John Williams composed the music for the first three Harry Potter films (The Sorcerer’s Stone, The Chamber of Secrets, and The Prisoner of Azkaban), and now the complete scores have been released for the first ...

Analogue Productions has followed up on their highly acclaimed series of 25 RCA Living Stereo SACDs with a smaller group of 9 Decca SACDs. (They are also releasing 25 more RCAs, including the Munch Daphnis ...

Those listeners not totally convinced by the change in sonority from a full symphony orchestra including a substantial string section and a wind band should give this spectacular recording a serious audition. The principal reason ...

Universal Music has generally chosen wisely for its important series of Blu-ray audio discs taken primarily from the distinguished Decca opera catalogue. Previous releases include the legendary Georg Solti Ring (now available complete on one ...

Louis Frémaux was principal conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) from 1969 to 1978. During that time he built the orchestra to the point where his successor Simon Rattle called it “the ...

Manfred Honeck explains his interpretive approach in this SACD’s program notes. The opening bars and following principal theme of the first movement of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5 reflect rage, then sadness. Mahler’s influence is present ...

In 1959, RCA released a Living Stereo recording of Henry Mancini’s music from Peter Gunn that was the first in a series of “soundtracks” that became consistent best sellers because of Mancini’s instantly likable music ...

This year’s Academy Award for Best Musical Score went to Ennio Morricone for The Hateful Eight, which provides a good starting point for a discussion of the checkered history of the Music Branch of the ...

Sir Charles Groves has been one of the best kept secrets in the music and recording industries. Groves had a wide effective repertoire, but he specialized in English music. He never achieved the popularity or ...

Many music critics, listeners, and audiophiles (myself included) consider the Georg Solti Ring to be the greatest recording of all time. It is difficult to dispute that conclusion. First of all, the size and scope ...

The third and final Mercury Living Presence CD collection was recently released. With the addition of the 53 CDs in this album, all of the remastered recordings supervised by Wilma Cozart Fine in the 1990s ...

The 1960s were a time for major change, and not necessarily for the better in the classical recording industry. After nearly a decade that is frequently described as the Golden Age of Recording, led by ...

Legacy Recordings, the catalog division of Sony Music Entertainment, has released a nine-CD collection containing eighteen of Henry Mancini’s film scores from the RCA, Columbia, and Epic labels. The Classic Soundtrack Collection effectively covers the ...

The RCA Living Stereo records of the 1950s and 1960s (pre-Dynagroove) have been considered by many audiophiles to rank among the best sounding recordings ever made. They are even more desirable because of RCA’s incredible ...

While Richard Mohr and Lewis Layton were mesmerizing audiophiles, RCA also released a series of spectacular sounding Henry Mancini “soundtracks.” It started with his 1958 jazz score for Peter Gunn and evolved into his famous ...