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CONTENTS

GRAMOPHONE is published by MA Business & Leisure Ltd, St Jude’s Church, Dulwich Road, London SE24 0PB, United Kingdom. gramophone.co.uk email gramophone@markallengroup.com or subscriptions@markallengroup.com Volume 91 Number 1108 EDITORIAL Phone 020 7738 5454 Fax 020 7733 2325 email gramophone@markallengroup.com EDITOR Martin Cullingford DEPUTY EDITOR Sarah Kirkup / 020 7501 6365 REVIEWS EDITOR Andrew Mellor / 020 7501 6367 FEATURES EDITOR James McCarthy / 020 7501 6366 SUB-EDITOR David Threasher / 020 7501 6370 ART DIRECTOR Dinah Lone / 020 7501 6689 PICTURE EDITOR Sunita Sharma-Gibson / 020 7501 6369 AUDIO EDITOR Andrew Everard EDITORIAL ADMINISTRATOR Libby McPhee THANKS TO Marija �uric´ Speare, Hannah Nepil and Charlotte Smith EDITOR-IN-CHIEF James Jolly

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The April issue of Gramophone is on sale from March 27; the May issue will be on sale from April 24 (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. UK subscription rate £57-£60. Printed in England by Wyndeham Heron. © 2014, MA Business & Leisure Limited. All rights reserved North American edition (ISSN 0017-310X): Gramophone, USPS 881080, is published monthly with an additional issue in September by MA Business and Leisure Limited, St Jude’s Church, Dulwich Road, London SE24 0PB, United Kingdom. The US annual subscription price is $89. Airfreight and mailing in the USA by agent named Air Business, c/o Worldnet Shipping Inc., 156-15, 146th Avenue, 2nd Floor, Jamaica, NY 11434, USA. Periodicals postage paid at Jamaica NY 11431. US Postmaster: Send address changes to Gramophone, Worldnet Shipping Inc. (see above). Subscription records are maintained at MA Business and Leisure Ltd, Jesses Farm, Snow Hill, Dinton, Wiltshire SP3 5HN, UK. Air Business Ltd is acting as our mailing agent.

EDITOR’S CHOICE

Martin Cullingford’s 12 most highly recommended recordings of the month

FOR THE RECORD

All the latest classical music news

RECORDING OF THE MONTH 52 Tchaikovsky from a sensational Russian pianist

ORCHESTRAL

First recording for Bax’s Symphony in F; early survey of new recordings featuring anniversary composer CPE Bach; two Sibelius concertos

CHAMBER

Florilegium turn from German music to French; two new discs of chamber works by Korngold; Stanford’s complete works for violin and piano

INSTRUMENTAL

Fourth disc in Kei Koito’s Bach organ series; Fifth disc in Christian Leotta’s Beethoven sonata cycle; Buchbinder moves from Beethoven to Schubert

VOCAL

Adams’s ‘Other Mary’ oratorio live from LA; Schubert song from Boesch and Finley; The Cardinall’s Musick sing Tallis on Hyperion

REISSUES

112

James Jolly presents an overview of new box-sets dedicated to Richard Strauss and Shostakovich

OPERA

114

George Benjamin’s Written on Skin on DVD; new recording for d’Indy’s L’étranger; a Scarlatti opera from Stavanger; Janowski’s Ring cycle concludes

REPLAY

122

Rob Cowan uncovers gems from a new label and a Toscanini classic gets an overhaul

BOOKS

124

Jeremy Nicholas reads the first volume in a major new biographical survery of Jascha Heifetz; David Fanning on a new study of Mussorgsky and friends

GRAMOPHONE COLLECTION 130 Geraint Lewis immerses himself in the extensive recording history of Haydn’s Harmoniemesse

PAVAROTTI IN HIS PRIME 10 As Decca releases a box-set of Pavarotti’s first decade of recordings, Pulitzer prize-winning writer Philip Kennicott charts the extraordinary blossoming of this remarkable voice

CHAMBER-STYLE BRUCKNER 16 Philip Clark listens to Bruckner anew as he meets the team behind the recording of a new reduced arrangement of the composer’s Symphony No 2

DAVID ZINMAN

James Jolly catches up with David Zinman as the conductor prepares to leave Zurich’s Tonhalle Orchestra after nearly 20 years at the helm

SUMMER FESTIVALS GUIDE 29 Gramophone’s go-to guide for the best classical music and opera festivals worldwide in 2014

THE MUSICIAN & THE SCORE 74 Jennifer Pike shines new light on the technically demanding score of Sibelius’s Violin Concerto

ICONS

Jeremy Nicholas pays tribute to Virgil Fox, the one-of-a-kind organ phenomenon

CONTEMPORARY COMPOSER 96 Peter Quantrill surveys the music of British composer Julian Anderson whose first opera, Thebans, will be premiered by ENO in May

CLASSICS RECONSIDERED 126 Van Cliburn’s 1958 recording of Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto is the cause of a difference of opinion between Jed Distler and Jeremy Nicholas

THE SPECIALIST’S GUIDE 128 James Jolly chooses 10 of his favourite recordings in the genre of works for piano left hand

HIGH FIDELITY

135

Reviews of Focal’s Easya all-in-one speaker system and Bang & Olufsen’s new headphones

LIVE EVENTS

142

LETTERS AND OBITUARIES 147 NEW RELEASES 150 REVIEWS INDEX 152 MY MUSIC 154 Historian Amanda Vickery on admiring British pastoral music and Handel’s philanthropy

4 GRAMOPHONE APRIL 2014

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