Strauss had a lifelong affair with the soprano voice and many of his songs were written with his wife Pauline’s voice in mind. This collection brings together five songs performed with crystalline purity by Christine Schaefer as well as some more dramatic settings performed by Karita Mattila, concluding with Mattila’s reading of the immortal Four […]

Four great Straussian heroes (including Strauss himself), in sumptuous readings by Giuseppe Sinopoli. ‘Also sprach Zarathustra’ and ‘Tod und Verklarung’ receive taut, thrilling readings from the New York Philharmonic. ‘Ein Heldenleben’ and ‘Don Juan’ are spacious and gloriously recorded with plenty of colourful orchestral detail.

Beginning with two rascally characters, the deluded Don Quixote and the prankster Till Eulenspiegel, this set includes remarkable recordings from the catalogues of Philips and Deutsche Grammophon with some recordings appearing on CD internationally for the first time – Haitink’s ‘Don Quixote’, Jochum’s blazing ‘Till Eulenspiegel’, shimmering Rosenkavalier Waltzes (both sets) and Munchinger’s recording of […]

While it remains a pity that Ansermet didn’t venture further into the bleaker landscapes of Sibelius, less may well be more, and these epic recordings of the Second and Fourth symphonies, together with a raw reading of Tapiola are collected together on CD for the first time. The mood of desolation continues with the Paris […]

Exhuming two glorious chamber music recordings. Jorg Demus is pianist in this joyous, sunny recording of Schubert’s ‘Trout’ Quintet and the Suk Trio’s only recording of the Dvorak ‘Dumky’ Trio, much sought after by collectors, finally makes an appearance on CD.

‘Russian folk culture is one the richest I know. In recent years, some of it lighter aspects have been commandeered by the entertainment and tourist industries: with this recording I wanted to go backwards and present songs I have so often heard – but never sung myself – in a direct and unvarnished, yet classical […]

While the bulk of Ansermet’s recordings were made with L’Orchestre de la Susise Romande, there were a few with the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra and the very occasional foray into recordings with London orchestras. One of these was with the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in 1959 with producer Michael Williamson and engineer Kenneth […]

While Ansermet’s stereo Suisse Romande recording of ‘Scheherazade’ is well-known and has been frequently reissued, his early (1954) Paris Conservatoire Orchestra recording of this piece is a relative rarity and here receives its first CD outing on Decca. It has, perhaps, that extra bit of fantasy over his later recording of the work and was […]

Fantasy and folklore are the subject of this 2CD collection of orchestral pieces by Rimsky-Korsakov recorded between 1953 and 1963 by the Suisse Romande Orchestra and Ernest Ansermet. We encounter Antar, disillusioned son of a slave who rises to become a Bedouin chief and dies in the arms of a fairy queen. We meet a […]

Recorded between October 1951 and June 1953, these mono recordings have been much prized and sought-after by collectors and now reappear on CD at super-budget price. Ravel and Ansermet were well acquainted and that adds a special authenticity to these sublime readings, presenting the majority of Ravel’s orchestral music (Bolero and La Valse appear on […]

This release brings together Ansermet’s complete Ravel concerto/concertante recordings with the first international release on CD of Swiss pianist Jacqueline Blancard’s aristocratic readings of the two Piano Concertos and Ruggiero Ricci’s dare-devilry in the Tzigane.

At the time of its release – 1960 – Ansermet’s stereo recording of the Mussorgsky-Ravel ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’ was demonstration worthy, and it still, today, retains its sense of space and impact. Much of the remainder of the program makes its first international appearance on CD, and the ‘Dance of the Persian Slaves’ (from […]