This month's heavyweight highlights include an 11-disc celebration of Leonard Bernstein as pianist (courtesy of the RCA Victor and Columbia Records archives), Wagner’s three early operas in fine modern performances under Sebastian Weigle from Frankfurt, Tchaikovsky’s complete operas in vintage live recordings from the Bolshoi, and a mammoth collection of albums from one of the most prolific pianists in recording history.
Wagner: The Early Operas
Frankfurter Opern-und Museumorchester & Chor der Opern Frankfurt, Sebastian Weigle
Made in Frankfurt in the early 2010s, these live recordings of Die Feen, Das Liebesverbot and Rienzi make a superb case for the non-Bayreuth operas, featuring singers such as Falk Struckmann, Peter Bronder and Anna Gabler who’ve won considerable acclaim in mainstream Wagner and (in Die Feen) some outstanding lyric voices including Christiane Karg, Brenda Rae and Julian Prégardien.
Available Format: 9 CDs
The Quartetto di Cremona’s Beethoven cycle (which they embarked upon in 2012) has been praised for its ‘visceral excitement and pulsating energy’ (BBC Music Magazine), ‘Italianate grace’ (The Guardian) and ‘blisteringly detailed playing’ (The Herald), with Vol. 7 winning an ECHO Klassik Award in 2017; this 8-CD collection also includes the String Quintet Op. 29.
Available Formats: FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Recorded at the Bolshoi between 1936 and 1963, this set includes complete performances of the well-known Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades as well as the less frequently-recorded Mazeppa, Cherevichki, Oprichnik, Iolanta, and The Maid of Orleans, plus the incidental music for Snegurochka and Hamlet, and the operatic fragments Romeo and Juliet and Mandragora.
Available Formats: 22 CDs, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
134 discs bearing testimony to the immensely diverse and prolific career of the Turkish-born pianist (now 76 and still going strong), including her debut recording of Couperin, Bach, Beethoven and Debussy for RTF in 1949 and the Mozart Concerto for Two Pianos with Wilhelm Kempff from 1953, plus her complete recordings of Beethoven, Schumann and Rachmaninov and the Liszt 200th Anniversary Edition from 2011.
Available Format: 134 CDs
