Sir Simon Rattle
Over a career, including extended tenures with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Simon Rattle has become recognized as one of the world's top conductors. Mostly focusing on symphonic music, he has also conducted major operatic productions. A native of Liverpool, Rattle was born on January 19, 1955. He studied piano, violin, and percussion as a youngster, joining the Merseyside Youth Orchestra as a percussionist and later playing with Britain's National Youth Orchestra. He gravitated naturally toward conducting, taking up the baton in his early teens and founding his own orchestra, the Liverpool Sinfonia, when he was just 15. He entered the Royal Academy of Music and graduated in 1974 at age 19, taking first prize in the John Player International Conductors' Competition that year. That was enough to land Rattle an assistant conductor post with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra as well as guest appearances in the U.S., including one with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1979. Rattle's tenure with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra began with his appointment as principal conductor and artistic advisor in 1980; he added the title of music director in 1990. He raised the orchestra's profile substantially, leading the group on European, American, and East Asian tours and starting a long recording association with the EMI label. Rattle also made many appearances at Britain's Glyndebourne Festival as an opera conductor, beginning in 1977. He served as principal guest conductor of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment beginning in 1992. Leaving his position with the City of Birmingham Symphony in 1998 and disillusioned by arts funding cuts in Britain, Rattle often appeared as a guest conductor in the late '90s with the Berlin Philharmonic before the orchestra's members named him the successor to Claudio Abbado; he began his tenure in 2002. His time in Berlin was controversial among critics, but the orchestra members, whose salaries he had successfully fought to increase, renewed his contract through 2018 when he stepped down and was succeeded by Kirill Petrenko. Rattle continued to record prolifically (as many as five albums a year) for EMI with the Berlin Philharmonic, issuing a wide variety of music, including a complete cycle of Beethoven's symphonies. He led a major new production of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in 2016 at New York's Metropolitan Opera. In 2017, Rattle returned to Britain as conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, where his recording career resumed with the orchestra's LSO Live label; his recording of Berlioz's La damnation de Faust appeared in 2019. He was scheduled to retire from the London Symphony in 2023 and take the title of conductor emeritus; that year, he was slated to become chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. In 2021, citing difficulties caused by Brexit, he applied for German citizenship. Rattle has won several Grammy awards, including one for Best Choral Performance for his 2008 recording of Brahms' Ein deutsches Requiem; his recording with the London Symphony of Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen earned a Grammy nomination for Best Opera Recording in 2022. By that time, his recording catalog comprised some 250 items, with a remarkable catholicity of taste that encompassed composers from Haydn to Duke Ellington. He has been noted for fine complete cycles of the symphonies of Beethoven, Mahler, and Sibelius. Rattle has been married three times, most recently to mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená; the couple has three children.© James Manheim /TiVo Read more
Over a career, including extended tenures with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Simon Rattle has become recognized as one of the world's top conductors. Mostly focusing on symphonic music, he has also conducted major operatic productions.
A native of Liverpool, Rattle was born on January 19, 1955. He studied piano, violin, and percussion as a youngster, joining the Merseyside Youth Orchestra as a percussionist and later playing with Britain's National Youth Orchestra. He gravitated naturally toward conducting, taking up the baton in his early teens and founding his own orchestra, the Liverpool Sinfonia, when he was just 15. He entered the Royal Academy of Music and graduated in 1974 at age 19, taking first prize in the John Player International Conductors' Competition that year. That was enough to land Rattle an assistant conductor post with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra as well as guest appearances in the U.S., including one with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1979.
Rattle's tenure with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra began with his appointment as principal conductor and artistic advisor in 1980; he added the title of music director in 1990. He raised the orchestra's profile substantially, leading the group on European, American, and East Asian tours and starting a long recording association with the EMI label. Rattle also made many appearances at Britain's Glyndebourne Festival as an opera conductor, beginning in 1977. He served as principal guest conductor of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment beginning in 1992. Leaving his position with the City of Birmingham Symphony in 1998 and disillusioned by arts funding cuts in Britain, Rattle often appeared as a guest conductor in the late '90s with the Berlin Philharmonic before the orchestra's members named him the successor to Claudio Abbado; he began his tenure in 2002. His time in Berlin was controversial among critics, but the orchestra members, whose salaries he had successfully fought to increase, renewed his contract through 2018 when he stepped down and was succeeded by Kirill Petrenko.
