Symphony No 2 / Vocalise

Awards:
Diapason d'Or
Editor Choice: Gramophone
Five Stars : ABC magazine
10/10 Classics Today.com

"Iván Fischer an his magnificent Budapest Orchestra have made a Rachmaninov Second for our time - staggeringly played and recorded. Do try to hear it in surround!...Fischer conducts the piece as Rachmaninov might have played in: with a free and malleable sense of spontaneity...Channel Classics has complemented his reading with a lovely, open and natural production...Fischer's Budapest strings aren't about imitating the Rachmaninov style; they inhabit it. His musical storytelling is exceptional."
(Gramophone)

The aim of founding conductor Iván Fischer was to bring enthusiastic, young musicians together who shared his passion to play orchestral music with the involvement and intensity of soloists or chamber musicians. Iván Fischer believed in working closely with every individual musician to release his or her artistic creativity. He introduced many reforms: intense chamber music activity, extended rehearsal periods with sectional rehearsals, solistic activity for all members of the orchestra. Iván Fischer has been the music director throughout the orchestra's twenty year history, but some important personalities have had close contact with this ensemble as guest conductors. Sir George Solti returned to his native Hungary to conduct this orchestra on tour and on records, close relationship has been developed with Yehudi Menuhin, Sandor Vegh, and some other excellent guest conductors. The Budapest Festival Orchestra is a foundation, now subsidized by the Hungarian state, the Budapest municipality, sponsors and an enthusiastic circle of friends of music lovers in Hungary and abroad.