Announcement: An invitation to All The Right Notes

Dear Friends of Top Ear,

It’s been around 10 years since Leonard and I founded Top Ear, and in the four years that we have been writing for it, we have taken enormous pleasure in sharing our thoughts on the music and recordings that we love to our readers. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for supporting our writing all these years.

During this hiatus in writing, I have taken the opportunity to listen much more music and reflect on the many comments, both positive and critical, that I have received on Top Ear. Thanks to your invaluable feedback, I believe I have matured considerably in writing style and aesthetic judgment. Moreover, I have humbly received several calls to continue writing about music.

It is for these reasons that I am thrilled to announce the launch of my new blog, All The Right Notes. You will find some brilliant new features and categories, as well as a refreshed interface. But more importantly, what I hope you’ll agree has remained is the keen insight and comprehensive coverage of music and recordings that readers of this blog have come to enjoy. While I will keep Top Ear online, I will only be updating All The Right Notes moving forward. Please follow me on Instagram (@all.the.right.notes) and Facebook (@all.the.right.notes.fb) for updates on my latest posts.

Please join me as I embark on this brand new voyage into the classical musical culture that we love and treasure. Thank you for your support as always.

Sincerely,

Jeremy

A Knockout Shostakovich 4th from Lazarev

Jeremy Lee writes

Alexander Lazarev is undoubtedly one of the great Shostakovich conductors of our time. In 2010 I went to a concert of Lazarev conducting the Hong Kong Philharmonic in the 11th symphony (a work he recorded with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra on Linn) and was thrilled by the raw power and excitement Lazarev got from the orchestra, and

Gerd Albrecht’s Grieg and Bizet Suites: An Expensive Indulgence

Jeremy Lee writes

These are excellent performances of warhorse pieces that have been recorded and performed too many times.  Gerd Albrecht is an underrated conductor.  Never mannered or calculated, always inspired, spontaneous, and natural, he was able to keep the music consistently fresh by employing lively and flowing tempi and

Colin Davis’ LSO Mozart Requiem

Jeremy Lee writes

Colin Davis was, of course, no mean Mozartian.  Apart from his universally acclaimed series of the operas, he was an intelligent accompanist to the concerti (Grumiaux and Larrocha to name two), and produced a glorious set of late symphonies with the Staatskapelle Dresden on Philips.  Of the Requiem, he recorded

Inbal’s TMSO Shostakovich 4

Jeremy Lee writes

First and foremost, an apology for the long hiatus that has preceded this review.  As the holidays commence (after a fantastically busy semester), we’ll have much more time to listen and write.

With that, let us turn our attention to Eliahu Inbal, a conductor whose recordings received international attention in the 1970s and 80s with high-profile accompaniment engagements (most notably the Chopin concertos with Arrau) and symphony cycles of

Chamayou’s “Complete” Ravel

Jeremy Lee writes

First, some housekeeping.  This release is billed as Ravel’s Complete Works for Solo Piano, but what it actually contains is not an exhaustive shopping-list of absolutely all the music that Ravel wrote for solo piano (there are some early variations and fugues not included, for example).  Rather, 

James Levine plays…Scott Joplin?

Jeremy Lee writes

James Levine enjoyed a long and fruitful association with RCA in the analog years, recording amongst other things cycles of Mahler, Brahms and Schumann symphonies, several Dvorak, Tchaikovsky and Mozart symphonies, as well as

In Memoriam: Pierre Boulez (1925-2016)

Top Ear is saddened to note the death of esteemed conductor and composer Pierre Boulez on January 5, 2016 at the grand old age of 90.  As the numerous obituaries from various news agencies and orchestras have already mentioned,

Tharaud’s Goldberg

Bach: Goldberg Variations
Alexander Tharaud (piano)
Warner Classics 2564604914 – 1CD

Leonard Ip writes (translated from the Chinese by Jeremy Lee)

For pianists who are specialists in the Baroque repertoire, Bach does not feature centrally in Tharaud’s repertoire.  While in these past years Tharaud has broadened his repertoire on record to the extent that he even recorded a disc of cabaret music, to date he had recorded

Featured Musician: A Maazel Celebration

The discs under consideration here.

Jeremy Lee writes