Rattle continued to record prolifically (as many as five albums a year) for EMI with the Berlin Philharmonic, issuing a wide variety of music, including a complete cycle of Beethoven's symphonies. He led a major new production of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in 2016 at New York's Metropolitan Opera. In 2017, Rattle returned to Britain as conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, where his recording career resumed with the orchestra's LSO Live label; his recording of Berlioz's La damnation de Faust appeared in 2019. He was scheduled to retire from the London Symphony in 2023 and take the title of conductor emeritus; that year, he was slated to become chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. In 2021, citing difficulties caused by Brexit, he applied for German citizenship. Rattle has won several Grammy awards, including one for Best Choral Performance for his 2008 recording of Brahms' Ein deutsches Requiem; his recording with the London Symphony of Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen earned a Grammy nomination for Best Opera Recording in 2022. By that time, his recording catalog comprised some 250 items, with a remarkable catholicity of taste that encompassed composers from Haydn to Duke Ellington. He has been noted for fine complete cycles of the symphonies of Beethoven, Mahler, and Sibelius. Rattle has been married three times, most recently to mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená; the couple has three children.
© James Manheim /TiVo
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Sibelius : Symphonies 1 - 7
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra on 11 Sep 2015
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Stravinsky Ballets
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by LSO Live on 25 Mar 2022
Denied early in his career by Philharmonia Orchestra's management, Sir Simon Rattle realized his dream of programming a concert of these three early S ...
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler: Symphony No. 2, 'Resurrection'
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics International on 7 Feb 2011
Hi-Res AudioGramophone Editor's Choice24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schumann : Symphonien 1 - 4
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra on 23 May 2014
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler: Symphony No. 5 (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics International on 15 Feb 2010
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
NAZARENO! Bernstein, Stravinsky, Golijov
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by LSO Live on 13 May 2022
Celebrating the union of classical and jazz, LSO Live’s latest release encapsulates the very best of the two genres with an irresistible selection of ...
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler: Complete Symphonies
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics on 27 Nov 1987
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Holst: The Planets
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics on 17 Feb 2012
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition - Borodin: Symphony No. 2 (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Warner Classics International on 7 Jan 2008
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart : Symphonies Nos. 39, 40, 41
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra on 7 Feb 2017
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Orff: Carmina Burana (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Choral Music (Choirs) - Released by Warner Classics International on 17 Jan 2005
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms : The Symphonies (Live)
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics International on 12 Aug 2009
Diapason d'or24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Holst: The Planets
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics International on 17 Feb 2012
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Symphonie fantastique & La mort de Cléopâtre (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Warner Classics International on 6 Feb 2013
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 - 4 Movement Version (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Symphonic Music - Released by Warner Classics International on 16 May 2012
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bizet: Carmen
Sir Simon Rattle
Opera - Released by Warner Classics International on 3 Sep 2012
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bernstein : Wonderful Town (Bonus Track Version)
Sir Simon Rattle
Musical Theatre - Released by LSO Live on 7 Sep 2018
5 de Diapason5 Sterne Fono Forum KlassikLeonard Bernstein's 1953 musical Wonderful Town, with song texts by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, hasn't had frequent performances and recordings. It ...
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Wagner: Das Rheingold, WWV 86A (Live)
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by BR-Klassik on 25 Sep 2015
Simon Rattle's 2015 recording on BR Klassik of Richard Wagner's Das Rheingold has much of the intensity and drama of a fully staged production, though ...
24-Bit 48.0 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms: Ein deutsches Requiem (A German Requiem) (Édition StudioMasters)
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Warner Classics International on 1 Jan 2007
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Christ on the Mount of Olives (Christus Am Ölberge)
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by LSO Live on 13 Nov 2020
Few recordings exist of Beethoven’s unique oratorio which drew influence from Händel’s work Haydn’s The Creation and the Seasons. A revelation came in ...
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Debussy: La mer & Orchestral Works (Studio Masters Edition )
Sir Simon Rattle
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on 1 Aug 2005
Hi-Res Audio24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo