performed by Tamás Vásáry, Thomas Brandis, Wolfram Christ and Ottomar Borwitzky, or below with Sviatoslav Richter and members of the Borodin Quartet (cover image by Maciej Rusek) We recently discussed the G minor quartet, op. 25, and it was a reminder … Continue reading Brahms Piano Quartet No. 2 in A, op. 26
performed by Jessye Norman and the London Symphony Orchestra under Sir Colin Davis (cover image by Eberhard Grossgasteiger) Can you believe this is (sort of) the first formal appearance of Richard Wagner on the blog(ner)? It is. I’ve reviewed two of … Continue reading Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder
performed by Tamás Vásáry, Thomas Brandis, Wolfram Christ and Ottomar Borwitzky, or below by Ax, Stern, Laredo, and Ma https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gX96azNTi98&feature=youtu.be&t=11m10s (cover image by Patrick Fischer) If you haven’t yet discovered Brahms’s chamber music, here’s a bit more for you. We’ve done … Continue reading Brahms Piano Quartet No. 1 in Gm, op. 25
performed by The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields under the late Sir Neville Marriner, or in a superb recording with the Vienna Philharmonic under István Kertész (cover image by Patrick Baum) It’s also been a while since we’ve … Continue reading Schubert Symphony no. 6 in C, D. 589
performed by the Artemis Quartet or below by the Alban Berg Quartett https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4pkT371U9g (cover image by Shane Stagner) Well, here we are, the final installment of the groundbreaking op. 18 quartets. Op. 18 no. 6 is the only one of … Continue reading Beethoven String Quartet no. 6 in B flat, op. 18, no. 6
performed by the Kontra Quartet (unfortunately there isn’t a recording on YouTube, but go check out all of Holmboe’s quartets on Spotify) (cover image by Trần Anh Tuấn) Covering this second quartet today means we’re 10% of the way through his twenty … Continue reading Holmboe String Quartet no. 2, op. 47
Maybe. The cover for this article (by Dan Gold) may seem not at all related to the subject at hand, but at the moment this article was posted (give or take) I am (or will have been? was just recently?) … Continue reading Spotify for Classical Music?
performed by Mikkel Futtrup, Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra & Hannu Koivula (Again, no YouTube for today, but get used to it. Buy your music or at the very least support your artists and record labels through Spotify. You can find … Continue reading Holmboe Chamber Concerto no. 6 for violin and chamber orchestra, op. 33
performed by Johannes Søe Hansen, violin; Christina Bjørkøe, piano (cover image by Maciej Rusek) In her review of the album on which this recording appears, Catherine Nelson describes the work as “nimble and lovely” with “fluid, folk-inspired phrases.” If you read … Continue reading Holmboe Violin Sonata no. 2, op. 16
performed by Johannes Søe Hansen, violin; Christina Bjørkøe, piano https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnasAzt1G8Q (cover image by Jack Anstey) As I said at the beginning of the year, we’ve got a new series on the blog, an ongoing one, and Holmboe was one of the … Continue reading Holmboe Violin Sonata no. 1, op. 2a
performed by the Artemis Quartet, or below by the Alban Berg Quartett https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_B9ftTBLJU0 (cover image by Andreea Chidu) We’re finally nearing the end of Beethoven’s op. 18 quartets that he published in 1801. This fifth quartet in the series of … Continue reading Beethoven String Quartet no. 5 in A, op. 18, no. 5
performed by Gidon Kremer and The Academy of St. Martin in the Fields under Sir Neville Marriner, with cadenzas by Alfred Schnittke https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy4Giri3QY4 (cover image by Steven Wang) This is one of only a few violin concertos we’ve discussed on … Continue reading Beethoven Violin Concerto in D, op. 61
performed by Gidon Kremer and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe under Nikolaus Harnoncourt, or below with Itzhak Perlman and the Berlin Philharmonic under Daniel Barenboim (cover image by Andrea Sonda) Well, I’ll try not to repeat myself too much, but … Continue reading Beethoven Romance for Violin and Orchestra no. 1 in G, op. 40
performed by Gidon Kremer and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe under Nikolaus Harnoncourt, or below by Itzhak Perlman and the Berlin Philharmonic under Daniel Barenboim (cover image by Steven Wang) As we saw and (I think) discussed at the beginning of … Continue reading Beethoven Romance for Violin and Orchestra no. 2 in F, op. 50
performed by Isaac Stern and the English Chamber Orchestra under Alexander Schneider, or below by David Oistrakh and The Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy (cover image by Colin Maynard) Bach’s violin concerto in E major is sometimes labeled as No. 2, … Continue reading Bach Violin Concerto in E, BWV 1042
performed by Steven Isserlis, or below by Anner Bylsma (cover image by Ashley Knedler) We’ve finally made our way around to another installment of Bach’s cello suites. I remember nearly two years ago now when I began the weekend chamber … Continue reading Bach Cello Suite no. 5 in Cm, BWV 1011
preformed by the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra under Mariss Jansons, or below by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra under Vladimir Ashkenazy It is the creation of a genial mind laboring in a field well known and loved by it, but not … Continue reading Revisit: Rachmaninoff Symphony no. 3 in A minor, op. 44
performed by the New Philharmonia Orchestra under Riccardo Muti, or in a superb recording by the Oslo Philharmonic under Mariss Jansons (cover image by Serge Kutuzov) It’s been a while since we’ve seen any Tchaikovsky (a little over a year) and even … Continue reading Tchaikovsky Symphony no. 2 in Cm, op. 17 ‘Little Russian’
performed by Boris Berman and the Vermeer Quartet, or as below (with the composer’s wife at the piano) I had to take what I wrote from imaginary spaces defined in terms of sound and put it into the psychological space … Continue reading Schnittke Quintet for Piano and Strings
performed by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra under Vernon Handley (Very unfortunately no YouTube today, but if you have even the slightest inkling of interest, go buy this album, on which also appears the fourth symphony. It’s superb.) (cover image by Abigail … Continue reading Simpson Symphony no. 2
performed by the Delmé Quartet (cover image by Cassie Boca) We will in due course get to the composer’s fourth, fifth, and sixth quartets, which are their own trilogy with a spiritual connection to Beethoven’s three Razumovsky quartets. This third … Continue reading Simpson String Quartet no. 3
Fugue for Thought 