Andris Nelsons continues his complete collection of Bruckner's symphonies with the Leipzig Gewandhaus, where he is now the musical director. At the head of this fabulous orchestra with its golden sounds, the Latvian conductor throws himself into the era of such legendary recordings of Bruckner as those by Jochum, Böhm, Haitink and Wand. Orchestral perfection, plasticity of sonic masses, coherence across all the music stands, and incredible reserves of power make this new recording a real event. Andris Nelsons gave a perfect summary of Bruckner's music when he said that it "elevates the soul". Under his baton, the music of the great Austrian becomes a real spiritual experience, going beyond Catholic mysticism to reach a metaphysical plane, an opening onto a new level that opens up infinite vistas. The tempo is ample, the music wreathed in mystery, the nuances subtle, the structure carefully thought-out. The whole musical canvas is alive and swells with a style of singing which is at once intense, luminous, supple and beautiful: it intoxicates the audience, but without ever being overbearing. Bruckner's worship of his god Wagner is well-known, but it takes on a whole new dimension with the addition of a dose of Wagner to round off each symphony. Here, Siegfried's Funeral March taken from the Götterdämmerung makes a lot of sense when we realise that Bruckner had written the marvellous Adagio of his 7th as an homage to Wagner, who died while the symphony was being composed. © François Hudry/Qobuz

Andris Nelsons continues his complete collection of Bruckner's symphonies with the Leipzig Gewandhaus, where he is now the musical director. At the head of this fabulous orchestra with its golden sounds, the Latvian conductor throws himself into the era of such legendary recordings of Bruckner as those by Jochum, Böhm, Haitink and Wand. Orchestral perfection, plasticity of sonic masses, coherence across all the music stands, and incredible reserves of power make this new recording a real event. Andris Nelsons gave a perfect summary of Bruckner's music when he said that it "elevates the soul". Under his baton, the music of the great Austrian becomes a real spiritual experience, going beyond Catholic mysticism to reach a metaphysical plane, an opening onto a new level that opens up infinite vistas. The tempo is ample, the music wreathed in mystery, the nuances subtle, the structure carefully thought-out. The whole musical canvas is alive and swells with a style of singing which is at once intense, luminous, supple and beautiful: it intoxicates the audience, but without ever being overbearing. Bruckner's worship of his god Wagner is well-known, but it takes on a whole new dimension with the addition of a dose of Wagner to round off each symphony. Here, Siegfried's Funeral March taken from the Götterdämmerung makes a lot of sense when we realise that Bruckner had written the marvellous Adagio of his 7th as an homage to Wagner, who died while the symphony was being composed. © François Hudry/Qobuz

Recorded in concert by the audiophile label PentaTone, Marek Janowski's brilliant performances of Richard Wagner's ten mature operas were issued as hybrid SACDs between 2011 and 2013, in celebration of the composer's bicentennial year. The most famous concert excerpts are presented here in the multichannel format, and include overtures, preludes, and orchestral music from Der fliegende Holländer, Lohengrin, Tannhäuser, Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Parsifal, and Wagner's masterpiece, Der Ring des Nibelungen. The Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra is exemplary in its dynamic performances showcasing Wagner's splendid orchestration, and the exceptional playing and high-quality engineering are apparent in the deep and rich sound of this package. There are many compilations of Wagner's greatest hits, including some of comparable musicianship and historical value, but few can match this generous collection for the excitement of the live performances and the spaciousness of the reproduction. Highly recommended, especially for anyone looking for a first-rate introduction to Wagner.© TiVo

