Jan 31, 2021 | Outstanding [w.e.f. January 2021], Recording Reviews
Benjamin Britten’s Frank Bridge Variations (1937, not short of recordings, including by the composer, for Decca, and Karajan for that matter, Philharmonia Orchestra) leaps off the page here, although it could be argued that John Wilson sometimes harries the music and...
Jan 30, 2021 | Outstanding [w.e.f. January 2021], Recording Reviews
It was a wonderful start to the year and is now a permanent fixture of timeless delights. I wrote a few words back then and am now pleased to welcome a release that will be a constant companion. As ever, disappointingly and annoyingly, Sony does not respect the...
Jan 24, 2021 | Recording Reviews
Hyperion’s The Romantic Piano Concerto series reaches volume eighty-two, which showcases the first two (of three) Piano Concertos by Armenian composer, pianist and teacher Stéphan Elmas (1862-1937). Both three-movement works (in respectively G-minor and D-minor)...
![RELEASED TODAY, January 22: A Vision of the Sea – The music of David Matthews [Signum Classics]](http://www.colinscolumn.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/sea.jpg)
Jan 22, 2021 | Outstanding [w.e.f. January 2021], Recording Reviews
Previously published on January 13 Four impressive orchestral works from the pen of Englishman David Matthews (born 1943). In order of disc appearance, the ten-minute Toward Sunrise (Opus 117) is atmospheric and suspenseful, a myriad of details and colours...
Jan 10, 2021 | Recording Reviews
Up first is Swiss composer Dieter Ammann’s The Piano Concerto (Gran Toccata), a half-hour score completed in 2019 and given its premiere during that year’s BBC Proms season, Sakari Oramo conducting. Ammann (born 1962) has created a terrific piece, a dazzling...
Jan 1, 2021 | Concert Reviews, Ramblings, Recording Reviews
I am not one for musical league tables or for pigeonholing musicians, so what follows, while far from arbitrary, is in no order whatsoever; it’s simply as I recalled a particular release that I regard as special I included it below, so something has no doubt...
