Latest stories
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The Presto Chart - 2021
4th Jan 2022by Katherine Cooper
Our 50 best-selling titles across all formats for the whole of last year, with Víkingur Ólafsson's recital of music by Mozart and his contemporaries leading the pack...
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Marc-André Hamelin plays CPE Bach
31st Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Canadian pianist's Midas touch is everywhere in evidence on this programme of sonatas and rondos, many of which reveal the composer's delight in the new expressive possibilities offered by early pianos.
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Anna Netrebko on Amata dalle tenebre
29th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Russian soprano answers some quick questions about her new album on Deutsche Grammophon, featuring arias from operas including Dido and Aeneas, Ariadne auf Naxos, Lohengrin and Tristan und Isolde.
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Joyce DiDonato's EDEN and other forthcoming vocal and opera highlights
24th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The American mezzo and Il Pomo d'Oro explore 'the power and fragility of Nature', Lise Davidsen and Leif Ove Andnes join forces for an all-Grieg recital, and Hans Abrahamsen's opera The Snow Queen (starring Barbara Hannigan as Gerda) receives its DVD/Blu-ray premiere.
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Aleksandra Kurzak on Mozart
23rd Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Polish soprano talks to Katherine about drawing on her background as a violinist to direct the Morphing Chamber Orchestra on her new recording of opera arias with obbligato instruments.
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John Mitchinson (1932-2021)
20th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The versatile English tenor, who excelled as Gerontius and Tristan as well as in Czech repertoire, has died aged 89.
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New Releases from late November and early December 2021
17th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
Chopin from prize-winning Canadian pianist Bruce Liu, Bach and Brouwer from Andreas Scholl and Edin Karamazov, Madama Butterfly starring Melody Moore, and Haydn's Die Schöpfung from Jordi Savall and his Catalonian forces.
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Vanessa Benelli Mosell on Debussy
16th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Italian pianist and conductor talks to Katherine about her new recording of the Second Book of Préludes, why she now considers the composer to be 'the father of contemporary music', and plans for her parallel career on the podium...
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Jeanine De Bique on Mirrors
14th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Trinidadian soprano talks to Katherine about her debut solo recording, juxtaposing a series of Handel heroines against their counterparts in operas by Telemann, Manna, Broschi and Graun.
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Recordings of the Year 2021 - Our Top 10
10th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The winners revealed - ten fantastic recordings which really stood out from the crowd for us over the past twelve months, plus the results of our five special category awards...
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Christmas New Releases 2021
10th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
Highlights from this year's crop of festive releases include recordings from The Sixteen, La Chapelle de Quebec, The Choir of King's College Cambridge, and Camerata Tchaikovsky.
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Claire Booth on Mussorgsky
8th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The British soprano talks to Katherine about her new album with pianist Christopher Glynn, which intersperses some of the composer's lesser-known songs with a selection of his piano pieces.
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Pamela Helen Stephen (1965-2021)
5th Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
The British mezzo Pamela Helen Stephen, who recorded extensively for Chandos, has died aged 57.
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New Release Round-Up - 3rd December 2021
3rd Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
Music inspired by the Kalevala from the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Dima Slobodeniouk, Bach from James Ehnes, Rameau's Platée from William Christie, and Winterreise from James Rutherford and Eugene Asti.
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Presto Editor's Choices - November 2021
1st Dec 2021by Katherine Cooper
A terrific debut album of baroque operatic heroines from Trinidadian soprano Jeanine De Bique, a mesmerising 'Venetian Mirror' from Le Consort, and a madcap musical journey down Lewis Carroll's rabbit-hole courtesy of Irish composer Gerald Barry.
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Pelléas et Mélisande from Jonathan Nott and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
26th Nov 2021by Katherine Cooper
The world premiere recording of the British conductor's own tone-poem on Debussy's opera is coupled with Schoenberg's suite from 1905, to illuminating effect.
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New Release Round-Up - 26th November 2021
26th Nov 2021by Katherine Cooper
Die Zauberflöte from Covent Garden with Roderick Williams and Sabine Devieilhe, Bach's Goldberg Variations from David Fray, Florence Price's Symphony No. 3 from Vienna, and Max Reger's piano concerto from Joseph Moog.
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Cecilia Bartoli - Unreleased
19th Nov 2021by Katherine Cooper
The Roman mezzo is in electrifying form in a programme of operatic and concert-arias by Haydn, Mysliveček, Mozart and Beethoven with the Kammerorchester Basel, recorded back in 2013.
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Recordings of the Year 2021 - Our Top 100
18th Nov 2021by Katherine Cooper
The first meeting of the Presto Awards committee is over, and it's time to reveal the 100 recordings which have most impressed our editorial team this year...
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New Release Round-Up - 12th November 2021
12th Nov 2021by Katherine Cooper
The continuation of Benjamin Alard's multi-instrumental survey of Bach's keyboard works; new music from James MacMillan; speculative Mozartian sonatas from Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, Anna Szałucka and Timothy Jones; and an enchanting selection of miniatures from Renaud Capuçon and Guillaume Bellom.