Hallé Orchestra
The Hallé Orchestra is one of Britain's oldest symphonic ensembles. The group has been led by several conductors who have achieved international renown and has presented the world premieres of significant works from Elgar's Symphony No. 1 in A flat major, Op. 55, in 1908 to Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 7 ("Sinfonia Antartica") in 1953 to Thomas Adès' These Premises Are Alarmed in 1996.
The Hallé Orchestra is named for its founder, Charles Hallé, a German who was tasked with creating a temporary orchestra for an art exhibit in Manchester and decided to keep the group together. What he at first called the Hallé Concerts were quite popular, and Hallé remained the group's conductor until 1895. Several times, the group has gone into decline but has been rescued by a charismatic and energetic new conductor. One of these was another German, Hans Richter, who arrived in 1899 and remained until 1911 despite conflicts between orchestra-goers who favored German music (and a German conductor) and backers of homegrown talent. Both World War I and II affected the orchestra's concert life, with its home venue, the Free Trade Hall, destroyed in 1940 by bombs in the German Blitz, but it bounced back each time, under Hamilton Harty (1920-1934) and, most familiar to modern audiences, Sir John Barbirolli (1948-1970), who built up a substantial catalog of Hallé Orchestra recordings even after his retirement in 1968, when he was named conductor laureate for life. The Hallé Orchestra's recording catalog extends back to the early LP era; an early release, with Barbirolli as conductor, featured Elgar's Enigma Variations.
Under conductors James Loughran, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, and Kent Nagano, the orchestra continued to face periods of financial uncertainty caused partly by competition with the rival BBC Northern Orchestra. The two groups agreed to share Manchester's new Bridgewater Hall, opened in 1996 by Queen Elizabeth II (the Free Trade Hall, despite poor acoustics, had been repaired after the war), and since 2000, the orchestra has enjoyed artistic stability under music director Sir Mark Elder. The orchestra's recording catalog has grown sharply since the formation of its own Hallé label in 2003; as many as four albums per year have appeared on that imprint, and the Hallé Orchestra has continued to record for EMI, NMC, and other labels. In 2019, Elder led the orchestra in a Hallé label recording of the Shostakovich Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op. 47.
The Hallé Orchestra collaborates with a Hallé Choir, formed by Charles Hallé himself, and, since 2002, with a Hallé Youth Orchestra. In 2023, the Hallé Orchestra announced that Kahchun Wong would succeed Elder, becoming principal conductor for the 2024-2025 season. During the 2010s and 2020s, the orchestra has been extremely prolific in the recording studio, issuing 15 albums in the year 2020 alone, despite pandemic-era restrictions. Some were on the Hallé label, but the majority were on the major Warner Classics label. By 2023, when the Hallé Orchestra issued an album of works by Dobrinka Tabakova, the orchestra's recording catalog comprised more than 150 digital releases, plus many others from the analog era.
© James Manheim /TiVo
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Sibelius: Symphony No. 2
Symfonische muziek - Released by Warner Classics on 22 jan. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Grime: Night Songs
Hallé Orchestra, Hallé Soloists, Jamie Phillips
Klassiek - Released by NMC Recordings on 22 sep. 2014
Gramophone Editor's Choice16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Donizetti: Rita
Katarina Karnéus, Barry Banks, Christopher Maltman, Hallé Orchestra, Mark Elder
Klassiek - Released by Opera Rara on 3 mrt. 2014
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Harrison Birtwistle: Night's Black Bird, The Shadow of Night & The Cry of Anubis
Owen Slade, Hallé Orchestra, Ryan Wigglesworth
Klassiek - Released by NMC Recordings on 16 mei 2011
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
BRAHMS / MENDELSSOHN: Violin Concertos (Szigeti) (1928, 1933)
Joseph Szigeti, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra, Thomas Beecham, Hamilton Harty
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 11 jan. 2002
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Discover 20th Century Classical Music
London Symphony Orchestra, New World String Quartet, Hallé Orchestra
Klassiek - Released by imp on 1 jan. 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Britten: The Rescue of Penelope & Phaedra
Kent Nagano, (Dame) Janet Baker, Hallé Orchestra
Humour/Spoken Word - Released by Warner Classics International on 11 jun. 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sibelius: Symphony No. 7
Symfonische muziek - Released by Warner Classics on 22 jan. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 in D minor
Sir John Barbirolli, Hallé Orchestra, BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra
Klassiek - Released by Infinity on 31 mei 2021
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sibelius: Symphony No. 3
Symfonische muziek - Released by Warner Classics on 22 jan. 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Tchaikovsky: The Great Symphonies
Hallé Orchestra, Sir John Barbirolli
Klassiek - Released by Urania Records on 31 mei 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 & Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No. 2
Jean-Bernard Pommier, Hallé Orchestra, Lawrence Foster
Klassiek - Released by Warner Classics on 1 jan. 1995
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
TCHAIKOVSKY: Piano Concerto No. 1/ CHOPIN: Etudes (Solomon) (1929-1930)
Solomon, Hallé Orchestra, Hamilton Harty
Concerten voor klavier - Released by Naxos on 10 mrt. 2002
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms: Symphony No. 3
Hallé Orchestra, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski
Klassiek - Released by imp on 1 jan. 1988
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
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Saint-Saëns, Handel, Wagner, Mozart, Bach & Various Composers: Cello Concerto No. 1 - Cello Concerto & Various Short Works
William Henry Squire, George Thomas Pattman, Sir Hamilton Harty, Hallé Orchestra
Klassiek - Released by Infinity on 5 mei 2022
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Overtures
Hallé Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Sir John Barbirolli, Arthur Rubinstein
Klassiek - Released by Archipel on 27 nov. 2007
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Great Pianists : Moiseiwitsch, volume 5 (1939-1947)
Benno Moiseiwitsch, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra, Constant Lambert, Basil Cameron, Leslie Heward
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 14 jul. 2002
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Pjotr Tschaikowski: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B flat minor, Op. 23 (Shellac Album of 1930)
Solomon, Hallé Orchestra, Sir Hamilton Harty
Klassiek - Released by Goldberg on 31 aug. 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bax: Violin Concerto - Symphony No. 3
BBC Symphony Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra
Klassiek - Released by Dutton Epoch on 1 jul. 2001
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Casken: Orion over Farne
Sophia Jaffe, Hallé Orchestra, Markus Stenz
Klassiek - Released by NMC Recordings on 21 apr. 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo