GRAMOPHONE Review: Mahler Symphony No. 4 – Carolyn Sampson, Minnesota Orchestra/Vänskä
Let me say straight away that Vanska is temperamentally far better suited to the pristine, child-like world of the Fourth Symphony than he was to the epic Second. There are many aspects of this excellent performance (and…
GRAMOPHONE: From Where I Sit – March 2020
A great deal has already been written about Beethoven this year. There will be more. Allow me to add to it. I have a vivid memory – a particular concert that took place on 9 June 1981…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Barber / Tchaikovsky Violin Concertos – Johan Dalene, Norrköping Symphony Orchestra/Blendulf
Gramophone has already singled out this young man as one to watch and from the shaping of his solo entrance in the Tchaikovsky alone there’s a ‘presence’ about Johan Dalene’s playing that announces a musician of special…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition / Khachaturian Spartacus Suite, Etc. – Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/Petrenko
This is one of those discs which commands respect (this conductor is pretty much always a safe investment) without setting the world on fire. I kept waiting for, anticipating, moments in all of these pieces when Petrenko…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Kathleen Ferrier in New York – Kathleen Ferrier, Set Svanholm, New York Philharmonic Orchestra/Walter
A treasure, to be sure. Four years before Bruno Walter’s celebrated, indeed classic, Vienna recording (1952) with Kathleen Ferrier, the man who conducted the world premiere of Mahler’s pantheistic symphony with voices takes his newest discovery from…
GRAMOPHONE: From Where I Sit – February 2020
After so many years of concert-going – including a time when writing for The Guardian and The Independent newspapers that I was averaging three concerts a week minimum – it’s good to be reminded that I can…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Offenbach Six Fables de La Fontaine – Karine Deshayes, Orchestre de l’Opéra de Rouen Normandie/Haeck
The shocking pink packaging says it all. If Offenbach had a colour then this might be it. Then there’s the quirky illustration of besuited animals relating, of course, to the Six Fables of De La Fontaine –…
GRAMOPHONE: From Where I Sit – January 2020
As a new year and a new decade beckon we continue to live in uncertain times for print journalism. The digital world has opened up new and exciting frontiers for sure; it has sharpened communication and promoted…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Mahler Symphony No. 8 – Soloists, Choirs, Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra/Fischer
Rather as he did for his controversial (and somewhat disappointing) account of Das Lied von Der Erde Adam Fischer offers a kind of apologia in the liner note as to the particular challenges of the Eighth Symphony…
GRAMOPHONE Review: Shostakovich Symphony No. 4 – London Symphony Orchestra/Noseda
It’s the symphony that might or might not have recalibrated Shostakovich’s future and it’s still one of the trickiest to pull off in performance. Noseda meets it halfway – which makes for plusses and minuses. His LSO…
