Best Orff: Carmina Burana out there - D. Runnicles and Altanta Symphony Orchestra. |
Heart of Mine: Maria Muldaur Sings Love Songs of Bob Dylan. Her voice is gritty perfect for Dylan's songs, and the recording is excellent. |
Telarc's Got the Blues
for me is GREAT!! |
Tierney Sutton...all of her Telarc discs. The engineers really captured the immediacy and subtelty of her voice. |
Orff: Carmina Burana - Robert Shaw, Atlanta Symphony Mahler: Symphonies 3,4,6,9 - Benjamin Zander Encores a la francaise & Poulenc: Organ Concerto Jongen: Symphonie Concertante & Franck: Fantaisie in A Beethoven: Piano Concertoes 3,4,5 - Rudolf Serkin, Ozawa |
Telarc's subsidiary, Head's Up, has some fantastic recordings under it's belt. |
Haydn- symphony Nos 31 & 45 Sir Charles 'shaking his' Mackerras, Orchestra of St Lukes. CD-80156.
'Iberia' music of Rimsky-Korsakov, Debussy, Turina- Eduardo Mata, Dallas Symphony Orchestra CD-80055
Bruckner-Symphony No7 Jesus Lopez Cobos, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra CD-80188 |
Since you left music type open,may I mention Ray Brown,'Live at Scullers',and'Don't Get Sassy'. |
Brahms' "Ein Deutsches Requiem" with Robert Shaw and Atlanta on Telarc is a definitive recording in so many respects - especially with regards to the choral performance. Also, Arleen Augér was one of my very favorite sopranos, and her performance on this recording is IMO one of the highlights of her career.
Oh and the sound quality is typically Telarc - very dynamic and detailled, perhaps a hair on the bright side. I have both the CD and the LP set . . . and I (blasphomer!) prefer the CD. This work has such loud, dynamic passages at the ends of movements, and in mastering the LPs have some noticible dynamic compression applied towards the inner grooves. |
The Boston-Zanders are not on Telarc but I recommend both his Boston recordings (Le Sacre is a blast!) and his Telarc Mahlers/Beethovens highly.
Kal |
My personal CD favorites are: Copland: Appalachian Spring, Rodeo, Fanfare for the Common Man. Louis Lane & Atlanta Sym. Orch.
Mahler: Sym. 1 "Titan", Leonard Slatkin, St.Louis Sym. Orch.
Respighi: Pines Of Rome, The Birds & Fountains of Rome. Louis Lane & Atlanta Sym. Orch.
Telarc also has a great sampler titled: Winter, Spring, Summer and Autumn which is worth the price. |
Lorin Maazel and Cleveland Orchestra Shostakovich 5th is way way fun on Telarc. Rachmaninov with Horacio Guitierez also with Lorin is also another favorite of mine. Lorin makes classical fun and a bit funky. He seems to understand rhythm and pace better than most. I don't like Eric Kunzel at all - brash and plain loud but without any good rhythms - seems to lack feeling to me - sounds like they use a metronome...
Mahler is heavy stuff but if you want some good CD's get the set by Benjamin Zander with Boston Philharmonic - I got my set straight from him and it has an extra CD with explanations or walk through about the interpretation - great if you want to dig deeper. Zander has good feeling - time will tell but I think it is a great interpretation.
If you are looking at Telarc you should also look at "Living Stereo" from the old mercury stuff - similar recording techniques. |
Jarvi and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra put out a couple of CD's a year on Telarc, as did Cobos and as does Kunzel with the Pops - I have nearly all of Jarvi's and a good deal of Cobos's and Kunzel's. They are all superb - particularly look at Ravel's works from all three. While Telarc is sonically impressive and I have a good number of Telarc recordings, IMO Telarc recordings do not reflect the sound one hears when present at a live performance - which I find is better reflected, in general, on DG and EMI CD's. BTW, the CSO records in Music Hall - which is sonically wonderful - when I lived in that city I attended somewhere in the order of 100 performances in that hall. |
Mahler 3rd. Jesus Lopez-Cobos. Wonderful in every respect. |