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Sir Mark Elder conducts this difficult oratorio with great skill and passion. The Bergen Philharmonic and Choruses are well-prepared. The only miscast is, in my personal opinion, baritone Roderick Williams, who has a really beautiful voice, but a rather problematic wobble. We had him already in that Chandos CD with the excerpts from Bernard Herrmann's "Wuthering Heights"... This leading Delius part should be sung by a baritone with a great linear voice! Though, reviewers are happy with him...
The other soloists are good.

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/articles/5631--recording-of-the-week-deliuss-a-mass-of-life-from-sir-mark-elder-and-the-bergen-philharmonic#:~:text=But%20this%20superb%20new%20set,all%20Elder's%20masterly%20grasp%20on

https://limelight-arts.com.au/reviews/delius-a-mass-of-life-roderick-williams-bergen-philharmonic-mark-elder/

https://www.classical-music.com/reviews/choral-song/delius-a-mass-of-life

I think the best recordings (for me) are still the older ones, those conducted by Beecham, Groves and Del Mar...

Among the various "older" recording of Franck's glorious Symphony I have (and cherish), it is interesting to note that Pierre Monteux, Paul Paray and Lorin Maazel recorded it twice, Maazel even within the stereo aera, the two others first in stereo, then in mono. All splendid and stylistically most respectful performances!
In 1953, the same year as Paray's first recording, Wilhelm Furtwängler recorded the Symphony with the Vienna Philharmonic - another great achievement! But I am also very fond of Karajan's, Jean Fournet's and Jean Martinon's versions! All these documents are an important contribution to my own musical culture.
Of course there are quite a few of other very valuable interpretations on disc. I also admire, for example, Christian Arming's "historical" version, which was issued in a highly interesting César Franck Jubilee box in 2021.
Some time ago, I met with a Swiss music lover (a Wagner fanatic) telling me that he does not like French music and that the French are uncapable of composing Symphonies! He does not even speak French, so he must be a genuine Francophobe (or Frankophobe?).

Ben-Gunnar gave me once the score of his excellent orchestral arrangement of Ravel's "Toccata" and "Fugue" from "Le Tombeau de Couperin".
He had already planned a concert with the Göttinger Barock-Orchester, on 20th April 2024, with a program including his string orchestra arrangements of rare Bruckner chamber works.
He has also prepared a new completion of Mozart's Requiem.
On the label Accentus Music one can hear Cohr's new critical editions of Bruckner's Requiem, Missa Solemnis, Tantum ergo Magnificat and 8 other sacred choral pieces - as performed by the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, codnucted by Lukasz Borowicz.

Sad news, speaking about Bruckner:
Dr. Benjamin-Gunnar Cohrs, the greatest Bruckner expert of these times, passed away on November 21st - at the age of 58.
We knew eachother since many years and I owe him the most valuable infos and advice on Bruckner. He was on the way of editing the new Bruckner-Gesamtausgabe. His own, recent last version of the 4th movement of Bruckner's Ninth Symphony is, in my opinion, the most valuable and seriously researched one.

The first complete Schmidt Symphonies (on the Slovak Opus label) were realised in 1987 by Maestro Ludovit Rajter and the Radio Bratislava Symphony Orchestra (later Slovak Radio SO). Schmidt and Josef Marx were Rajter's composition teachers at the Vienna Hochschule. In other words, these recordings can be considered as quite authoritative. No big show, but deeply felt.
Rajter was also the founder of the Slowak Philarmonic. Before Slovakia's indipendence he was a non.convinced Communist (therefore considered a "supect person") and got his rehabilitation only in 1991. He was a higly cultivated person, I admired him. In the 1980s he had the reputation of being the oldest active conductor of the world. I attended a few of his Bratislava Philharmonic concerts, an orchestra which was managed at that time by his wife.
And it was thanks to Rajter that the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra had become such a super orchestra. I could personally take advantage of this - and will never forget the great time between 1987 and 2000 in which I could record 21 CDS with this ensemble.

Sounds good, but I think we have enough Sibelius from them now :-)

Anybody knew this already?

https://www.macrumors.com/2023/09/05/apple-acquires-bis-records/
https://symphony.org/apple-buys-bis-classical-record-label/

Well, on a GALLO CD of 2000, entitled "Chant et Piano", there are also "dix rondes et ballades françaises" (10 duos for soprano and baritone), "six mélodies de jeunesse" and "trois ballades françaises", which means that the Toccata CD does not really contain EJD's "complete" songs. It contains his complete, earlier German-language Lieder. The Gallo CD (which is worth investigating) contains French "mélodies" (songs), as interpteted by Audrey Michael and Philippe Huttenlocher.