A man of his time, Prokofiev linked his name with Russian cinema. He worked with Eisenstein on the film Alexander Nevski in 1938. The two men inspired each other: some sequences were built around images, others, around music. This was a very singular set-up which made the original soundtrack more than just a dramatic enhancer, but a motor of the action in its own right. Prokofiev wrote a cantata for mezzo, mixed choir and orchestra in seven tableaux for the work. The orchestra, with its clever spacing of the deepest bass tones and the sharpest high notes, forges a space for the choir which is grandiose, and oftentimes unsettling. Prokofiev's musical language makes a modernist harmony of strained dissonances and themes with a folk feel. The musicians, choristers and instrumentalists all perform at a very high level of excellence. Led by Thierry Fisher, no stranger to repertoires that make use of imposing ensembles, they present a very fine version. Never falling into forced grandiloquence, they do justice to the work and all its historical and political resonances. The second, lighter part of this Prokofiev album centres on his first foray into cinema, in 1933. Alexander Feinzimmer's film, Lieutenant Kijé, tells of an imaginary lieutenant, who comes into being as a result of an administrative error. It was never performed, but Prokofiev turned his score into an orchestral suite. With an often- caustic humour, the suite moves between a series of evocative atmospheres. The careful foregrounding of the wind section creates a sonic parade of uniforms, fifes and horns, creating a stylised military world, in particular in the and third movements. The second movement presents a Romance in the form of variations on a theme. Double bass, bassoon, celesta and flute all join together in this nostalgic theme. A tour de force of writing, the finale brings together all the themes of the whole work into a single, poignant tableau, in which the Utah Symphony's ability to create a multiplicity of colours and soundscapes really allows them to shine. © Elsa Siffert/Qobuz

Henry Purcell died on 21 November 1695 at the age of thirty- six. The music he had written for the funeral of Queen Mary only eight months earlier was performed again for his burial service. Soon afterwards, several composers paid tribute to Purcell by writing odes in his memory. Jeremiah Clarke’s homage to ‘Orpheus Britannicus’ in his Ode on the Death of Henry Purcell is a deeply moving token of the younger composer’s admiration. Alas, Clarke too was destined to die in his prime, and we can only imagine what the destiny of British music might have been if their lives had been prolonged. After an acclaimed production of Dido and Aeneas, Vincent Dumestre and Le Poème Harmonique continue their exploration of the world of Purcell and seventeenth-century English music. Constantly keeping an ear out for multiple musical ramifications, from Dowland to Lully by way of the Elizabethan masques, this new programme spotlights the genius of Jeremiah Clarke, whose sadly premature death makes us regret all the marvels he might have produced. Here is a collection of masterpieces coupling two of Purcell’s most popular works with an exceptional discovery. (c) Alpha Classics

After the catharsis of 2021's Act 1, Imagine Dragons complete the story with Mercury: Act 2, a whopping 18-track journey that examines the time after the shock and grief of loss has begun to settle. While part one processed those messy emotions with some of the rawest and most vulnerable moments in the band's usual radio- and gym-friendly catalog, part two loses focus by biting off more than they can chew. There are plenty of great songs here -- fully expected for a band as hook-savvy as Imagine Dragons -- but there's simply too much going on and not enough editorial trimming to make this as impactful an experience as Act 1. Starting strong with irresistible singles "Bones" and "Sharks," Act 2 soon takes a turn to the pensive and reflective, with frontman Dan Reynolds lamenting his shortcomings on "I Don't Like Myself" and pleading for relief on "Take It Easy." The second half of the album is weighed down by similar moments, snuffing the momentum of the handful of classic stompers peppered throughout. Of this introspective bunch, the country-dusted acoustic gem "Crushed" is on par with "Wrecked" as a tearjerking standout, as "Sirens" merges the group's usual radio-friendly ear with a deep well of emotion. While the buoyant handclaps-and-synths highlight "Younger" and the riffs-and-breakbeats blazer "Blur" come closest to joining their array of mainstream smashes on a future Greatest Hits set, the bulk of Act 2 is truly for the dedicated fans who care to patiently sit with Reynolds and his feelings until everyone's ready to pump out a more focused and immediate set. [Compiling both parts on Mercury: Acts 1 & 2, the band presents the full experience across an expansive 32 tracks, which joins Act 1 and 2 as well as the hit single "Enemy" with JID from the Arcane League of Legends soundtrack.]© Neil Z. Yeung /TiVo

