Archive for Review – Page 12
HR Audio Gives Five Stars to Pittsburgh Symphony’s Tchaikovsky/Leshnoff!
HR Audio‘s Graham Williams gives a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review for the Pittsburgh Symphony and Manfred Honeck’s Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4 & Leshnoff: Double Concerto SACD: “any new release from the award-winning team of Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony on the Reference Recordings label is worth investigating as, based on previous form, it is likely to yield a performance that brings new interpretive insights to even the most familiar staples of the classical repertoire. In addition,…
Orthodox Arts Journal Reviews PaTRAM’s Blessed Art Thou Among Women
The Orthodox Arts Journal reviews the new PaTRAM Institute recording, Blessed Art Thou Among Women: “The repertoire lineup is indeed star-studded. Here the listener will find hymns that are familiar and widely beloved… Throughout the program, there are moments of exquisite choral beauty, punctuated by outstanding solo contributions: by soprano Fotina Naumenko, basso profundo Glenn Miller, baritone Protodeacon Leonid Roschko, and basso profundo Alexis Lukianov, who poignantly intones “Memory eternal” to his late father, Protopresbyter…
PaTRAM’s Kurt Sander: Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom in Choral Journal
PaTRAM’s recording of Kurt Sander’s Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom received a three-page feature in the latest issue (Vol 60, No. 9) of the American Choral Directors Association’s Choral Journal: “The Reference Recordings album, most excellently sung by PaTram Institute Singers under the direction of Peter Jermihov, has garnered two 2020 GRAMMY® nominations, and deservedly so. It is a sublime recording, which expertly marries gorgeous choral performance with majestic, inspiring choral composition. … Sanders…
The Audio Beat Reviews the Dallas Winds’ John Williams At the Movies LP
The Dallas Winds and Jerry Junkin’s 180-gram double-LP of John Williams at the Movies gets a 4 & 5-star rating from The Audio Beat: “Since 1976, with the release of Guitar and… featuring guitarist Bunyan Webb in recital accompanied by flute and viola, Reference Recordings has offered the music-loving audiophile an elegant buffet of exceptional recordings of a wide-ranging selection of music. … Now, 43 years after that first release, comes this deluxe two-LP reissue of a…
Limelight Magazine Says Utah’s Prokofiev Ticks Every Box
Australia’s Limelight Magazine gives a 4.5 Star review to the Utah Symphony and Thierry Fischer’s Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky – Lieutenant Kijé Suite recording: “what a witty juxtaposition: Russia’s great medieval nationalist epic contrasted with a cheeky satire on stultifying Tsarist military bureaucracy. … All the participants acquit themselves brilliantly. In the Kijé, the orchestra conveys just the right mixture of piquancy and subversion. The soloists are a delight, especially the fat tubas and the droll sounding…
American Record Guide Reviews Hermitage Piano Trio’s Rachmaninoff
American Record Guide Editor Donald Vroon reviewed the Hermitage Piano Trio’s Rachmaninoff recording in the Fall 2019 issue. It was also one of his recordings of the year! “I have recordings of the Rachmaninoff Trio 1 that range from 12 to 16 minutes. … Our three Russians who call themselves the Hermitage Trio… take 14-1/2 minutes, and they sound Russian and romantic; they have ardor, but they are not pushy about it. This is the…
American Record Guide Reviews Kansas City Symphony’s New Holst Recording
The Kansas City Symphony and Michael Stern’s Holst: The Planets; The Perfect Fool gets a great review in the March/April 2020 issue of American Record Guide: “This wonderful recording sounds better and better the more you increase the volume; and somehow, that glorious sound includes both great detail and great space. We seem to be hovering just above music director Michael Stern, so individual instruments are heard vividly, and yet we never seem too close.…
Wisconsin Public Radio Reviews Hermitage Piano Trio’s Rachmaninoff
