Brahms: The Piano Concertos

This attractively priced double set is one of Stephen Hough’s most important recordings. ‘Britain’s greatest living pianist’ (The Mail on Sunday) is joined by the Mozarteumorchester Salzburg and international conductor Mark Wigglesworth in their Hyperion debut for Brahms’s Piano Concertos. These works are among the greatest in the genre, and shore up Brahms’s reputation as both a symphonist and a piano composer. Separated by twenty-two years and widely differing in their reception (the first was scorned and the second a huge success), they are monumental in scale, impassioned and truly romantic, forward-looking in form and requiring both great virtuosity and intimacy from the pianist. Stephen Hough has performed them in concert for many years to ecstatic acclaim: this new recording is surely one of his most desirable offerings.

CDA67961  97 minutes 53 seconds (2 discs)
INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW 'OUTSTANDING' AWARD
THE SUNDAY TIMES ALBUM OF THE WEEK
‘Stephen Hough's splendid recordings … a poetic player, he employs all the muscle these most arduous works demand, while losing none of the poetry. Some of his passage work is revelatory, with ph ...
‘I ended up delighted by and in complete admiration of Hough's boldness. He has become a warmer player of increased range in Brahms, and unafraid to take risks … the concertos call for a brillian ...
‘Stephen Hough has proved himself a superb Brahms player in various discs of the solo piano music, and this very satisfying double album of the two Concertos confirms and augments his reputation. Clea ...