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GRAMOPHONE is published by Haymarket Consumer, Teddington Studios, Broom Road, Teddington, Middlesex TW11 9BE, United Kingdom. gramophone.co.uk email gramophone@haymarket.com Volume 91 Number 1098 EDITORIAL Phone 020 8267 5136 Fax 020 8267 5844 email gramophone@haymarket.com EDITOR Martin Cullingford DEPUTY EDITOR Sarah Kirkup / 020 8267 5829 REVIEWS EDITOR Andrew Mellor / 020 8267 5125 FEATURES EDITOR James McCarthy / 020 8267 5954 PRODUCTION EDITOR Antony Craig / 020 8267 5874 NEWS EDITOR Charlotte Smith / 020 8267 5155 SUB EDITOR David Threasher / 020 8267 5135 ART EDITOR Lynsey Row / 020 8267 5091 AUDIO EDITOR Andrew Everard / 020 8267 5029 PICTURE EDITOR Sunita Sharma-Gibson / 020 8267 5861 EDITORIAL AND PUBLISHING COORDINATOR Sue McWilliams / 020 8267 5136 GRAMOPHONE SECRETARY Libby McPhee EDITOR IN CHIEF James Jolly LIBRARIAN Richard Farr THANKS TO Hannah Nepil, Marija uric´ Speare and Hazel Rowland

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THIS MONTH’S CONTRIBUTORS

‘Tippett, for me, is one of the greatest composers of all – how nice that his star is once again in the ascendant,’ says OLIVER SODEN, who has written about the special focus on Tippett’s music at this year’s Proms. ‘It’s such a pleasure to explore this subject for Gramophone – a Tippett revival is long overdue.’

For this issue’s Specialist’s Guide, ADRIAN EDWARDS seeks out the most intriguing recordings of concert suites written since Tchaikovsky revived the genre. As he writes, ‘The term “suite” covers many preambulations but in its purest sense it has attracted a wide range of composers and, notably, many from the UK.’

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The July issue of Gramophone is on sale from June 20; the August issue will be on sale from July 22 (both UK). Every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of statements in this magazine but we cannot accept responsibility for errors or omissions, or for matters arising from clerical or printers’ errors, or an advertiser not completing his contract. Regarding concert listings, all information is correct at the time of going to press. Letters to the editor requiring a personal reply should be accompanied by a stamped addressed envelope. We have made every effort to secure permission to use copyright material. Where material has been used inadvertently or we have been unable to trace the copyright owner, acknowledgement will be made in a future issue. Printed in England by Wyndeham Heron. ISSN 0017-310X. © 2013, Haymarket Media Group Ltd. All rights reserved North American edition: Gramophone ISSN number 74501X, is published 13 times a year by Haymarket Media Group, Teddington Studios, Broom Road, Teddington TW11 9BE, United Kingdom. The US annual subscription price is $89. Airfreight and mailing in the USA by agent named Air Business Ltd, c/o Worldnet Shipping Inc, 156-15, 146th Avenue, 2nd Floor, Jamaica, NY 11434, USA. Periodicals postage paid at Jamaica NY 11431. Subscription records are maintained at Haymarket Media Group, Teddington Studios, Broom Road, Teddington TW11 9BE. Air Business Ltd is acting as our mailing agent.

For her feature on the Choirbook for the Queen project, CAROLINE GILL attended the BBC Singers’ recording sessions: ‘Five hundred years ago, the record for the last proper choirbook was made by scribes; this time it was made by 21st-century electronics – proof of how little the importance of music has changed over time.’

FOR THE LIST OF GRAMOPHONE REVIEWERS TURN TO PAGE 49

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Founded in 1923 by Sir Compton Mackenzie and Christopher Stone as ‘an organ of candid opinion for the numerous possessors of gramophones’

The Proms – a music festival for the world

‘The world’s greatest music festival.’ If Daniel Barenboim can use that phrase about the Proms, then – despite being London-based and so susceptible to charges of bias – so can we. In scope and scale of repertoire and range of artists, it is unrivalled. When it comes to accessibility, the opportunity to turn up on the day and, for a modest sum, stand feet away from the world’s greatest performers is quite a selling point. As is the opportunity to tune in or log on to BBC Radio 3, BBC Two or BBC Four, or the Proms website to enjoy the concerts. Not that the Proms needs a selling point: 114,000 tickets were bought in the first 12 hours of sale.

All of which makes it easy to be complacent. To attend the Royal Albert Hall during the Proms – or indeed many other city-centre

‘Knowledge about, and enthusiasm for, classical music in the wider world can be, frankly, limited at best. We need our champions – the Proms is one’

concert halls during the main concert season – might render talk of classical music being a marginal activity as somewhat absurd. But, in truth, it is in danger of becoming so. Knowledge about, and enthusiasm for, classical music in the wider world can be, frankly, limited at best. We need our champions. The Proms, with its knack for claiming swathes of general media real estate, is one. Daniel Barenboim is another. Without compromising his musical activities, he manages to root music-making in the wider cultural and social world, where it should belong, and where its greatest advocates of generations past would have found it. And, crucially, the wider world listens. This year Barenboim brings Wagner’s Ring to the Proms; Geoffrey Norris talks to him about that, as well as about his ability to take classical music to new audiences.

Classical music always needs to embrace different ways of enthusing,

inspiring and educating. The Proms does it, Barenboim does it, and so, too, does a Beethoven app from DG and Touch Press, a foretaste of the role tablet technology could play in classical music

(see page 13). The way we listen, and what we listen to, continues to evolve. And as it does so, we’ll continue to tell you about it – just as we have for 90 years now.

martin.cullingford@haymarket.com

GRAMOPHONE JULY 2013 3