VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Hodie / Fantasia on Christmas Carols Janice Watson (soprano) Peter Hoare (tenor) Stephen Gadd (baritone) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Hilary Davan Wetton [ Naxos / CD - released 22/Nov/2007 ] "The performances are distinctive and good. That Naxos chose two of the composer's works which are not so popular or well known today is to be applauded." (MusicWeb Dec 2007) |
RAVEL
Piano music (Incls 'Sonatine' & 'Le Tombeau de Couperin') Jean Yves Thibaudet (piano) with Helen Grimaud and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra [ Portrait Classics / CD - released 1/Sep/2009 ] Highly acclaimed performances, licensed from Denon. Thibaudet recordings unavailable since the late 1990s |
NED ROREM
Violin Concerto / Flute Concerto / Pilgrims Jeffrey Khaner (Flute) Philippe Quint (Violin) / Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / Jose Serebrier (Conductor) [ Naxos American Classics / CD - released 17/Jun/2006 ] "A classic album. Satisfying and beautiful music that has about it a rippling current of vitality." (MusicWeb May 2006) |
HANDEL
Messiah (orchestrated by Eugene Goossens and recorded in 1959) Jennifer Vyvyan, Monica Sinclair, Jon Vickers, Giorgio Tozzi / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra & Chorus, Sir Thomas Beecham [ RCA Victor Gold / 3 CD Box Set - released 20/Jan/2013 ] |
JACQUES OFFENBACH / GIUSEPPE VERDI / VINCENZO BELLINI
Darwin: Song for a City [Recorded Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, UK, January 1975] Joan Sutherland, Heather Begg Tom McDonnell, Clifford Grant, Louis Quilico, Margreta Elkins / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Richard Bonynge [ Decca SBS Australian Eloquence / CD - released 10/Apr/2012 ] Christmas Eve 1974 was a nightmare for the inhabitants of Darwin when it was destroyed by a violent cyclone. A Darwin Appeal Fund was launched and a month later, on 25 January 1975, Richard Bonynge conducted a fund-raising concert at the Royal Opera. |
HANDEL
Messiah (highlights) Joanne Lunn, Melanie Marshall, James Gilchrist, Christopher Purves / Cambridge Singers / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / John Rutter [ Collegium / CD - released 23/Nov/2007 ] John Rutter was born in London in 1945 and received his first musical education as a chorister at Highgate School. He went on to study music at Clare College, Cambridge, where he wrote his first published compositions and conducted his first... |
HANDEL
Messiah (complete) Joanne Lunn, Melanie Marshall, James Gilchrist, Christopher Purves / Cambridge Singers / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / John Rutter [ Collegium / 2 CD - released 29/Nov/2007 ] John Rutter was born in London in 1945 and received his first musical education as a chorister at Highgate School. He went on to study music at Clare College, Cambridge, where he wrote his first published compositions and conducted his first... |
GERALD FINZI
Music for Love's Labour's Lost / Let Us Garlands Bring / etc John Carol Case (baritone) Ian Partridge (tenor) Jane Mannin (soprano) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / New Philharmonia Orchestra / Vernon Handley [ Lyrita / CD ] In 1946 Noel Iliff was to produce Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost for the BBC Home Service His wife, Simona Pakenham, was adapting it. She was musician enough to be writing a book on Vaughan Williams, and to have recognized Finzi's gifts. He... |
GERALD FINZI
Concerto for Clarinet and String Orchestra Op. 31 / Concerto for Cello and Orchestra Op.40 John Denman (clarinet) New Philharmonia Orchestra / Yo-Yo Ma (cello) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Vernon Handley [ Lyrita / CD - released 1/Jul/2007 ] "These recordings - sounding handsome still - derive from two Lyrita Recorded Edition LPs issued 1976-79. The Clarinet Concerto comes from SRCS 92 where it was alongside the two piano-and-orchestra works already used as fillers for SRCD... |
JOHN IRELAND
The Piano Concerto / Indian Summer / A Sea Idyll / etc John Lenehan (piano) / Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, John Wilson [ Naxos / CD - released 1/Nov/2011 ] "John Ireland's Piano Concerto of 1930 receives a thoroughly sympathetic, lucid performance, as does the ominously darker Legend of three years later...A delightful disc." (Daily Telegraph) |
TRADITIONAL / JOHN RUTTER / etc
The Colours of Christmas The Bach Choir & Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, John Rutter, with Over the Bridge [ Decca Music Group / CD - released 1/Dec/2011 ] "If you believe that Christmas music should have a warm, comfortable feel, then this CD will fit the bill perfectly." (Gramophone) |
TCHAIKOVSKY
Piano Concerto No. 1 (with Prokofiev-Piano Concerto No 3) Jon Kimura Parker (piano) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Andre Previn [ Telarc Classics / CD - released 25/Aug/2003 ] Since winning the Leeds Piano Competition in 1984, Jon Kimura Parker has maintained an international career at the highest level throughout the world. |
PROKOFIEV
Symphony 1 & 5 / Romeo & Juliet excerpts / Concerto No. 3 for Piano Jon Kimura Parker (piano) / Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Yoel Levi / Royal Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Andre Previn [ Telarc Everybody's Classics / 2 CD - released 20/Sep/2008 ] "Marvelous!...Levi consistently displays extraordinary imagination both in terms of balancing the various musical strands and in his magical handling of dynamics and articulation." -CD Review |
SHOSTAKOVICH
Symphony No. 10 / The Gadfly (excerpts) Jonathan Carney (violin) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Frank Shipway [ Royal Philharmonic / SACD - released 10/Oct/2008 ] |
ELGAR / DELIUS / ARNE / HOLST / WOOD
The Ultimate Last Night of the Proms (rec 1996) Jonathan Carney (violin) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Richard Cooke [ Royal Philharmonic / CD - released 10/Oct/2008 ] The Ultimate Last Night of the Proms includes legendary pieces such as Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance, Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on Greensleeves, Delius's On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring and classics such as Rule, Britannia! and Jerusalem. |
ELGAR / DELIUS / ARNE / HOLST / WOOD
The Ultimate Last Night of the Proms (rec 1996) Jonathan Carney (violin) / Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Richard Cooke [ Royal Philharmonic / SACD - released 10/Oct/2008 ] The Ultimate Last Night of the Proms includes legendary pieces such as Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance, Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on Greensleeves, Delius's On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring and classics such as Rule, Britannia! and Jerusalem. |
RICHARD STRAUSS
Symphonia Domestica / Eine Alpensinfonie / Oboe Concerto / Duett-Concertino Jonathan Small (oboe) Nicholas Cox (clarinet) Alan Pendlebury (bassoon) / Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / Gerard Schwarz [ Avie / 2 CD - released 30/Nov/2007 ] "It is a tribute to the recording that even the most cacophonous climax makes sense, and there is no impression at any time of any loss of detail. What an advert for the RLPO this set is! The cultural life of Liverpool is clearly thriving" (MusicWeb) |
ARMSTRONG GIBBS / SCOTT / WRIGHT / PEKKONEN
Oboe Concertos Jonathan Small (oboe) / Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / Martin Yates [ Dutton Epoch / CD - released 23/Aug/2010 ] |
TCHAIKOVSKY / SIBELIUS
Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 35 / Symphony No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 82 Joshua Bell (violin) / Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra / Sakari Oramo [ Accentus Music DVD / DVD - released 8/Aug/2011 ] |