Music Reviews
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A Wonderful Performance of Carl Orff’s ‘Carmina Burana’
Gabor Hollerung conducts the Budafok Dohnanyi Orchestra, The Budapest Academic Choral Society, and 4 marvelous soloists in the Carmina Burana cantata, composed in 1935 and 1936 by Carl Orff, and based on 24 poems from the medieval collection Carmina Burana. It’s sung in Latin, as well as Middle High German. Even if you are not […]
Weill – The Seven deadly Sins
Originally written for Classical Source. Read original article HERE. Despite the best efforts of various record labels, outside of The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, The Threepenny Opera and the Little Threepenny Music, Kurt Weill’s music remains largely unknown. These concert performances open with the nine movement ballet The Seven Deadly Sins, […]
A breath of fresh air!
You may have overlooked this one- I did! But that’s the reason I do these “Discoveries”. It’s an LP length release from an orchestra you might not have heard of, and you probably have more than one recording of Stravinsky’s Petrushka already. So imagine my surprise at finding this performance absolutely delightful! The late 50s […]
Ricardo Gallén Sets New Standard
Originally written for HRAuido.net There is nothing colloquial about Sergio Assad’s captivating Colloquial Preludes – written for star guitarist, Ricardo Gallén – with which this new Eudora release begins. At first listening, it becomes immediately clear that these are anything but ‘colloquial’. It’s magical. All of it. The composition, the playing and the recorded result […]
Music of Silence Xiaowen Shang
Xiaowen Shang’s debut album is a delightful program featuring a number of individual selections from Federico Mompou’s Musica Callada, interspersed with some of Antonio Soler’s eighteenth-century sonatas, and piano transcriptions of the sixteenth-century sacred composer Antonio de Cabézon- 3 centuries of Spanish music that she brings together flawlessly. She plays with crystal clarity, yet never […]
Fresh Dvorak!
Want some fresh Dvorak? Tomas Netopil and the Czech Philharmonic serve up a delightful array of some of Dvorak’s lesser-known works on this release from a few weeks ago. They may not be as well known as his Slavonic Dances and others, but that doesn’t mean they are in any way inferior. The Legends are […]
Notes on Recent Finds, No. 28 (Repost from Positive Feedback)
Read Original Pure DSD256 from Eudora, Hunnia, Yarlung, and more! I’m catching up… honestly I am. There are many wonderful albums to talk about, more than I can cover in one article. But, I’ll make a start and then add more in a later article. Today, I want to visit several terrific Pure DSD256 recordings […]
Van Poucke, an Unconventional Poet
Quality and quantity are two different things. The best, of course, is getting both. But if a choice has to be made, quality must prevail. Short as this DSD EP may be, it scores high on quality. For the first time, I heard the Dutch pianist, van Poucke, in a carefully crafted Schumann recital – The […]
Another Holiday Music Essential
Written by Robert Baird for Stereophile – January 2025 Jazz Record Reviews Donald Vega, pianoClovis Nicolas, bassPete Van Nostrand, drums It’s easy to hear why performers of all stripes are drawn to Christmas music: The tunes are irresistible. The challenge lies in how every known Christmas tune has been played live and recorded umpteen times. […]
Hungarian and proud of it!
I got hooked on Miklos Rozsa’s music as a high school kid, when I saw Ben Hur in a newly-remodeled theater in it’s first “roadshow” run. The Sound system in that theater was excellent, and I was blown away. I played the soundtrack album so often I imagine I was driving my parents crazy! I […]
Don’t Miss These! Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra debuts its own label with these two releases. I was thoroughly impressed by each one, and I want to be sure that they get the attention they deserve. First, Australian soprano Siobhan Stagg and the MSO’s chief conductor, Jaime Martin in song suites by Debussy and Strauss. Ariettes Oublidees, the Debussy songs […]