A fantastic new review for the Hermitage Piano Trio’s GRAMMY®-nominated Rachmaninoff recording from Wisconsin Public Radio: “virtuoso performances, outstanding production quality, and a program overflowing with gorgeous music and deeply wrought emotion. … The music provides a shimmering showcase for the young musicians, enabling them to display powerful technical and interpretive chops. The program itself is profoundly moving, including a youthful work, an elegy to Tchaikovsky after his death, and a gorgeous arrangement of the “Vocalise” that will be new…
Classical CD Choice Review for Utah Symphony’s Prokofiev
Classical CD Choice‘s Graham Williams reviews the Utah Symphony and Thierry Fischer’s Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky – Lieutenant Kijé Suite recording: “Discerning collectors are used to releases from the Reference Recordings label receiving effusive plaudits, not only for the high artistic level of the performances but especially for the thrilling audiophile sound quality that brings listening at home to a new level of enjoyment. This latest spectacular recording from Thierry Fischer and the Utah Symphony of…
The Arts Desk Reviews Hermitage Piano Trio’s Rachmaninoff
The Arts Desk‘s Graham Rickson reviews the Hermitage Piano Trio’s GRAMMY®-nominated Rachmaninoff album: “This performance, from three Russian musicians, oozes soul. Cellist Sergey Antonov has a gloriously dark tone, and he’s well matched with violinist Misha Keylin. And what a beautifully balanced recording too, pianist Ilya Kazantsev’s Steinway captured with startling fidelity. This never once sounds like a contractual meeting between three starry soloists; it’s clear that these musicians have lived with this music for…
Audiostream Review for Prokofiev
Audiostream Magazine reviews our high-resolution downloads for the Utah Symphony’s Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky – Lieutenant Kijé Suite: “I was given access to download the 24-bit/192kHz WAV files of Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky – Lieutenant Kijé Suite for listening, and was immediately blown away at the lack of any compression artefacting on the tracks – this recording sounds like it has a mile of dynamic headroom built into it. Regardless of whether I played it on my…
Gramophone Magazine Reviews Utah Symphony’s Prokofiev
Gramophone Magazine’s Mark Pullinger reviews Thierry Fischer and the Utah Symphony’s Prokofiev: Alexander Nevsky – Lieutenant Kijé Suite in their February 2020 issue: “Thierry Fischer pairs two contrasting Prokofiev film scores in this Utah Symphony release: the gritty, rarely heard cantata Alexander Nevsky and the quirky, satirical Lieutenant Kijé. The latter is… guaranteed to raise a smile. … Nevsky is given a sober reading here, the University of Utah A Cappella Choir and University of…
Four-Star Limelight Review for Richmond Symphony’s Bates & Vaughan Williams
Limelight Magazine offers a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ review for the Richmond Symphony and Chorus and Steven Smith’s recording of Mason Bates: Children of Adam; Vaughan Williams: Dona Nobis Pacem. “[Bates’s] choral writing is reminiscent of Vaughan Williams, whose well known Dona Nobis Pacem is the coupling. … Bates’ command of orchestral texture is colourful and assured. In the choral sections, he sets poets such as Whitman, Sandburg, and the long passage from Genesis about the creation of the world.…
Pittsburgh’s Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 an Audiophile Sound Album of the Month
Italian magazine, Audiophile Sound, has named the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Manfred Honeck’s Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 recording their December 2019 album of the month! “Over the last decade Manfred Honeck has moulded the Pittsburgh Symphony into a world-class band and on this album they give a compelling account of Bruckner’s greatest symphony using the Nowak edition. … The magnificent recording also allows one to hear how Honeck delineates instrumental lines and builds massive, structured…
The Arts Desk Reviews Holst: The Planets
The Arts Desk’s Graham Rickson reviews Kansas City Symphony and Michael Stern’s recording of Holst: The Planets; The Perfect Fool: “Michael Stern’s Kansas City Symphony version is a blast… An audiophile’s delight as well as a musical treat, Stern gets pretty much everything right. You’ll hear things in this recording that you’ll struggle to discern on starrier versions, the marvel being that nothing feels forced or artificially spotlit. There’s a sepulchral brass chorale a few…