Marek Janowski presents Schumann: Complete Symphonies, a comprehensive collection recorded together with the Dresdner Philharmonie. After a fruitful decade as a composer for piano and voice, Schumann then began writing symphonic works, marking a new phase in his life. Recorded between 2021 and 2023, Janowski interprets Schumann’s symphonies with great vitality and intensity in this release that celebrates the culmination of his appointment as chief conductor with the orchestra.

Maestro Marek Janowski, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and the Transylvania State Philharmonic Choir present Giuseppe Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera (1859), together with a stellar cast, headed by Freddie De Tommaso (Riccardo), Lester Lynch (Renato) and Saioa Hernández (Amelia). Un ballo in maschera is Verdi’s tragicomic masterpiece, in which the composer skilfully switches gears between the light and tragic, as well as between his earlier and more mature style. As such, it is both an entertaining and highly sophisticated work.

Marek Janowski presents his first purely-orchestral Schubert recording, together with the Dresdner Philharmonie, performing the composer’s two final, groundbreaking and most famous symphonies. While the two movements of the “Unfinished” symphony in B Minor reach a level of perfection despite the work’s apparent incompleteness, Robert Schumann praised the “Great” symphony in C Major for its “heavenly length”. Janowski’s interpretation combines a sense of tradition with vitality and intensity.

This 5 CD boxset presents the complete set of internationally acclaimed violinist Hilary Hahn’s recordings for Sony. Contained are recordings of much-loved works such as Bach’s Partitas for Solo Violin, and concerti by Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn, Shostakovich, and more – including the violin concerto written specially for Hahn by Edgar Meyer.

After their acclaimed recording of Weber’s Freischütz, the Dresdner Philharmonie and conductor Marek Janowski present yet another German opera classic with Beethoven’s Fidelio. They work together with a stellar cast, including Lise Davidsen (Fidelio/Leonore), Christian Elsner (Florestan), Georg Zeppenfeld (Rocco), Christina Landshamer (Marzelline), and more. This should have been a live concert recording, but recent shutdowns frustrated those plans. Luckily, it turned out possible to record Beethoven’s masterpiece in two studio sessions, with two different, established choirs: the Sächsischer Staatsopernchor Dresden, as well as the MDR Leipzig Radio Choir.

The fact that Roussel's four symphonies aren't better known is a pity, but surely the fault of his own countrymen. Symphonies were never a French specialty, and of the four great French practitioners of the symphonic art at the first decades of this century (Honegger, Roussel, Tournemire, and Magnard), only Honegger seems to have firmly established himself in the international repertoire. While Roussel's Third was championed by conductors like Charles Munch and Leonard Bernstein, even in France the remaining works are neglected. They are, however, one and all, excellently crafted pieces: tuneful, pithy, and very listenable. If you like one, you'll like them all; so this first-rate set is both good listening and good sense.

Penderecki’s first opera “The Devils of Loudun” had its world premiere in 1969 at the Hamburg State Opera. This film adoption, recorded in the same year shortly after the premiere, reunified the original cast of this premiere – e.g. Tatiana Troyanos with an amazing and breathtaking interpretation of the humpy non Jeanne. Because of her sexual visions a priest, who doesn’t know her, burns at the stake. The expressive music and the intensive camera shots result in a mix which is not for faint-hearted people. So it’s no surprise that film director William Friedkin used the music by Penderecki in his movie “The Exorcist”. If you like this movie, you will love this DVD!

Orpheus in the Underworld represents a quantum leap in Offenbach’s operetta output, for it would have been unthinkable to have created a stage work of such opulence and extravagance in Paris prior to that time. Strict regulations dating from the era of Napoleon I assigned to each of the city’s theatres a specific dramatic genre and a proportionate number of employees and performers. For Offenbach this meant writing for no more than three actors on stage at any one time. He openly flouted the regulations, however, ingeniously increasing his dramatic possibilities by adding puppets to his cast list and conveying what he had to say by means of banners held up by mute actors.

Die aufnahmetechnisch hervorragendste, die erste digitale 'Ring'-Produktion: Dynamische Expansion, Brillanz des Klangbildes, instrumentale Qualität und Präzision des Zusammenspiels sind vermutlich nicht zu übertreffen. Die Staatskapelle Dresden erweist sich etwa den Wiener und Berliner Philharmonikern bei Wagner als gleichwertig. Janowski, ein vorzüglicher Musiker, ist als Koordinator von Orchester und Sängern, als Disponent des Gesamtklanges außergewöhnlich gut. Gleiches gilt für Schreiers Loge, die auffallendste Einzelleistung.

Janowski's unfussy, clearly laid out performances, with the Dresden Staatskapelle on superlative form, may lack the sweep and energy of Solti's, or the compelling beauty of Karajan's, but they still have much to recommend them… Jessye Norman, then at the height of her vocal powers, is a rich-toned Sieglinde.

The Staatskapelle Dresden plays spotlessly for Marek Janowski … An excellent 'Ring' experience." Das Rheingold is dominated by Siegfried Nimsgern's vibrant, articulate Alberich, Peter Schreier's wonderfully vital, strikingly intelligent and articulate Loge and Theo Adam's experienced Wotan. But Fricka, the Giants and Rhinemaidens are all well cast, and the whole performance grips one's attention from start to finish.

After their acclaimed recording of Weber’s Freischütz, the Dresdner Philharmonie and its Principal conductor Marek Janowski present yet another German opera stereo classic with Beethoven’s Fidelio. They work together with a stellar cast — well-seasoned in German opera — including Lise Davidsen (Fidelio/Leonore), Christian Elsner (Florestan), Georg Zeppenfeld (Rocco), Christina Landshamer (Marzelline), Cornel Frey (Jaquino), Johannes Martin Kränzle (Don Pizzarro) and Günther Groissböck (Don Fernando).

Johannes Brahms’ four symphonies were greeted by his contemporaries as the most promising answer to Beethoven’s legendary legacy, and they have remained at the core of the symphonic repertoire ever since. Steering clear of poetic titles and adhering to traditional forms, they are nonetheless full of drama and musical innovation. This digital boxset presents the symphonies in chronological order, performed by the Pittsburgh Symphony under the baton of Marek Janowski, one of the greatest interpreters of German Romantic repertoire.