This new version of Tchaikovsky's famous ballet has been released hot on the heels of Disney's Nutcracker and the Four Realms, whose original music by James Newton Howard reprises and updates some of the themes from the Russian's score. Recorded by Gustavo Dudamel with Lang Lang at the piano and Andrea Bocelli singing the titles, this film's soundtrack is made to measure for these three global stars. This recording of the original material was carried out at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles in December 2013 during a Christmas celebration. The concert marked ten years of fruitful collaboration between Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. The Venezuelan maestro brings us a hedonistic vision of this German fairytale by ETA Hoffman, re-imagined by Alexandre Dumas and so wonderfully turned in to music by Tchaikovsky. It was one of the Russian's last masterpieces, coming just before the "Pathétique" Symphony which would be his musical testament. But here, all is hardly fairytale and sugar thanks to an extraordinary melodic inspiration which is brought out by a light orchestration with unique timbres, like in the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy which popularised the Celesta, an odd instrument invented in 1886 (an improbable lovechild of the glockenspiel and the piano that Tchaikovsky encountered in Paris). Dudamel is playing with dreams here. We are treated to a supple, refined conducting style that looks towards Vienna more than it does to St Petersburg, but it never loses sight of a childlike spirit that's sure to delight. © François Hudry/Qobuz

This complete edition of the symphonic works of Edvard Grieg is especially convincing thanks to the authentic approach of the Norwegian Eivind Aadland, who strongly influences the interpretations of the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne under his direction. The first LP of this series presents two of Grieg's principal collections on 180g vinyl: his first Peer Gynt suite from the incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's drama Peer Gynt, the story of the "Nordic Faust" which inspired Grieg to compose a sonic panorama of the Norwegian character - from the melancholy song Death of Åses to the furious chase in the Hall of the Mountain King - as well as his four Symphonic Dances Op. 64 of 1898, where the composer draws on his experiences as a conductor of the leading European orchestras. The second LP of this Grieg series includes the second Peer Gynt suite, the Funeral March in Memory of Rikard Nordraak as well as the famous suite From Holberg's Time - a homage to Ludvig Holberg, the caustic "Molière of the North" - and Klokkeklang - an almost impressionist study documenting a surprisingly visionary trait of the otherwise rather conservative composer. © audite

Surprisingly, very few artists can float a digital-age collection of number one singles without resorting to trickery involving foreign countries or obscure charts. The Beatles had little trouble (The Beatles 1) and Elvis Presley managed both a disc of number ones (Elvis: 30 #1 Hits) and one of number twos (2nd to None), but Michael Jackson bent the rules so far that calling his disc Number Ones is tantamount to consumer fraud. Additionally, a collection of number one singles may not be the best representation of an artist's career; the Elvis volume included nothing from his Sun years, and the Beatles' set skipped "Strawberry Fields Forever." The #1's, Motown's collection of chart-toppers by Diana Ross & the Supremes, fares much better. It benefits from two Supremes characteristics: as a pop group through and through, their biggest hits were often their best songs, and, with the help of the solo Diana Ross, they spent a long time on the charts (nearly 20 years separates the Supremes' debut at the top from Ross' last number one single). While Motown's separate volumes on Diana Ross and the Supremes (in the Ultimate Collection series) remain the best source for a single-disc picture of either act, The #1's works remarkably well. It includes 19 number one pop singles (13 from the group, six from the solo Ross), plus various number ones on the R&B and dance charts, and there aren't any glaring omissions. Granted, fans of early Motown can't live without the girl-group chestnuts "Buttered Popcorn" and "Your Heart Belongs to Me," while those who enjoy latter-day Ross won't find "One More Chance" or "Why Do Fools Fall in Love?" -- but of course, this collection wasn't created with them in mind. For the group who recorded more hit singles during the '60s than any other act except the Beatles, and for one of the reigning solo artists of the '70s, The #1's is a worthy tribute.© John Bush /TiVo

