Lebrecht’s Album of the Week

Mieczyslaw Weinberg: Cello Concerto (CPO)

If Norman Lebrecht goes a month without hearing Weinberg he feels the loss

Britten, Hindemith, RVW, Martinu (Claves)

The 1934 suite by Ralph Vaughan Williams demands a sympathy for the rolling contours of the English countryside

Theodorakis and Christou: Intersection 1955

The Ballad of Mauthausen ranks among the most beautiful music ever written about the Nazi Holocaust

Nikolai Kapustin, Alfred Schnittke: Cello Concertos (Capriccio)

I can imagine Kapustin in the background, smiling at his piano, during this breath-taking revival

Christopher Rouse: 5th symphony (Naxos)

What Rouse wrote was an intimate series of love letters to the orchestra

Two lost composers

Feinberg / Winterberg: The lost works (Melism)

Ravel, Dutilleux, Debussy: Quart de nuit (Deux-Elles)

Norman Lebrecht is left wanting more Dutilleux

Alexander Zemlinsky: The Mermaid (Pentatone)

Norman Lebrecht breaks a rule in his review of The Mermaid

An essential record

Norman Lebrecht reviews Shostakovich: Violin concertos 1&2, performed by Alina Ibragimova and the State Symphony Orchestra of Russia