Born in Vienna in April 1902, the cheery-looking Josef Krips seems to have been pre-destined to achieve eminence in the Viennese classics. He recorded with both, the Wiener Philharmoniker and the key London orchestras for Decca in the 1940s, 50s and 60s and the interpretations have genuine expressive power while remaining devoid of exaggeration or […]

In 1961, at age 86, Pierre Monteux was appointed chief conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra on a 25-year contract. It was typical of his sense of humour that he chose to sign a contract of this length at this time in his life, but there is no doubt that the brief period he enjoyed […]

During the 1950s, Karl Böhm made a handful of orchestral recordings for Decca with the Wiener Philharmoniker of music by, among others, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms Schubert and Weber. The Brahms Symphony is performed with sweep and with classical poise and the music is clearly in the Viennese players’ blood (after all, they premiered the symphony […]

‘You sing as if you had written it yourself!’ Jean Cocteau once told Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. This anthology of lieder by Brahms and Schumann is a prime example of the great singer doing just that, mining every nuance of emotion from a song while, at the same time, sounding as spontaneous and free as if he […]

One of the most gorgeous recorded versions of Schubert’s String Quintet is now available once more, after its relatively short-lived release as a full-price CD. The cellist was Christopher van Kampen, with whom the Fitzwilliams performed often. Appearing on CD for the first time is the Quartet’s recording of the Brahms Clarinet Quintet, with Alan […]

The Pro Arte Piano Quartet was made up of leading London-based instrumentalists, many of whom also played in the Melos Ensemble of London. Pianist Lamar Crowson was, and remains, one of the great chamber music pianists of all time (and a soloist in his own right). Kenneth Sillito led, for several years, the Academy of […]

Renowned for the precision of his execution, it was said that Reiner could ‘stand before an orchestra he has never seen before and conduct a new piece at first sight without verbal explanation, by means of manual technique alone’ (he later taught at the Curtis Institute, where he unsuccessful attempted to moderate the young Leonard […]

During the 1950s, 60s and 70s, Decca recorded a number of albums of overtures with some of its key conductors. Many of these were singled out by the press for their terrific sound quality (the fabled ‘Decca Sound’) and for their often adventurous programming. Some of them also included entr’actes and intermezzi. Prized as collectors’ […]

This collection of five of Brahms’s chamber music masterpieces includes four with piano and all of these feature the supreme artistry of András Schiff. Both the quintets – for clarinet and for piano – are included; the recording of the Clarinet Quintet with Peter Schmidl and members of the New Vienna Octet, receives its first release […]

‘When he is at his best he plays more beautifully than any of us’ wrote Alfred Brendel on the pianism of Wilhelm Kempff. Eloquence is proud to announce a mini-edition devoted to some of the rarer recordings of Wilhelm Kempff, born in 1895 at Jüterbog, the son of a church organist. By 1916, Kempff was […]

‘When he is at his best he plays more beautifully than any of us’ wrote Alfred Brendel on the pianism of Wilhelm Kempff. Eloquence is proud to announce a mini-edition devoted to some of the rarer recordings of Wilhelm Kempff, born in 1895 at Jüterbog, the son of a church organist. By 1916 Kempff was […]

Lorin Maazel had a long history of recording with Decca and many of his recordings are being reissued on Eloquence. Thrilling sound and vigour mark the performances of Maazel’s 1970s Brahms cycle from Cleveland, and Gramophone made a note of the superb quality of the sound engineering. The set is issued internationally on CD for the first […]