It is rare when the quality of the performance, the clarity of the recording, and the insightfulness of the liner notes all come together in one outstanding release. Manfred Honeck’s recording of a live performance of Bruckner’s Ninth Symphony in February 2018 with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in Pittsburgh’s Heinz Hall, released on the Reference […]
Anton Bruckner
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#ClassicsaDay #ClassicalTimeMachine Week 2
For the month of October, the Classics a Day team turned nostalgic. Classical musicians have been making recordings since the 1890s. So we all have over 130 years of documented performance practices. And we can judge first-hand the artistry of legendary performers. The challenge is to post classical recordings made before 1949 (pre-LP era). Here […]
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Charlottesville Symphony concert just misses the mark
One phrase characterizes my impression of the Charlottesville Symphony’s November 16th concert: “it was great, except for…” The program itself, “Romantic Titans” was first-rate. The first half of the program featured two orchestral works; the second two large-scale choral works. Maestro Benjamin Rouse freely admitted “Caught by the Wind” was something of an outliner. Composer […]
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Anton Bruckner Complete Piano Music Complete Surprise
May I use the word “revelatory?” It most accurately describes my reaction to this release of Anton Brucker’s piano music. Bruckner’s reputation (rightly) rests on his symphonies. But those were far in the future of the young student who wrote these piano pieces. All of the works recorded were composed as student pieces and composition […]
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Bruckner Symphonies 4, 7 & 9
It has taken about a century for the symphonies of Austrian composer Anton Bruckner to enter the repertories of major orchestras. One of his champions is German conductor Gerd Schaller, most widely known in Germany as an opera conductor and founder and music director of the Ebracher Musiksommer Festival. His recording with the Philharmonie Festiva […]