Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Brahms: Symphony No. 4 and MacMillan: Larghetto for Orchestra receives a 10/10 in Artist Quality and Sound Quality from ClassicsToday.com and David Hurwitz! “After a first movement outstanding for its exquisitely gentle (but still fluent) opening and an aptly ferocious coda, the remainder of the symphony is noteworthy for its unusual fleetness–no “autumnal” Brahms here! This approach pays big dividends in the ballad-like second movement, whose singing, legato melodies…
Watch a new ClassicsToday video review with David Hurwitz of the Kansas City Symphony and Michael Stern’s Holst: The Planets; The Perfect Fool recording: See the full review on ClassicsToday.com Purchase
ClassicsToday.com is forgoing the usual “Best of” lists for 2017 to begin a new, annual “Artists You Can Trust” list featuring their top ten currently active performers “whose body of work sustains the highest level of consistency and musical excellence.” We’re happy to announce, that FRESH! From RR artist Manfred Honeck has made this inaugural list! Find the full list and their entire archive of Manfred Honeck recording reviews at ClassicsToday.com. Manfred Honeck Recordings on…
Order Now “Manfred Honeck makes the Shostakovich Fifth sound freshly-composed–quite an accomplishment for this certified warhorse. His scrupulous attention to Shostakovich’s meticulous dynamic markings and instrumental balances–the harp emerging perfectly from the orchestral texture in the first movement, the audible piano at the climax of the adagio, and the brass beautifully sonorous and penetrating throughout–provides much aural delight. Honeck’s interpretation is remarkable for its clean, rhythmically-alert phrasing… The Pittsburgh Symphony plays marvelously, with a bright…
“This is juicy. I’m sure that many music lovers have wished that Strauss had made a suite from Elektra. It is, after all, one of his most exciting scores, as well as one of his most symphonically cogent. Well, here it is, courtesy of Manfred Honeck and Tomas Ille, and it’s a doozy. You get all of the major bits: Elektra’s opening monologue, the entry of Klytaemnestra, the recognition scene, the two murders, and of…
“You would expect Honeck to respond to the passion and intensity of Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony, and so he does. The wild first movement development and exciting scherzo handily capture the music’s dynamism, and the playing is, as usual, terrific. What lingers in the mind most, though, is Honeck’s ability to project the despairing finale in a single arch from start to finish. There’s something about his phrasing that captures the music’s flow with special conviction;…
The Pittsburgh Symphony and Manfred Honeck’s BEETHOVEN: Symphony Nos. 5 & 7 recording receives perfect 10 ratings from ClassicsToday: “No matter how many billion recordings of this music we already have, a great performance offers its own justification, these are very great performances. … It’s not easy to offer interpretations of this music that sound new without turning capricious–that both respect the music and personalize it. Honeck and the orchestra manage to pull it off…
ClassicsToday editor David Hurwitz reviews the Utah Symphony’s new Mahler: Symphony No. 1 recording: “Under Music Director Thierry Fischer, it’s clear that orchestral standards are considerably higher today … just as this SACD reflects improvements in engineering since the 1960s. Fischer leads a singularly appealing performance of this perennially fresh and engaging music. The first movement builds inexorably, the tempo accelerating steadily through the exciting final pages exactly as Mahler requests. Indeed, Fischer’s control of…
ClassicsToday critic David Vernier gives a 9/10 rating to True Concord Voices & Orchestra’s new Far In The Heavens: Choral Music of Stephen Paulus recording: “Paulus wisely sought in this work to honor the victims while addressing the universal experience of those grieving and healing from loss of loved ones–in his words… Indeed, he accomplished that, with music that projects a concert-hall-scale grandeur (including some savvy orchestration) while embodying a style reminiscent of what can…
ClassicsToday‘s David Horowitz reviews the “remarkably good” Kansas City Symphony recording of Saint-Saëns Symphony No. 3: “…this is an unusually vivacious and texturally transparent reading, recorded with welcome clarity in an acoustic that never permits detail to get obscured by excessive reverberation. The balance between organ and orchestra in the finale, even when everyone is blasting away, could not be more perfect. In the serene Adagio too, which flows with impressive poise, the soft tones…
ClassicsToday critic David Hurwitz says Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony have “Done Right By Bruckner’s Fourth” giving them a 10/10 rating for Artistic Quality: “The most immediately remarkable aspect of the performance is its huge dynamic range, especially from the brass section. Pittsburgh has possibly the best horn section in the world today, not just in its ringing fortissimos, but in its ability to play softly. The strings, too, manage triple-pianos without any loss…
ClassicsToday gives a 10/10 for Artistic Quality and a 10/10 for Sound Quality to the new Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Dvořák & Janáček recording, hailing it as “Honeck’s Incandescent Dvořák 8th!” “There are few things more wonderful in the life of a record collector than a really great recording of a repertory warhorse. … along comes a performance by a conductor who loves the music, who has genuine ideas about how it should go and what…
ClassicsToday gives Pittsburgh Symphony’s Strauss recording a 10/10 in both Artist & Sound Quality! “Recordings like this restore one’s faith in the possibility of true musical greatness. Manfred Honeck conducts this music as do few others today. He’s not afraid to have a good time, nor is he a strict literalist. … For all of their larger-than-life qualities, Honeck remains sensitive to every dynamic nuance, intricacy of balance, and rhythmic quirk. Every one of these…
ClassicsToday rates our latest Kansas City Symphony Elgar/Vaughan Williams recording a 9/10 for Artistic Quality and a 10/10 for Sound Quality, while highly recommending the recording even if you have multiple recordings of the repertoire: “Michael Stern and his Kansas City Symphony take to the music as if to the manner born. The Wasps, here given as the complete suite and not just the overture, is delightful. “The finale is extremely impressive, aided by state-of-the-art…
ClassicsToday.com reviewer David Vernier gives new Dallas Wind Symphony release Horns for the Holidays a 9/10 for artistic quality and a 10/10 in Sound Quality in his rave review “A Merry, Windy Christmas.” “If you are a lover of Christmas music—carols, popular songs, and all manner of medleys and clever arrangements of such—and you miss this extraordinary recording by the first-rate Dallas Wind Symphony, then your holiday listening stands to be just a bit more…