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 93 Number 1129 EDITORIAL Phone 020 7738 5454 Fax 020 7733 2325 email gramophone@markallengroup.com EDITOR AND PUBLISHER Martin Cullingford DEPUTY EDITOR Sarah Kirkup / 020 7501 6365 REVIEWS EDITOR Hugo Shirley / 020 7501 6367 ONLINE CONTENT 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 LIBRARIAN Richard Farr THANKS TO Hannah Nepil, Marija �uric´ Speare and Charlotte Gardner EDITOR-IN-CHIEF James Jolly
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EDITOR’S CHOICE
The 12 most highly recommended recordings of the month
7
FOR THE RECORD
The latest classical music news
8
RECORDING OF THE MONTH 26 Igor Levit tackles three towering sets of variations
ORCHESTRAL
28
Ibragimova in Bach concertos; Muti’s CSO Berlioz; new Chopin from Argerich; Offenbach from Neeme Järvi; Gautier Capuçon’s Shostakovich
CHAMBER
Weilerstein in Chopin and Rachmaninov; a period-instrument Schubert quartet; bon‑bons from Yo-Yo Ma and Kathryn Stott
50
INSTRUMENTAL
62
Chopin from Yundi and Dong Hyek Lim; Hough in Janá∂ek and Scriabin; four-hand Fleisher
VOCAL
74
Bliss’s Morning Heroes; Anne Boleyn’s Songbook from Alamire; Ex Cathedra’s ‘Brazilian Adventures’
REISSUES
86
Delving deep into the Horowitz archive; Marcel Dupré’s legacy on Mercury Living Presence
OPERA
88
Naxos’s new Rheingold; period-instrument Bellini; a trio of Rameau releases; Cavalli collections
REPLAY
A collection of historical Sibelius recordings; Kogan in concertos; Goossens’s Tchaikovsky
94
BOOKS
David Gutman on a new biography of Alma Mahler; a new study of musical exoticism
96
GRAMOPHONE COLLECTION 102 Jeremy Nicholas chooses the finest recording of Weber’s Konzertstück in F minor
NEW RELEASES
REVIEWS INDEX
124
128
BACH’S B MINOR MASS
10
Thirty years after making his first recording of Bach’s monumental Mass, Sir John Eliot Gardiner returns to the work for another take, this time on his own label, Soli Deo Gloria
IGOR LEVIT
The pianist talks to Hugo Shirley about his ambitious new album for Sony Classical and his uncompromising approach to recording
16
GIANANDREA NOSEDA
20
Geoffrey Norris meet the conductor as he continues his series championing lesser-known Italian composers for Chandos
AT HOME WITH THE HALLÉ 22 Martin Cullingford travels to Manchester to visit the Hallé’s new rehearsal and recording studio as they tape Elgar’s Sea Pictures
THE MUSICIAN & THE SCORE 48 Shostakovich’s First Cello Concerto presents a daunting physical challenge for Gautier Capuçon, who talks to us about playing the piece
ICONS
60
Mike Ashman surveys the career and recordings of the American soprano Anna Moffo
CONTEMPORARY COMPOSERS 72 Andrew Mellor pays tribute to Aulis Sallinen, a masterful composer of opera and symphonies
CLASSICS RECONSIDERED 98 Mravinsky’s 1960 account of Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique comes under the spotlight
THE SPECIALIST’S GUIDE 100 English music of remembrance, by Geraint Lewis
PLAYLISTS
108
Featuring playlists from conductors Hannu Lintu and Laurence Equilbey, and pianist James Baillieu
PERFORMANCES & EVENTS 111 The best classical music concerts worldwide
HIGH FIDELITY
Reviews of the Quad Vena amp and the Focal Sphear in-ear headphones
113
LETTERS & OBITUARIES 122 MY MUSIC 130 Choreographer Kim Brandstrup on how a passion for film led to a love for classical music
4 GRAMOPHONE NOVEMBER 2015
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