The labels that are now gathered under the Universal Classics umbrella have a pretty impressive scorecard in the area of classical compilations. We've seen The Greatest Opera Show on Earth, The Yellow Guide: Classical Music, Best of the Millennium, and now there's The No. 1 Opera Album. But that's no surprise, since Universal has some of the finest interpreters in its ...
Manufacturer: Decca
This, Anonymous 4's final recording, is a break from their usual "early music" periods and locations; it presents American music, religious in nature, from the 18th and 19th centuries. And it's absolutely beautiful from start to finish. Their normal, exquisite technique and purity here blend to sound the way we imagined the ladies' choir in church meetings in America past might have sounded: ...
Manufacturer: Harmonia Mundi Fr.
Having left medieval chant and somewhat later polyphony behind and moved, musically, across the Atlantic with their last CD (American Angels), the women of Anonymous 4 are still exploring. For their move up a few centuries, their impeccable tonal purity remains, but a decidedly American twang has been added to some of the folksier, Southern mountain-based tunes and revival songs. It's as ...
Manufacturer: Vox (Classical)
Back in the days when the forces that controlled television actually cared about art, it was perfectly normal to see original plays and live musical performances right in your living room. In 1950, Menotti was commissioned to write an opera for television, and on Christmas Eve, 1951, Amahl and the Night Visitors was performed by the NBC Television Theater. This recording, under the ...
Manufacturer: RCA
Manufacturer: EMI Classics
This follow-up to Anonymous 4's debut "hit," An English Ladymass, is even better. From the choice of repertoire to the proficiency of the singing to the recorded sound, this is a standard-setting production. The 23 works--plainchants, carols, songs, and motets--invoke various aspects of the Christmas story: the visitation of the angel Gabriel, tributes to the Virgin Mary, gifts of the ...
Manufacturer: Harmonia Mundi France.
Record-label politics prevented this awesome recording of Argentinean pianist Martha Argerich from being released for 34 years. The spitfire musician delivers a powerful set of Chopin's best-loved works that still sounds riveting today. Intense and gorgeous. --Jason Verlinde
