Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 6 & 8 features the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Gianandrea Noseda. Their complete Beethoven Symphonies is a multi-year project, with the performances and recordings spanning the 2021–2022 and 2022–2023 seasons. Symphonies Nos. 1 & 3 and 4 & 5 were released in 2022 and 2023, with 2 & 7 scheduled for December. The project will culminate in the release of No. 9 and the complete box set in February 2024.

These performances received wide praise with The Washington Post calling the performance of Symphony No. 8 “powerful” and “rousing,” while commenting on No. 6, “If there’s a trick to making this well-trodden symphony sound fresh, I suspect it’s at the heart of Noseda’s approach: Keep it simple, let it do its thing, tend its garden. Like a new day, it only requires we awaken to it.”

The complete Beethoven Symphonies continue the legacy of the NSO’s rich recording history, which began in the 1940s. Under its own label the NSO has released a pairing of Copland’s Suite from Billy the Kid and Dvořák’s Symphony No. 9, From the New World in 2020, and the complete George Walker Sinfonias in September of 2023. For its achievement in performances and recordings, the NSO was nominated for the 2023 Gramophone Orchestra of the Year Award.

National Symphony Orchestra
Gianandrea Noseda, Conductor