With so many new recordings released every week, the choice can be overwhelming. To help you sort the wheat from the chaff, we’ve picked out the best classical music albums released every month in this ongoing list. Either head to your favourite streaming platform or online store – and get listening!
Best classical music albums 2024
Penderecki: Sacred Choral Works (Latvian Radio Choir)
‘Sumptuous, passionate and uplifting, Penderecki’s sacred choral music spans his career. From the early avant-garde outbursts to the refreshed traditional sounds of his maturity, these expressions of often defiant piety are central to his output. Rarely, though, have they received such assured and lovingly committed performances as on this ravishing album from the Latvian Radio Choir and conductor Sigvards Kļava.’
Latvian Radio Choir/Sigvards Kļava
Ondine ODE 1435-2
Read the full review of Penderecki Sacred Choral Works.
Lutosławski (Christian Tetzlaff)
This compelling release from conductor Nicholas Collon and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra makes clear the evolutionary exuberance of Lutosławski’s creative development. Building on the Bartók- and Stravinsky-inspired cross-rhythms and neo-baroque structures of the Concerto, he hones its lithe motivic detailing in complex rigorous forms, embracing aleatoricism, while retaining a distinctive directness of expression.
Lutosławski
Partita for Violin and Orchestra*; Concerto for Orchestra; Novelette
*Christian Tetzlaff (violin); Finnish Radio Symphony/Nicholas Collon
Ondine ODE 1444-2
Read the full review of Christian Tetzlaff’s Lutosławski recording.
Schumann & Grieg Piano Concertos (Elisabeth Leonskaja)
‘ There are other ways of performing these works, but these interpretations are utterly consistent and totally enlightening. Sound is well balanced; even though the wind are slightly set back as they would be in the concert hall, they make their personable mark from the oboe’s perfect turn in Schumann’s opening to the incandescent flute in Grieg’s finale: pure melodic genius.’
Elisabeth Leonskaja (piano); Lucerne Symphony Orchestra/Michael Sanderling
Warner Classics 5419783783
Read the full review of Elisabeth Leonskaja’s Schumann & Grieg Piano Concertos.
Take 3 (Patricia Kopatchinskaja)
‘Listening intently, Kopatchinskaja, Bieri and Leschenko bounce exuberantly off each other, generating a vividly characterised, conversationally sophisticated tour de force. It’s capped by a finale overflowing with impish snap, crackle and pop. All in all, chamber music at its most vivaciously invigorating and life-enhancing.’
Works by Bartók, Poulenc, Schoenfield, Nichifor
Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin), Reto Bieri (clarinet), Polina Leschenko (piano)
Alpha Classics ALPHA772
66:41 mins
Read the full review of Patricia Kopatchinskaja’s Take 3.
