Back in 1940, Keynote Recordings Inc. was a new, small and independent New York company with offices at 522 Fifth Ave., recently founded by Eric Bernay, the owner of a midtown Manhattan record store called The Music Room. Bernay was musically openminded and, looking for a place in the increasingly convulsed American record industry, he launched a catalog of varied music and performers.

Few record labels can boast as glorious a legacy as Sony Classical. This lavish four-disc set chronicles the finest performances available on the label from the past ninety-five years. Eighty selections comprising over four hours of music are accompanied by two lavishly illustrated booklets highlighting Sony Classical's stellar history.

Decca has created this complete collection of award winning recordings to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of Haydn's death. Recorded between 1969 and 1972, this was the first complete cycle of Haydn's symphonies. Hungarian-born Antal Dorati was a Haydn pioneer and specialist who also recorded Haydn operas for Philips during the same period. The Decca catalog of Haydn is without parallel and contains complete cycles of the Piano Sonatas and String Quartets. This is a limited-edition super-budget set.

The 32 Piano Sonatas by Ludwig van Beethoven are often referred to as the ‘New Testament’ of the keyboard literature, following on the ‘Old Testament’ of J.S. Bach's 48 preludes and fugues in the Well-Tempered Clavier. Composed over a period of almost three decades, from 1795 to 1822, the sonatas constitute a fascinating panorama of an artistic career which underwent numerous changes – not to say upheavals – but nevertheless remained remarkably consistent.

It's not as if recordings of the 62 Piano Sonatas of Franz Josef Haydn are thick on the ground. Among the relative big names, there's Jeno Jando on Naxos and John McCabe on Decca. Among the less well-known names, there's Walid Akl on Koch Discover, Roland Batik on Camerata, Ronald Brautigam on BIS, Walter Olbertz on Berlin Classics, and Christine Schornsheim on Capriccio. And for those listeners with record players and aging memories, there's also the venerable Hungaroton cycle, the first complete recorded cycle, that coupled relatively well-known Hungarians like Zoltán Kocsis and Dezsö Ránki with nearly unknown Hungarians like János Sebestyén and the inimitable Zsuzsa Pertis.

40 CD box set featuring concerts, quartets, divertimenti, symphonies, arias, opera scenes, famous overtures, sonatas and so much more.

Box set containing a compilation of great piano concertos performed by the pianist Van Cliburn. It includes, amongst others, 'Piano Concerto No. 1 in B Flat Minor, Op. 23' by Pyotr Il'yich Tchaikovsky, 'Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 18' by Sergei Rachmaninov, 'Concerto No. 1 in D Minor, Op. 15' by Johannes Brahms, 'Concerto in A Minor, Op. 16' by Edvard Grieg, 'Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37' by Ludwig van Beethoven, 'Concerto No. 1 in E Flat Major' by Franz Liszt and 'Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Major, Op. 26' by Sergei Prokofiev.

Box set containing a compilation of works for the Erato label performed by the soprano Sumi Jo. As well as the tracks listed it also includes 'Gualtier Mald…Caro Nome' from 'Rigoletto' by Giuseppe Verdi, 'No, No, Che Non Sei Capace, K419' By Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 'Son Vergin Vezzosa' from 'I Puritani' by Vincenzo Bellini, 'Qual Farfalletta Amante' by Domenico Scarlatti, 'C'est bien L'Air Que Chaque Matin' from 'L'toile du Nord Scribe' by Giacomo Meyerbeer, 'Overture' from 'Die Fledermaus' by Johann Strauss, 'Unusual Way' By Maury Yeston, 'Amazing Grace', 'Cantata Pastorale Per La Nascita di Nostro Signore' by Alessandro Scarlatti and 'As Steals The Morn Upon The Night' by George Frideric Handel, amongst others.

One of the most persistent questions that musicians ask themselves while practicing a piece is the inevitable query of how the composer himself might have performed his music. There are many written reports on how the old masters such as Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven may have played or improvised; and there are lines of teacher/pupil relationships which can trace their lineage back to the pianistic greats such as Liszt, but still we have to imagine the sound since we cannot actually hear it.

To mark the 50th anniversary of the pianist’s death, EMI has brought out the largest and most comprehensive Cortot collection ever. The set offers nearly every commercial studio recording released under Cortot’s name on 78 shellac, vinyl LP, 45 rpm single, or compact disc, including unpublished takes already released on CD. To be sure, it is not quite “The Complete Cortot”. For example, the collection omits Cortot’s 1903 sessions accompanying soprano Felia Litvinne, plus a 1925 recording containing the second half only of Chopin’s First Ballade coupled on shellac with the same composer’s Second Impromptu. There is no broadcast material, either. However, we do get Cortot’s unpublished 1957 Chopin Preludes and Ballades, along with a few samples from the pianist’s long-rumored, unfinished Beethoven cycle recorded at the Ecole Normale in 1958/59

The edition comprises 33 CDs and 1 LP with previously unreleased recordings (Piano Concerto No. 2 performed by Vladimir Krainev and the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Yuri Temirkanov; and Vocalise orchestrated by the composer and performed by the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Dmitri Kitaenko).

Marking 100 years since his death, this is the first ever set of SCRIABIN COMPLETE WORKS. Drawn principally from Decca’s distinguished catalogue, the set also features no fewer than 64 newly-recorded tracks - over 200 mins of music, newly recorded by Vladimir Ashkenazy and Valentina Lisitsa especially for this set.

There's perfect symmetry in the way this four-disc anthology opens with a raw, solo acoustic 1948 rendition of John Lee Hooker's signature tune, "Boogie Chillen'," and then closes a half-century later with Eric Clapton teaming with Hooker on the same tune. Though the Mississippi bluesman who relocated to Detroit has been justly celebrated for his spellbinding repetitions and primal incantations, this comprehensive set shows just how much more range and depth there was to Hooker's music than basic boogie…

A super-budget introduction to the riches of the Spanish piano repertoire, including many critically acclaimed recordings.

The West-Eastern Divan Orchestra – that name taken from Goethe – was the amazing inspiration of Daniel Barenboim and his Palestinian philosopher friend, the late Edward Said. The idea was to bring together in direct collaboration young Arab musicians and young Israelis, for them to make music together, sharing at every level, so that each would more readily come to understand the other. As Said says in a long conversation with Barenboim, contained on the bonus DVD, ‘Their lives have been changed’.