Elgar – Barbirolli Records
Now I have this box, I wouldn’t want to be without it…
Fantasiebilder aus Wien – Zassimova
For once the CD album cover photo (by Magnus Arrevad) sums up its contents very accurately: Anna Zassimova in black dress storm-tossed in a bleak evening landscape. She carries a hat, the interior of which seems to contain a cyclone all its own…
Schubert – Mullova & Beatson
There is an attractive smokiness to Viktoria Mullova’s playing on gut strings which gives these performances a truly domestic chamber feeling, far removed from the modern concert hall…
Mozart – Piano Concertos
Manchester Camerata is fifty years old this year and it has been a distinguished half century. Before it was started as a project by Ralph Gonley under the auspices of BBC Radio Manchester, the city had two symphony orchestras but no professional chamber orchestra of any great standing…
Chopin – Piano Concertos 1 & 2
The main appeal of these chamber versions of Chopin’s concertos, for piano and string quintet (including double bass) is that it makes them available to venues that cannot fit or afford a full orchestra…