Fanfare Magazine reviews Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4 & Leshnoff Double Concerto recording in the September/October 2020 issue:
“Manfred Honeck has a special talent for making recordings. …A Honeck release is a documentarian’s dream. Musicologists will never have to puzzle over what he meant to achieve, as historians still do with storied conductors of the past. I wish more were like him. … Honeck’s take on the Tchaikovsky Fourth Symphony is similar to what one would expect from his Strauss, Dvořák, and Beethoven, not to mention his Tchaikovsky “Pathétique,” all well received here. The essence of a Honeck performance is rich textures balanced from the bottom up, soaring horns, rhythmic flexibility in climaxes and his special trademark, explosive, convulsive timpani. … Not only is the Leshnoff a gorgeous, thoroughly tonal and sensuous piece, it even starts out sounding Russian, with dreamy moments which remind you of Rimsky-Korsakoff and Glazunov, a perfect fit. The soloists, Pittsburgh Symphony principals both, have lovely sonorities playing off each other in different registers.… Leshnoff has a beautiful ear for warm color. This may be an odd form of praise, but this music contains only seductive moments. An instant classic, in the history of Modernism it is wonderful for what it is not.”
—Steven Kruger, Fanfare