Box Set Selections,
Boxed Set Selections - May 2024
This month's heavyweights include Antonio Pappano's complete symphonic, concertante & sacred music recordings with the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, a collection of newly-remastered live recordings from Leopold Stowkoski, and an anthology celebrating the legacy of producer John Culshaw, and Josef Krips's complete mono recordings for Decca.
Antonio Pappano & Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia
Complete symphonic, concertante & sacred music recordings
Pappano served as Music Director of the Roman orchestra from 2005 until 2023, when he was succeeded by Daniel Harding. This celebration of his tenure includes their Gramophone and BBC Music Magazine Award-winning recording of the Verdi Requiem and Quattro pezzi sacri from 2009, Rossini's Stabat Mater and Petite Messe solennelle, Respighi's Roman Trilogy and Il tramonto, and symphonies by Mahler, Bruckner, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff and Bernstein.
Available Format: 27 CDs
Released to mark the centenary of Culshaw's birth, this set includes the first-ever studio recording of Barber's Adagio for Strings, the 1951 & 1953 Bayreuth recordings (which were a precursor to the landmark Solti Ring Cycle), Copland playing his own music, the first international release of Solti's 1854 Brahms Requiem (recorded for Capitol), and a lost tape of Clifford Curzon. The supporting documentation includes a 6500-word essay on Culshaw's legacy by Dominic Fyfe and many previously-unseen photographs.
Available Format: 12 CDs
This set contains Krips's complete mono recordings for Decca (beginning with Kingsway Hall sessions in October 1947): repertoire includes a number of late Mozart symphonies, Die Entführung aus dem Serail and the Piano Concertos Nos. 23 & 24 with Clifford Curzon, the Schumann Piano Concerto with Wilhelm Kempff, Mendelssohn's Elijah, Schubert's Symphonies Nos. 6, 8 & 9, and the Dvořák Cello Concerto with Zara Nelsova. A second volume dedicated to Krips's Decca and Philips recordings from the stereo era (1955-72) will be released next month.
Available Format: 22 CDs
Newly remastered to reflect Stokowski's instructions on how he wanted his work to sound, this collection of live recordings includes the 1963 Proms premiere of Mahler's Symphony No. 2 (described as 'meticulously loyal, noble and deeply felt' by The Times), Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, Fala's El amor brujo, Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5, Scriabin's Poème de l’extase, Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique, and Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. The set also features a nine-minute conversation between Stokowski and musicologist Deryck Cooke from 1965.
Available Formats: 6 CDs, MP3, FLAC
This collection of recordings from the Berlin-based string quartet opens with a Beethoven cycle which was described as 'extremely dynamic and incisive' by BBC Music Magazine and praised in Gramophone for the 'uncompromising honesty and probity' of the playing. Other highlights include a previously-unreleased account of Dvořák’s 'American' Quartet (recorded just days before the death of violist Friedemann Weigle in 2015), the Schumann & Brahms Piano Quintets with Leif Ove Andsnes, Ligeti's String Quartets Nos. 1 & 2, and The Piazzolla Project from 2009.
Available Format: 23 CDs
This 6-disc set brings together Lewis's acclaimed recordings of Schubert's major mature works for solo piano, including the Piano Sonatas Nos. 14-21, the Wanderer-Fantasie, Moments Musicaux, Impromptus D899 & 935, and the Drei Klavierstücke D946). Reviewing the recording of Piano Sonatas Nos. 15, 17 & 18 in 2012, Gramophone declared that 'every now and again a recording comes along that makes you want to dance in the street, handing out copies to complete strangers. This is one of those instances', whilst The Telegraph opined that 'Lewis’s mature insight into the workings and emotional characteristics of these works lends his interpretations particular power and depth'.
Available Format: 6 CDs
Founded by Pavel Klikar in 1982, Musica Antique Praha was one of the first Czech ensembles to explore historically-informed performance and forgotten Baroque repertoire. This collection brings together five seminal albums from the 1990s: Baroque Music From The Kroměříž Archives, Italian Music of Early Baroque, Alessandro Grandi and Masters of Italian Baroque, Giovanni Legrenzi – Sonate E Motetti and Christmas Music of Baroque Bohemia.
Available Formats: 5 CDs, MP3, FLAC
Born in Capua in 1856, Giuseppe Martucci has a distinguished career as a pianist, conductor and teacher in addition to his compositional activies: he did much to introduce Wagner's operas to Italy (conducting the Italian premiere of Tristan und Isolde) and counted Respighi among his composition students. The first release in a projected series called Italian Romantics, this collection includes his complete orchestral music and piano concertos, a disc of songs, and an album of solo piano works.
Available Format: 10 CDs
