Lumbye: Copenhagen Steam Railway Galop

DVD and Blu-Ray will include a live version of the New Year’s Concert as well as bonus footage: A special tour through Vienna, guided by members of the Vienna Philharmonic plus 3 ballet bonus tracks.

Sony Classical is pleased to announce the release of the recording of one of the world’s most famous classical music events: the 2012 New Year’s Concert with the Vienna Philharmonic. Latvian conductor Mariss Jansons returns to direct the 2012 celebrations after his acclaimed debut in 2006. The live recording encompasses releases on CD, DVD and Blu-ray.

The annual New Year's Day Concert in the stunning Vienna Musikverein has been an exalted tradition for more than seven decades, and the resulting recordings with works from the Strauss dynasty and their contemporaries are among the classical market's most important releases. The concert will be broadcast on TV and radio to over 70 countries around the world with an estimate of more than 40 million viewers.

The programme traditionally revolves around waltzes and polkas by the Strauss family (Johann father and son as well as Josef and Eduard Strauss) whose music has enjoyed a recent resurgence due to the success of André Rieu and his Johann Strauss Orchestra. In 2012 the programme is once again a skilful blend of well-known classics and six New Year’s Concert premieres. As always the concert is bound to end with two traditional encores – the famous waltz The Blue Danube and the Radetzky March.

“It is something quite special: a wonderful opportunity to listen to this music and get to know it. This atmosphere, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Golden Hall of the Musikverein – all that adds up to a long and wonderful tradition resulting in fantastic, very specific music.” Mariss Jansons

Sony Classical is pleased to announce the release of the recording of one of the world’s most famous classical music events: the 2012 New Year’s Concert with the Vienna Philharmonic. Latvian conductor Mariss Jansons returns to direct the 2012 celebrations after his acclaimed debut in 2006. The live recording encompasses releases on CD, DVD and Blu-ray.

The annual New Year's Day Concert in the stunning Vienna Musikverein has been an exalted tradition for more than seven decades, and the resulting recordings with works from the Strauss dynasty and their contemporaries are among the classical market's most important releases. The concert will be broadcast on TV and radio to over 70 countries around the world with an estimate of more than 40 million viewers.

The programme traditionally revolves around waltzes and polkas by the Strauss family (Johann father and son as well as Josef and Eduard Strauss) whose music has enjoyed a recent resurgence due to the success of André Rieu and his Johann Strauss Orchestra. In 2012 the programme is once again a skilful blend of well-known classics and six New Year’s Concert premieres. As always the concert is bound to end with two traditional encores – the famous waltz The Blue Danube and the Radetzky March.

“It is something quite special: a wonderful opportunity to listen to this music and get to know it. This atmosphere, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Golden Hall of the Musikverein – all that adds up to a long and wonderful tradition resulting in fantastic, very specific music.” Mariss Jansons

With heavily atmospheric TV Scandinavian crime drama now all the rage, here is an essentially upbeat antidote to the leaden skies of northern Europe filling our TV screens! This collection features firm favourites such as Alfvén's Midsommarvake (Midsummer Vigil aka Swedish Rhapsody) and Grieg's Våren (Last Spring) and also less familiar works by Halvorsen, Svendsen, Bull and Nielsen. Completing the well-filled Smörgåsbord are three delightful miniatures by 'the Johann Strauss of the north' Hans Lumbye. Many of these performances, including six works conducted by Øivin Fjeldstad and John Frandsen's 1955 recording of Kuhnau's Elverhøj, are on CD for the first time.

This CD brings together compositions from slightly more than a hundred years, featuring treatments of the ‘railroad’ theme which are now idyllic or impressionistic, now realistic or even smacking of social criticism, but in classical form.The variety of forms and wealth of ideas in these compositions from France, Sweden, the U.S.A., Brazil, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland and Germany even surprised the conductor on this CD, Jir¡i Stárek – whose father was a railroad worker …

Such diverse musicians as the Strauss family dynasty in Vienna, Antonín Dvorák and Arthur Honegger, were all infected with railroad fever. The feeling of intoxication induced by sheer speed, the implacability of mechanical forces, the menace inherent in acceleration, the clatter of the wheels, the whistling and hooting of the valves, but also the stillness following a thunderous journey – all these are found with varying degrees of accentuation in the colorful and exciting orchestral works featured on this disc.