The frocks, the pearls, the chicest branding of any perfume in the world… Sorry, this is not what The New Look is about, for those who swooned at the V&A’s recent Chanel exhibition.
Leif Ove Andsnes: The Warner Classics Edition 1990-2010 (Warner Classics)
Back on home ground, the Hallé begin 2024 in Manchester with a repeated programme. I heard the first of three performances this week. It includes one piece they played only 10 days ago on a tour in Spain with the orchestra’s new principal conductor designate, Kahchun Wong.
Continuing the retrospective aspect of his final season as music director of the Hallé, Sir Mark Elder returned last night to Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé, the work with which he opened the orchestra’s 2014-15 Manchester series to such memorable effect.
That was the fulfilment of a long-held ambition, he said at the time, and, with the Hallé Choir joining the orchestra for the performance of this “choreographic symphony”, it was no doubt equally satisfying to bring it back in all its glory.
Antal Doráti: The Mercury Masters – The Mono Recordings (Decca Eloquence)
Louise Farrenc: Symphonies 1-3 Insula Orchestra/Laurence Equilbey (Erato)
Shostakovich: Symphonies 8, 9 and 10 Berliner Philharmoniker/Kirill Petrenko (Berlin Phil Media)
What a manifesto against those in power who seem determined to knock the UK off its hard-won classical music pedestal: hundreds of young choristers and instrumentalists of two fabulous orchestras in a week-long celebration of innovative programming and presentation. Any politician attending – I’d like to think there were a few, but I doubt it - would have been fired up to devote every effort in support of British youth and music
Nadia & Lili Boulanger: Les Heures Claires - The Complete Songs Lucile Richardot (mezzo), Stéphane Degout (baritone), Raquel Camarinha (soprano), Anne de Fornel (piano), Sarah Nemtanu (violin), Emmanuelle Bertrand (cello) (Harmonia Mundi)
Debussy: Piano Works Volume 2 Dennis Lee (piano) (ICSM Records)