Quarterly Critic’s Choice
The best and most interesting new releases of the previous three months are awarded a place on the Quarterly Critic’s Choice. Evaluation criteria are artistic quality, repertoire value, presentation, and sound quality. From 2014 onward, the Long Lists are stored directly with each Quarterly Critic’s Choice.
NEW: Long List 2/2024, published on 5th April 2024
Orchestral Music & Concertos
Johannes Brahms: Symphonien Nr. 1-4
Wiener Symphoniker, Philippe Jordan. 4 CD, Wiener Symphoniker WSO21 (Edel)
There is truly no shortage of recordings of the four Brahms symphonies. But this latest one, created in Philippe Jordan’s last season as chief conductor of the Vienna Symphonics, is completely convincing. The »Brahms-Heimstatt« – the Vienna Musikvereinssaal – proves to be the ideal recording location. »Inner singing«, as Jordan calls it, so essential for Brahms, becomes the constituent, structural, and the tonal guideline of his interpretation. In addition to sensuality and sweetness, firm tempos, attention to detail, and a flexible, transparent music-making are the characteristics of these recordings. The melancholy Brahms can be experienced up close, as can the dramatic one. For the jury: Peter Stieber
Orchestral Music & Concertos
Transitions
Nikolai Kapustin: Cello Concerto No. 1 op.85; Alfred Schnittke: Cello Concerto No. 1. Eckart Runge, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Frank Strobel. Capriccio C5362 (Naxos)
In the first cello concerto by Nikolai Kapustin, who died July 2020, symphonic, chamber music, and jazz are combined in an inspiring way. Kapustin entrusted the sheet music for the work to the soloist Eckart Runge; this is the first recording. The polystylistic world of sound of Alfred Schnittke, who created a masterpiece with his first cello concerto that is part of the standard repertoire today, is no less fascinating. Runge, the long-time cellist of the Artemis Quartet, is stylistically at home in both worlds of expression: relaxed and with a light hand with Kapustin, playing Schnittke with an intensity that gets under the skin. And one thing is always evident: this is about the existential. For the jury: Norbert Hornig