Celebrating 25 Years of Excellence

All articles by SOMM Recordings – Page 3

Gramophone Reviews Stanford String Quintets and Intermezzi

“it’s worth reiterating just what a debt of gratitude lovers of British music owe to SOMM and the Dante Quartet for their commitment to Stanford’s chamber music. Listening to this vibrant new recording, what struck me was… the freshness, the spontaneity, the instinctive ‘rightness’ of Stanford’s writing for strings. This might be the most satisfying […]

Gramophone Reviews Leon McCawley’s Haydn Sonatas Volume Three

Gramophone Magazine’s January 2021 issue features a review of Leon McCawley’s Haydn Piano Sonatas Volume III: “In McCawley’s vivid realisations …Each sonata emerges as a succinct, self-contained drama, with airtight plot and an endless variety of characters. In the exquisite Adagio of the A flat Sonata (HobXVI:46), for instance, McCawley is all artful simplicity, letting Haydn’s eloquent […]

Gramophone Review for One Hundred Years of British Song, Vol. 1

Gramophone Magazine’s January 2021 issue features a rave review for James Gilchrist and Nathan Williamson’s first volume of One Hundred Years of British Song: “James Gilchrist’s contribution is past praise in its probing range of expression and unfailing sensitivity to the text. What’s more, he enjoys immaculate support throughout from Nathan Williamson, who also provides […]

The Open Window is a Gramophone Critic’s Choice

Gramophone Critics have released their 2020 Critic’s choice in the December issue and Jeremy Dibble has selected Simon Callaghan and Clíodna Shanahan’s Dyson: The Open Window! “We do not generally associate Sir George Dyson with the piano, but this 101-minute album demonstrates that he was very much in touch with its repertoire… It is also […]

Two SOMM Recordings Named MusicWeb 2020 International Recordings of the Year

MusicWeb International critics have released their list of recordings of the year, and two have selected SOMM releases! See the full list and links to full reviews at MusicWeb-International.com. Façades: Music by William Walton and Constant Lambert “A typically excellent disc from SOMM. Skilfully programmed, wonderfully played and beautifully presented. A disc that combines listening […]

BBC Music Magazine Gives The Open Window 4 Stars!

BBC Music Magazine gives Simon Callaghan’s George Dyson: The Open Window recording a four-star review: “even with the fingering is simple and the length very brief, Dyson usually packs in plenty of substance, with tricky rhythms, surprising harmonies that belie his conservative image and considerable authentic charm. …in the Open Window set of 1920, Dyson […]

Gramophone Reviews Hoffmeister’s Magic Flute

Gramophone Magazine’s David Threasher reviews Hoffmeister’s Magic Flute, Vol. One from Boris Bizjack, Lana Trotvšek, and the Piatti Quartet in the November 2020 issue: “In a recent blog for the Gramophone website, Bizjak writes that this music ‘is well composed, flows so well and has such freshness and originality’. Certainly the Quartet that opens the disc revels […]

Gramophone Reviews Clélia Iruzun’s new Piano Concertos recording!

Clélia Iruzun, Jac van Steen, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s new Oswald & Saint-Saëns Piano Concertos recording is in the Gramophone Awards Issue: “ I was at least charmed by the … reading by Clélia Iruzun and Jac van Steen. I warmed to the slow movement, with its echoes of Fauré, and thoroughly enjoyed the tarantella […]

BBC Gives Four Stars to Rosa Mystica

BBC Music Magazine gives a four-star performance and recording review for Paul Spicer and the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir’s Rosa Mystica: “The programme concept here is a familiar choral conductor’s standby, music in honour of the Virgin Mary: but the selection is anything but hackneyed. … The experienced choral director Paul Spicer is an […]

Gramophone Reviews Roderick Williams and Susie Allan’s Somervell Recording

Andrew Achenbach reviews Roderick Williams and Susie Allan’s new recording of Sir Arthur Somervell: A Shropshire Lad & Maud in the August issue of Gramophone Magazine: “Superbly partnered by Susie Allan (whose deft touch and ingratiating tone are a constant source of pleasure), Roderick Williams gives an outstandingly sympathetic rendering, his consistently perceptive characterisation especially […]