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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Music of Brahms – Swedish Chamber Orchestra, Thomas Dausgaard
Begun in 2012 with the release of Symphony No. 1, Thomas Dausgaard’s four-album traversal of the symphonies of Johannes Brahms is brought to a close with the composer’s final work in the genre – the E minor Symphony. The smaller forces of the Swedish Chamber Orchestra contribute to a transparency and clarity which bring out the finer details. As in ...
François Leleux: Bienvenue en France
The oboe has held a special place in France’s culture since the time of Louis XIV, and on “Bienvenue en France” the oboist François Leleux, partnered by pianist Emmanuel Strosser, performs works originating from the 20th century. The composers are Debussy, Saint-Saëns, and Dutilleux, the lesser-known Pierné, Bozza and Sancan, and the contemporary Thierry Pécou. This music could not find ...
ORA Singers: Music of Tallis & MacMillan
The award-winning ORA Singers have released a new recording on Harmonia Mundi, the group’s seventh album in its series of critically-acclaimed recordings. The focal point of the new disc is Thomas Tallis’ iconic 40-part motet, Spem in alium, which was believed to have been composed around 1570. To mark the 450th anniversary of this choral masterpiece, ORA Singers commissioned the ...
Dunhill & Erlanger: Piano Quintets – Piers Lane, Goldner String Quartet
The Goldner String Quartet has a long-standing reputation, not only as Australia’s preeminent string quartet but as an ensemble of international significance. Joined by pianist Piers Lane, they explore two rarely heard English quintets from the early years of the 20th century. Frédéric Alfred Erlanger’s chamber music is small but distinctive. His piano quintet of 1902 is notable for its ...
Jorge Federico Osorio: The French Album
Distinguished international pianist Jorge Federico Osorio brings his flair for French music to works of the Baroque, Romantic, and early 20th century eras by Jean-Philippe Rameau, Emmanuel Chabrier, Gabriel Fauré, Claude Debussy, and Maurice Ravel. The Mexican-born, European-trained pianist offers eight of Debussy’s pictorial Préludes, each with its unique sound world. A set of Spanish-flavored works includes Chabrier’s Cuban-inspired Habanera, Debussy’s lively La ...
Brahms & Mozart: Clarinet Quintets – Eli Eban, Alexander String Quartet
Clarinetist Eli Eban and the Alexander String Quartet celebrate the two masterpieces widely considered the preeminent works in their form: the clarinet quintets by Mozart and Brahms. These works are invariably paired in recordings, as they are on this album. And it is quite right that they should be. They are two of the finest chamber works by two of ...
Kenneth Fuchs: Point of Tranquility – United States Coast Guard Band
This new album reveals Kenneth Fuchs’ mastery of the band medium and features the exceptional United States Coast Guard Band, in definitive performances of seven works for symphonic winds by one of America’s leading composers. Fuchs has written music for orchestra, band, voice, chorus, and various chamber ensembles. This release features the alto saxophone concerto Rush, in its version with ...
Ethel Smyth: The Prison
August 18th marks the 100th anniversary of the 19th Constitutional Amendment, granting women in the United States the right to vote. A fitting time then for the release of the world-premiere recording of Ethel Smyth’s late masterpiece The Prison. Smyth left home at nineteen to study composition in Leipzig, where she met and won the admiration of composers such as ...
Music of Dvořák: Kian Soltani, Berlin Staatskapelle, Daniel Barenboim
Praised by The Washington Post for playing with “an easy warmth, drawing the orchestra after him like a halo around a candle flame,” cellist Kian Soltani follows his debut album, Home, with an album of works by Antonín Dvořák, centered on the famous Cello Concerto. Featuring conductor Daniel Barenboim and the Berlin Staatskapelle, the concerto is paired with five arrangements of beloved ...
Elgar: Sea Pictures, The Music Makers – Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Vasily Petrenko
Vasily Petrenko and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra continue their critically acclaimed Elgar project with Sea Pictures and The Music Makers, with Kathryn Rudge as soloist. Sea Pictures is one of the composer’s most popular works and, as an orchestral song cycle, stands alongside those by Mahler and Strauss. The Music Makers, however, has had a more troubled history. Elgar ...
