A rare, beautiful and unusual Christmas compilation: three 1960s Argo recordings of contemporary settings and arrangements of carols – Sir Cristemas, Sing Nowell and Carols Of Today – released collectively on Decca CD for the first time. The settings include composers such as Nicholas Maw, Peter Maxwell Davies, Malcolm Williamson, Louis Halsey, Bernard Naylor, William […]

The Bernard Herrmann / Phase 4 connection was one of the most significant in the artistic and audio history of Decca. Collected here and are significant recordings of his film music he recorded for the company from films which remain classics of all time. This 2CD set is a timely reminder of the devastatingly effective […]

Bernard Herrmann made some significant recordings for Decca in the late-1960s/early-1970s.  Many of these used the company’s then new audio technology, Phase 4, which brought the music into brilliant light. This collection brings together a selection of British Film Music as well as music by Herrmann himself for a series of Alfred Hitchcock films, including […]

A collection of prized Decca recordings of the music of Holst, including a rare – and controversial! – recording by film score supremo Bernard Herrmann, released internationally for the first time on CD. Also included are two orchestral works (The Perfect Fool and Egdon Heath) conducted by Sir Adrian Boult, recorded in 1961 and much […]

An inspired arrangement between Decca and Imogen Holst, led to a series of pioneering recordings of her father Gustav Holst’s music, which appeared on Argo and are now comprehensively released on CD as part of the Eloquence series. This collection highlights Holst’s fascination with mysticism and the Orient, with the inclusion of the Rig-Veda Hymns […]

In September 1790, following the death of his princely employer, court composer Haydn and his entire orchestra were sacked. As he was considering this change in circumstances, Haydn received an unexpected visit from Johann Peter Salomon, a German impresario based in London, who made him a tempting offer: an opera, six symphonies and twenty other […]

An inspired arrangement between Decca and Imogen Holst led to a series of pioneering recordings of her father Gustav Holst’s music, which appeared on Argo and are now comprehensively released on CD as part of the Eloquence series. In a beautifully-programmed sequence of choral music, with the little chamber music gem, the Terzetto, Imogen Holst […]

An inspired arrangement between Decca and Imogen Holst, led to a series of pioneering recordings of her father Gustave Holst’s music, which appeared on Argo and are now comprehensively released on CD as part of the Eloquence series. This collection opens with the Pears/Britten recording of a substantial English song cycle never before published on […]

John Coprario is not yet a household name (unless the house be one with devoted viol consort aficionados!) but his name should resound in any dwelling where people with a love of English music dwell – for he is firmly of the line of inspiration that leads directly to Henry Purcell two generations later (Coprario […]

King James was paranoid, neurotic, suspicious and an immensely jealous man. Anyone at Court who had individuality, a certain ‘swagger’ and self-assuredness was a sure target of his unsure outlook. Such a one was the Earl of Devonshire, Charles Blount along with his beautiful Penelope – a very striking pair but who became the brunt […]

Grieg’s mighty score for the incidental music to Ibsen’s dramatic literary work, here receives a thrilling performance under Herbert Blomstedt with an orchestra from the very city Peer Gynt himself was reputed to have visited on his travels. The 73 minutes of incidental music take in all the movements traditionally included in the two suites […]

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 […]