexandre Kantorow became the first French pianist to win the prestigious Tchaikovsky Competition. Before then he had released three acclaimed albums, awarded distinctions such as Diapason d’or de l’Année and Gramophone’s Editor’s Choice and earning Kantorow descriptions ranging from “Liszt reincarnated” to “a fire-breathing virtuoso with a poetic charm and innate stylistic mastery.” ...
Kete: Piano Music of Africa and the African Diaspora – William Chapman Nyaho
William Chapman Nyaho maintains a diverse and distinguished career as a performer and educator. In his recitals all around the world, Nyaho advocates music by composers of African descent. He says that this album “consists of music from the first two volumes of Piano Music of Africa and the African Diaspora, which I compiled and edited for Oxford University Press ...
Monteverdi: Vespers of the Blessed Virgin – Green Mountain Project
The Green Mountain Project began with a 400th anniversary performance of Monteverdi’s Vespers of the Blessed Virgin in 2010. It was a momentous occasion that brought together a cast of 29 musicians and 800 audience members at the Church of St. Mary the Virgin in New York City. Spearheaded by co-directors Jolle Greenleaf and Scott Metcalfe, the concert was offered ...
Aaron Tindall: Yellowbird
“Yellowbird” features the sensational tuba virtuoso Aaron Tindall in an album that defies categorization. Tindall’s latest recording includes jazz pianist Shelly Berg on the ballad The Peacocks, Claude Bolling’s Suite for Cello and Jazz Trio in Tindall’s breathtaking transcription for tuba, and a swinging rock band accompaniment to Fred Tackett’s Yellowbird. Prepare to be entertained and astonished!
Daniel Hope: Hope@Home
“Hope@Home” features a selection of the livestream concerts that violinist Daniel Hope presented during his period of social distancing. Performed from his living room in Berlin as well as with an assortment of prestigious guests for Arte Concert, “Hope@Home” includes appearances from Christoph Israel, Max Raabe, Till Brönner, Joy Denalane, Matthias Goerne, and Jacques Ammon, among others. Hope comments: “This album ...
ARC Ensemble: Chamber Works by Walter Kaufmann
For the fourth installment in their “Music in Exile” series, the Toronto-based ARC Ensemble turns its attention to the music of Walter Kaufmann. Despite a promising start in Prague and then Berlin, and friendships with Albert Einstein and with Franz Kafka’s circle, Kaufmann’s career become a casualty of the Nazi regime that forced scores of Jewish musicians to flee Germany. ...
Alexandre Desplat: Airlines – Emmanuel Pahud
Flutist Emmanuel Pahud takes the music of Oscar-winning film composer Alexandre Desplat beyond the cinema. Airlines is entirely devoted to world premiere recordings – of original concert works and of re-imagined versions of Desplat’s film scores, including his Oscar-winners The Shape of Water (2018) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014). Pahud is accompanied by the French National Orchestra, conducted by ...