Beethoven: Complete String Quartets – Kuss Quartet
Recorded live in Tokyo’s Suntory Hall in the space of only three weeks, the acclaimed Kuss Quartet performs the complete Beethoven quartet cycle. These works reflect the journey of the composer – starting with the Haydn and Mozart-influenced early works and tracing the mastery of his technique and style into the fully-fledged composer who today still casts a colossal shadow ...
Respighi: Roman Trilogy – Sinfonia of London, John Wilson
Following the widespread critical acclaim of their first two recordings, John Wilson and the Sinfonia of London turn to Respighi’s Roman Trilogy for their third release. Fountains of Rome was the first of these three great tone poems, inspired by a series of photographs given to the composer by the artist Edita Broglio. Pines of Rome was completed in 1924 ...
Dall’Abaco: Cello Sonatas – Elinor Frey
Cellist Elinor Frey, along with harpsichordist Federica Bianchi, lutenist Giangiacomo Pinard, and cellist Mauro Valli, present the first recording of cello sonatas by Giuseppe Clemente Dall’Abaco (1710-1805). These sonatas are full of singing melodies with the lightness of folk songs, passage work that demands brilliance and facility, and extraordinary slow movements that bring out the natural beauty of the cello’s ...
Beethoven: Violin Sonatas, Vol. 3 – James Ehnes, Andrew Armstrong
This is the third release in the complete Beethoven Violin Sonatas from violinist James Ehnes and pianist Andrew Armstrong. The earlier albums received outstanding reviews. Gramophone said, “With some discs, you can just tell that everything’s going to go like a dream.” On the new album, the popular Spring Sonata is framed by the strange, beguiling Fourth and the good-natured ...
Music for a Viennese Salon – Night Music
The Philadelphia-based period-instrument ensemble Night Music re-creates an afternoon of music making in 1801 at the Palais Arnstein in Vienna. The program includes a flamboyant Quintet for flute and strings by Joseph Kraus, a duo by Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf for the unusual combination of viola and double bass, and a chamber arrangement – by the impresario Johann Peter Salomon ...
Ray Chen: Solace
Award-winning violinist Ray Chen has a released a new album entitled Solace, sharing movements from J. S. Bach’s Six Sonatas and Partitas. The events of 2020 which brought the world to a standstill have also created a time for self-reflection and a renewed appreciation of the power of music. Chen explains, “Music heals the soul, it calms us, centers us, and ...
The Leipzig Circle, Vol. II: Chamber Music by Felix, Clara, and Robert – London Bridge Trio
This is the second volume in the London Bridge Trio’s revealing exploration, recorded live, of the influential musical fraternity known as the Leipzig Circle. The ensemble delves deeper into the group that coalesced around Robert and Clara Schumann as Leipzig became a major center of European music making in the 1840s. The program includes Felix Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No. 1 ...
Patterson/Sutton Duo: Still Life
The trailblazing duo of Kimberly Patterson and Patrick Sutton are champions of the budding cello and guitar genre of chamber music. The Patterson/Sutton Duo and composer Stephen Goss have worked together over many years and this album represents the fruits of their musical collaboration. This collection of Goss’s complete works for cello and guitar is a kaleidoscopic journey through the ...
Beethoven Revolution: Symphonies 1 to 5 – Le Concert des Nations, Jordi Savall
For this set of Beethoven’s first five symphonies, Jordi Savall began with the fundamental idea of recovering the original sound of the orchestra and tempos as the composer imagined them. All the orchestral work was performed with instruments corresponding to those used at the time, and by 55-60 musicians, a number similar to that arranged by the composer. 35 players ...
John Rutter: The Piano Collection
This period of lockdown has inspired John Rutter to return to some of his most cherished works and re-score them. His familiar melodies have been stripped back to their roots as never heard before. Accompanied by sheet music released on Oxford University Press for Rutter enthusiasts to enjoy at home, the album was recorded by pianist Wayne Marshall in isolation ...
