Martha Argerich’s Ravel G major was for so long a reference recording that it’s easy to forget how idiosyncratic it actually is. I wouldn’t actually blame anyone who found it too garish in its colouring, with its volatility giving diminishing returns and its rubato too predictably appassionato for a sensibility as dapper as Ravel’s. Such a person might well find exactly what they want in Steven Osborne’s account, which is masterful in its own way but essentially self-effacing.

Tippett’s first two published symphonies are mature and confident works dating from the middle of the last century. Coruscating accounts from Martyn Brabbins and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra are sure to win new friends for this marvellous music.

Tippett’s first two published symphonies are mature and confident works dating from the middle of the last century. Coruscating accounts from Martyn Brabbins and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra are sure to win new friends for this marvellous music.

Hermann Scherchen's performances of these Brandenburg Concerts avoids the normally expected exaltation of opening and closing movements conferred by most performances. Instead, he opts for a beautifully serene approach to the score, making it more reflective, thoughtful and expansive, hightlighting the lyrical flow that emanates from it.

Beethoven's nine symphonies were recorded by Herbert von Karajan in 1961-1962 with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra - of which he became permanent conductor in 1955 to replace Wilhelm Furtwängler - and released on the DG label in 1963. 1963 October 15, Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic played Beethoven's Ninth Symphony at the inaugural concert of the Berlin Philharmonie.
The first complete recording by the Austrian conductor - next will be the versions recorded between 1975-1977 (released in 1977, also a high-flying interpretation) and between 1982 and 1984 (released in 1985) - this version of 1963 remains the most inhabited on the whole. Technically remarkable, she is one of the great peaks of her discography.

“Nobody plays this music more authoritatively and eloquently,” wrote London’s Sunday Times of Stephen Kovacevich in Beethoven. “He is in his element, responding wholeheartedly to the extreme physicality that Beethoven brought to music … but the wit and delicacy of the playing are also remarkable.”Kovacevich himself has spoken of his love for the “fun and virtuosity” of the composer’s early sonatas, while in the often

Niklas Sivelöv - a professor at the Royal Academy of Music in Copenhagen - is one of the leading pianists in the Nordic countries. He was born in Skellefteå in northern Sweden and began playing the organ at the age of six. When he was fourteen, he switched to the piano and studied at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm from the age of seventeen. He made his debut, playing Bartók's Second Piano Concerto, in 1991, and since then the conductors he has worked with include Thomas Dausgaard, Alan Gilbert, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Jukka-Pekka Saraste and Leif Segerstam.

To celebrate the inauguration of the newly restored former organ of the Palais du Trocadéro and Palais de Chaillot in Paris, the Orchestre National de Lyon and their organist-in-residence, Vincent Warnier, present two major works for organ and orchestra by Camille Saint-Saëns. Both are historically linked with the great Cavaillé-Coll organs, and are performed with an arrangement for solo organ of his famous Danse macabre.

This second volume of Leos Janácek's orchestral works by the fine and sympathetic Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra under Edward Gardner is necessarily something of a mixed bag, with a couple of unfinished works, several pieces that more or less qualify as obscurities, and just one repertory work, the symphonic poem Taras Bulba, JW VI/15. That work from the World War I years is vintage Janácek, a programmatic evocation of scenes from Nikolai Gogol's epic novel that has the composer's trademark mixture of vividness and compression.

Conductor Edward Gardner and the Bergen Philharmonic here commence their series devoted to Leos Janaceks orchestral works. This opening salvo features three works from Janaceks late, great period: The Sinfonietta, one of the composers most successful and popular works; the Capriccio, with pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet taking on the left-hand solo part, and, restored to its original, striking orchestration by Sir Charles Mackerras, the suite of instrumental interludes from Janaceks 1923 opera The Cunning Little Vixen.

Henri Dutilleux's work has been gaining attention through a number of significant recent recordings. Esa-Pekka Salonen recorded his Correspondances with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and Ludovic Morlot has recorded both his symphonies, as well as other works, as the new conductor of the Seattle Symphony. This opportunity to experience and appraise his work casts him as among the most significant French composers of the late twentieth century.

Although Miles Davis did not live to participate in Gerry Mulligan's reunion recordings featuring the nonet that played on the famous late-'40s and early-'50s cool sessions, he participated in a reunion concert held at Montreux in 1991. This featured both the Gil Evans Orchestra and George Gruntz Concert Jazz Band, plus additional guests Benny Bailey, Grady Tate, Carlos Benavent and various European players teaming with a gravely ill Davis to perform Gil Evans' marvelous arrangements.

The modern-day appreciation of Francesco Bartolomeo Conti takes a decisive turn in the direction of his church music with this early eighteenth-century composers Missa Sancti Pauli given an ideal recording on Glossa by György Vashegyi, the Purcell Choir and Orfeo Orchestra. Conti was a Florentine who worked for much of his career in the Imperial Court in Vienna, generating much attention there the ever-observant JS Bach and Zelenka were both known to have been attracted by his music.

Sir Simon Rattle and the London Symphony Orchestra pay homage to Leonard Bernstein with a recording of Wonderful Town that captures the energy and excitement of sold-out performances from December 2017. Featuring an all-star cast led by Danielle de Niese and Alysha Umphress, this release coincides with worldwide #BernsteinAt100 celebrations marking the centenary of the Orchestra’s former President.