In my opinion, Pfitzner's gretaest and most inspired work is his cantata "Von deutscher Seele" - on poems by Eichendorff. The best recording forever is the 1966 DDG album conducted by Joseph Keilberth, featuring singers like Agnes Giebel, Hertha Töpper, Fritz Wunderlich and Otto Wiener. One of my "desert island" items!

Raff's "Samson" in Berne:

https://buehnenbern.ch/spielplan/programm/soko-01-samson/

https://wemakeit.com/projects/opera-samson-by-joachim-raff?locale=de

Mark, will you travel?
They also say it will be published on CD (Label: Schweizer Fonogramm), calling it a "world premier recording" - so what about last year's cpo Weimar production? Do they still intend to issue it in spite of those horrible staged extra noises?

Thanks, John Boyer :-)

Some members in here may be interested in this little (personal) digression, I hope:

(String sextet works arranged for string orchestra):
 
- Tchaikovsky: Souvenir de Florence – yes, as, for example, the version by Anton Seidl
- Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht – yes indeed, the composer did it (Karajan's fabulous recording will never be surpassed!)


(String quartet works arranged for string orchestra):

- Beethoven: Quartets Op. 131 and 135, arranged by Leonard Bernstein – rather no, although wonderfully performed/recorded by him!
- Schubert: Der Tod und das Mädchen, arr. Gustav Mahler – ok, but rather no.
(Incidentally, I do not agree Mahler's opinion that Beethoven's and Schubert's quartets were actually intended to be symphonies and the composers renounced to work further on it because they felt unable!).
- Respighi: Il tramonto (with singing voice) – the composer wrote out a separate double bass part without caring of the remaining, in case it should become a string orchestra; so I also did, but still prefer the original 😊
- Barber: Adagio for strings – The original was a string quartet movement. Barber also arranged it as an Agnus Dei for 8-part choir - no further comment :-)
- Barber: Dover Beach (with singing voice) - should be left as intimate as it is.
- Schoeck: Notturno (with singing voice, Alban Berg liked it) – this could work in an arrangement for string orchestra, but the original is great, expressionistic and visionary enough.
- Shostakovich: Quartet, op. 110, arr. Barshai – why not?
etc.

And there are some original string orchestra pieces which could be re-arranged (or already have been re-arranged) for string quartet 😊

Incidentally, The (excellent) Herrmann CD by the Tippett Quartet (Label: Signum Classics, 2011) induding "Echoes" and "Souvenir de Voyage", also features a "Psycho, Suite for string quartet", arranged by Richard Birchall. The liner notes say: "The suite has been arranged and double tracked" (!??).

To my (personal!) opinion on this (no doubt: well-done) blowing up of "Echoes": I am just pointing on on its idiosyncratic transparent, intimate and "white" original sound of this little masterwork.
I have nothing against arrangements of string quartets (I've done quite a few myself too), but this is a particular case. I am astonished that Herrmann's heirs agreed to that, knowing how important and private "Echoes" were to him and, anyway, that he also was very uncompromising about performances of his works. So I hope at least, that his Clarinet Quintet "Souvenir de Voyage" will remain untouched...

In my personal view, this recording is not necessary.
What disturbs me is that they call this "Reader's Digest" version of "Wuthering Heights" a "Suite". In the domain of opera, this generelly goes under "excerpts" - or a "synthesis".
Performances are OK, although all other than sanguine - and not idiomatic enough. Then we have Roderick Williams, which is an excellent singer, but has too much vibrato for this kind of repertoire. The aria "I am the only being..." becomes a rather boring, too lyrical statement - without tension. Just compare it with the wonderfully passionate, linear and full flow of Donald Bell's voice (who sings it in BH's complete recording of the opera) - then you get what the composer wanted.

And a string orchestra version of BH's "Echoes" is just against the composer's intentions! He created a totally intimate, mysterious and transparent piece; a string quartet is just the right combination this kind of music. There are string quartets with "orchestral potential" which can be "blown-up" or orchestrated, but just not this one:  BH would have never allowed this transcription - and the above "suite".

There is a Naxos DVD of "Adriana Lecouvreur" with Martin Mühle (a splendid staging!), conducted by Daniel Harding and a cpo CD of Zandonai's "Francesca da Rimini" conducted by Fabrice Bollon.
A really beautiful and cultivated voice!
("Francesca" is one of my favourite Italian operas :-)

In Armin Jordan's recording of 1981 she sings a beautiful Mélisande alongside with Eric Tappy and Philippe Huttenlocher.