One morning in 1822, Schubert wrote down an enigmatic text in which all his ghosts seem to take shape: wandering, solitude, consolation, disappointed love. Inspired by this dreamlike narrative, Raphaël Pichon, Pygmalion and Stéphane Degout have devised a vast Romantic fresco, combining resurrection of unknown treasures with rediscovery of established masterpieces. © harmonia mundi

It may have been surprising to see this release by a newish U.S. ensemble show up on British classical best-seller charts in the summer of 2023. Several factors may have contributed, one being the marketing muscle of the PentaTone Classics label and another being that label's engineering staff getting splendid results from a live 2021 concert at San Francisco's Davies Symphony Hall. A third factor might be the unusual large brass ensemble format: there are 31 players, allowing an unusually large palette of sounds and textures. This is especially effective in the work that takes up the whole second CD and second part of the program, The Ring, a condensation of Wagner's entire Ring cycle by Timothy Higgins. This hits many of the familiar pieces from those four operas, which of course, contain a great deal of writing for brass in the first place. There are other unfamiliar and intriguing pieces: a rare fanfare by Richard Strauss, the title work by Jonathan Bingham, which is palindromic in several respects, and a pleasing, lightly Latin-accented Brass Fantasy of Arturo Sandoval. The National Brass Ensemble is not a standing group but one drawn from top players in various U.S. orchestras (the San Francisco Symphony has the largest group); conductor Eun Sun Kim's direction is crisp, and the virtuosity of several of the players is notable although the cohesion of a well-drilled chamber group is impossible. There have been several other instrumental "summaries" of the Ring, but this one is both unusual and engaging. A must for brass fans. © James Manheim /TiVo

The suites from Peer Gynt, through no fault of his own, are Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg's calling card. Certain pieces, such as "Morning Mood" and "In the Hall of the Mountain King" are well known even among those who have never heard of Grieg. However, Grieg's incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt is only seldom recorded as a complete unit. Part of the problem is a textual one, as although Grieg finished the score barely in time for the premiere of Peer Gynt in 1876, he continued to alter it over the course of the next 20 years. A critical edition incorporating Grieg's final thoughts on the matter was not published until 1987 and was concurrently recorded for Deutsche Grammophon by Neeme Järvi and the Gothenburg Symphony. The family tradition is carried on in this Virgin Classics recording, as it is led by his son, Paavo Järvi, with the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. In orchestral terms, the younger Järvi's Grieg: Peer Gynt is a magnificent performance, fully capturing the sweep and grandeur of Grieg and Ibsen's vast conception. While in some instances Järvi cannot resist pointing up some of the music's similarity to the idiom of Mussorgsky, he is likewise careful not to lose sight of the score's Nordic iciness. The little bit of singing that there is in Peer Gynt is essentially where this Virgin Classics release comes down to earth. In "In the Hall of the Mountain King" there is a problem of balance between the Estonian National Male Choir and the orchestra in that the latter is quite clearly drowned out by the former. Baritone Peter Mattei does a fine job singing the one song the title character is given to sing, and Camilla Tilling is good as Solveig, although if one already has Kirsten Flagstad's performance of "Solveig's Song" in his/her head this might be a bit of a letdown. There is no ambiguity, though, about Charlotte Hellekant as Arabian temptress Anitra -- she sings as though she is trying to sell real estate, rather than seduce Peer and relieve him of his fortune. Robert Layton's liner notes are excellent; we are surprised to learn how Grieg felt that "In the Hall of the Mountain King" was something "I literally can't bear listening to because it absolutely reeks of cow-dung" and the extraordinary extent to which Ibsen himself intervened in the creation of this music.© TiVo