Here commences what I intend to be bimonthly “Top Ten (+3)” lists of favorite media. This first list came about somewhat as a matter of circumstance…
… as Mrs. Synaphaï and I have recently been shopping for upgrades to the music-meets-home-theater rig in the apartment we share. After combing the collection for a representative sample of ear candy, I cobbled together a stack of ten discs of classical music which will put both electronics and transducers to the test, not only in the category of pushing technical limits but testing the ability to accurately reproduce complex signals and delicate timbres:
Gustav Mahler: Symphony No.3
Anna Larson, contralto • Arnold Schoenberg-Chor • Tölzer Knabenchor
Lucerne Festival Orchestra • Claudio Abbado, conductor
Medici Arts 2056338 — DVD-Video (Region 0/Dolby Digital 5.1/DTS5.1/LPCM2.0)
Despite serious illness, Claudio Abbado conjured an astonishingly moving an nuanced performance of Mahler’s Symphony No.3 on August 19, 2007, and the natural, ungimmicked sonics on this exceptional Medici Arts release are the best of any symphonic release I have heard in the DVD format, from both the LPCM and DTS audio layers. Be prepared for very wide dynamic range.
Georg Frideric Handel: Water Music / Music for the Royal Fireworks
Aradia Ensemble • Kevin Mallon, conductor
Naxos 5.110115 — DVD-Audio (DVD-A24bit-96kHz Surround/DTS5.1/LPCM2.0)
A fine period-instrument performance by a superb Canadian-based ensemble, recorded in rich but not overly reverberant acoustics. Rock-solid imaging in both hi-res DVD-Audio and DTS.
Crown Imperial: Festive Music for Organ, Winds, Brass & Percussion
Mary Preston, organ • Dallas Wind Symphony • Jerry Junkin, conductor
Reference Recordings RR112 — CD (HDCD)
I had to throw at least one “lease-breaker” into the pile. Staggeringly wide dynamics and subwoofer-busting bass, made even more remarkable by the outstanding playing of the excellent Dallas Wind Symphony. Fasten your seatbelts and try track 6, Elsa’s Procession from Wagner’s Lohengrin in former Marine Band music director John Bourgeois’s sensational arrangement. If you’re using a tube amp, this track alone will heat a medium-sized home.
Kodo: Heartbeat Drummers of Japan
Sheffield Lab 12222-2-F — CD
This CD was first issued a little over two decades ago, and it’s still in my “unfair test” pile. I’ve also seen Kodo live in a variety of venues, and if you have never had the opportunity to see this incredible ensemble and their fusion of music, ceremony and theatricality, I’d urge you to jump at any chance to experience this awe-inspiring group. Sony has issued their fair share of Kodo discs, but none of them come anywhere close to Sheffield Lab in capturing the unique timbres of the ensemble’s handmade drums. Kodo not only performs traditional music but has commissioned some of Japan’s most prestigious composers for new works; one of their most spectacular showpieces is the third track on this disc, Maki Ishii’s Monochrome for small drums and percussion instruments. The work rises from dead silence to a massive crescendo, followed by a panopoly of timbres and textures. The second track showcases the massive O-Daiko (literally, “Big Drum”) in a bravura piece that will have your floor shaking.
Johann Sebastian Bach: Brandenburg Concertos
European Brandenburg Ensemble • Trevor Pinnock, harpsichord and director
Avie AV 2119 — 2 CDs
This set has it all: a world-class ensemble led by a major Bach interpreter, captured in vivid sound by DNS Studios. Pinnock has completely rethought his approach to these pieces, and the purist engineering captures the lively, energetic and expressive playing of this hand-picked Baroque chamber orchestra. Try track 7 of the first disc (the fianl movement of Brandenburg 3) or the second (the opening of Brandenburg 6 for violas, violas da gamba and continuo) and luxuriate in the realistic string sonorities.
Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No.11 “The Year 1905”
London Symphony Orchestra • Mstislav Rostropovich, conductor
LSO Live 535 — Hybrid Surround SACD
Tony Faulkner’s purist live recording has very possibly the widest dynamic range of any orchestral recording I have yet heard, capturing with hair-raising intensity and primal visceral wallop Shostakovich’s most scathing musical indictment of the Soviet nightmare, Symphony No.11 “The Year 1956 1905,” with conductor Mstislav Rostropovich holding nothing back.
Nordheim (electroacoustic works by Arne Nordheim)
Cikada Duo
2L 39 — Hybrid Surround SACD
This unusually colorful program of electroacoustic music by Norwegian avant-garde composer Arne Nordheim written for the unique Cikada Duo (synthesizer player Kenneth Karlsson and percussionist Bjorn Rabben) proves audiophile production values and studio techniques can be combined with results that are not merely satisfying but impressive.
Liszt Recital
Polina Leschenko, piano
avanticlassic 1027 — Hybrid Surround SACD
Producer Frédéric Grun gets the most realistic piano sound of any producer I’ve heard – and it helps that he manages to find some of the most interesting and underexposed players on the European scene. My favorite of his recordings is Russian pianist Polina Leschenko’s recording of music by Liszt and Busoni. Leschenko’s dramatic playing is palpable – but so is her amazingly mature control of the often unwieldy structure of Liszt’s music.
Berio • Xenakis • Turnage
Christian Lindberg, trombone
Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra • Peter Rundel, conductor
BIS SACD-1638 — Hybrid Surround SACD
You knew there’d have to be something with Xenakis in the test disc pile, and what could top a recording sporting a world-class soloist, a superb conductor specializing in the postwar avant-garde, and the state-of-the-art team of producer Robert Suff and engineer Ulf Schneider?
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Vespers
Saint Petersburg Chamber Choir • Nikolai Korniev, conductor
PentaTone 5186 027 — Hybrid Surround SACD
PentaTone remains a major player in high-quality recordings, and their recording of Rachmaninoff’s choral masterpiece (a work that poses great challenges for even the best engineers and producers due to the often difficult nature of recording massed voices) is a genuine sonic achievement.
The “Plus 3” were added because I am now in the market for both a BluRay player and a new turntable and arm:
Provisional BluRay choice:
Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier
Anne Schwanewilms • Kurt Rydl • Anke Vondung • Hans-Joachim Ketelsen • Maki Mori
Staatskapelle u. Staatsoperchor Dresden • Fabio Luisi, conductor
Medici Arts 2056914 — BluRay (1080i/Dolby Digital 5.1/DTS5.1/LPCM2.0)
There are still too few BluRay choices, but this release sports impressive sound (couldn’t they have waited and issued this one in DTS Master Audio?), excellent picture quality, a solid overall cast (with some particularly edifying ensemble singing), and the impressive podium direction of Swiss maestro Fabio Luisi, a top-rank Straussian in the tradition of Böhm and Kempe.
Undisputed vinyl choices:
Sergei Prokofiev: Romeo and Juliet – Scenes from the Ballet
Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra • Erich Leinsdorf, conductor
Sheffield Lab 8 — LP, Direct-to-Disc
The Fox Touch, Volume 1
Johann Sebastian Bach • Joseph Jongen
Virgil Fox, Fratelli Ruffatti Organ of the Garden Grove Community Church
Crystal Clear 7001 — LP, Direct-to-Disc
The two most realistic-sounding classical stereo LPs ever issued, in my not-so-humble opinion.
What are your favorite evaluation discs? Drop me a line; I’ll be composing a separate post on favorite reader choices.