A SYMPHONY EDITION CHOSEN BY POPULAR VOTE: Deutsche Grammophon rolls out a cornucopia of great symphonic music, chosen by the people – all the symphonies you’ll ever need in a compact cube, at a great price!
The symphony is the most significant and most complex form of musicial composition, which in its Classical form represents the supreme achievement of Western music.” So wrote polymath Nicolas Slonimsky, and there can be litte doubt that for the majority of music-lovers the symphony, from before Haydn to Shostakovich and beyond, is the mainstay of their listening pleasure.
THE VOTE: To arrive at 100 Great Symphonies, we put the question to the vote (as with the successful Berlin Philharmonic set in 2013), asking our faithful public: What are your favourite symphonies? Over 2,300 people responded, casting over 8,000 votes altogether. We havemade the top 50 symphonies in the voter charts the backbone of this set.
A a substantial box – 56 CDs – containing a huge range of works, starting with Giovanni Battista Sammartini and ending with Arvo Pärt and Philip Glass, taking in every major symphonist on the way. Over 60 hours of glorious, fascinating listening!
The vote has produced the core of the box, with cycles by Beethoven, Schumann and Brahms, and major contributions from Bruckner, Mahler and Shostakovich.
We have felt free to extend the list chronologically, going back to the beginnings of the Symphony for CD 1 (Sammartini, Stamitz, von Dittersdorf, CPE Bach, JC Bach), and exploring the 20th-century symphony more broadly, so the box also provides a history of the form. Here the help of the Decca catalogue has been indispensable.
In order to present as rich and colourful a soundworld as possible, we decided to limit the number of complete symphonic cycles, choosing the most significant or popular works from an individual composer’s oeuvre.
There are some great rarities too: Franz Schimdt’s Fourth, Samuel Barber’s Symphony no. 1, Philip Glass’s “Low” Symphony – well worth a listen!
Artists
Gwyneth Jones (soprano), Hanna Schwarz (alto), René Kollo (tenor), Kurt Moll (bass), Vinson Cole (tenor), Simon Preston (organ), Christine Schäfer (soprano), Michelle DeYoung (mezzo), Yvonne Loriod, Jeanne Loriod, Lukas Foss (piano), Joanna Koslowska (soprano)
Aradia Ensemble, The Academy of Ancient Music, Camerata Bern, Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Münchener Bach-Orchester, The English Concert, Wiener Philharmoniker, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, Berliner Philharmoniker, Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, Konzertvereinigung Wiener Staatsopernchor, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Members of, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Staatskapelle Dresden, Dresden State Opera Chorus, Göteborgs Symfoniker, Russian National Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, Wiener Singverein, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra Washingto, New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, The Monteverdi Choir, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre de l'Opéra Bastille, New York Philharmonic Orchestr, New Philharmonia Orchestra, London Voices, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, The Brooklyn Philharmonic Orchestr, Kevin Mallon, Christopher Hogwood, Thomas Füri, Neville Marriner, Karl Richter, Trevor Pinnock, Leonard Bernstein, Eugen Jochum, James Levine, John Eliot Gardiner, Claudio Abbado, Gustavo Dudamel, Karl Böhm, Marc Minkowski, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Herbert von Karajan, Rafael Kubelik, Neeme Järvi, Mikhail Pletnev, Pierre Boulez, Christian Thielemann, Zubin Mehta, Mstislav Rostropovich, David Zinman, Herbert Blomstedt, Roger Norrington, Andrew Litton, Myung-Whun Chung, Benjamin Britten, Colin Davis, Peter Eötvös, Witold Lutoslawski, Kazimierz Kord, Dennis Russell Davies
