Editor's Choice: Awards issue 2023 | The best new classical recordings

Monday, October 16, 2023

Featuring new recordings of Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine, Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra, Dvořák's Complete Piano Trios and more

In every issue of Gramophone, Editor Martin Cullingford chooses 12 albums (10 new releases, plus one DVD/blu-ray and one archive recommendation) as his Editor's Choice. Below, you will find the albums selected as Editor's Choice in the Awards 2023 issue, beginning with the Recording of the Month. 

We've included links to the album reviews in Gramophone's Reviews Database, a digital archive of all of our reviews from 1983 to today. To find out more about subscribing to Gramophone and the Reviews Database, please visit: magsubscriptions.com

Recording of the month

Monteverdi Vespro della Beata Vergine

Pygmalion / Raphaël Pichon 

Harmonia Mundi 

‘Gripping … impactful … bursting with energy and passion’ – the words of critic Edward Breen perfectly encapsulate this riveting performance of the Monteverdi Vespers from Raphaël Pichon. 

Read the Gramophone review


Bartók Concerto for Orchestra. Viola Concerto 

Amihai Grosz va Orchestre National de Lille / Alexandre Bloch

Alpha 

Alexandre Bloch and his Lille players offer a brilliant Bartók pairing, revealing their shared vision and cohesion as collaborators.

Read the Gramophone review


Mozart Piano Concertos Nos 9 (‘Jeunehomme’) & 24 

Paris Chamber Orchestra / Lars Vogt pf

Ondine 

A wonderful Mozart concertos album from the late Lars Vogt – a moving tribute to the joy and love he brought to music-making.

Read the Gramophone review


Dvořák Complete Piano Trios 

Veronika Jarůšková vn Peter Jarůšek vc Boris Giltburg pf

Supraphon 

Chamber music-making at its finest - these Dvořák trios burst with the energy and spirit that makes such shared performance a pleasure to hear and, it sounds, to play too! 

Read the Gramophone review


Liszt Études d’exécution transcendante 

Haochen Zhang pf

BIS 

A kaleidoscopic range of tone, virtuosity placed at the service of an exploratory interpretation, Haochen Zhang’s Transcendental Études are a supreme achievement. 

Read the Gramophone review


‘Baroque’ 

Miloš Karadaglić gtr

Sony Classical 

Miloš brings a beautiful sense of searching and reflection to this music of the Baroque – whether Bach or Boccherini, Vivaldi or Weiss – throughout a thoughtfully chosen, wonderfully personal programme.

Read the Gramophone review


‘Fantasia’ 

Igor Levit pf

Sony Classical 

Every work, every bar, from the tenderest Bach to the mightiest Liszt, feels so deeply, so carefully considered – another compelling triumph from Igor Levit, one of our era’s most thought-provoking virtuosos.  

Read the Gramophone review


Hough Missa mirabilis 

London Choral Sinfonia / Michael Waldron 

Orchid 

The range and reflectiveness, the spirituality and humanity of Stephen Hough’s choral music is wonderful explored on this beautifully performed collection. 

Read the Gramophone review


Puccini ‘The Great Puccini’ 

Jonathan Tetelman ten PKF Prague Philharmonia / Carlo Rizzi

DG 

‘The Great Puccini’ from, it’s quickly clear, a great Puccinian – his beauty of tone is paired by an instinctive sense of drama.

Read the Gramophone review


Purcell Dido and Aeneas 

Sols; La Nuova Musica / David Bates 

Pentatone 

David Bates offers superbly engaging playing from La Nuova Musica plus a luxurious cast of soloists for a theatrically thrilling performance of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.

Read the Gramophone review


DVD/blu-ray

Humperdinck Königskinder 

Sols; Dutch National Opera / Marc Albrecht 

Naxos 

A lesser-known Humperdinck opera receives the best possible advocacy in a film our critic Andrew Mellor found ‘utterly captivating – every single second of it’.

Read the Gramophone review


Reissue/archive

Mendelssohn Elias 

Sols; Bavarian State Orchestra / Wolfgang Sawallisch 

BSO Recordings 

What a set of soloists! Margaret Price, Brigitte Fassbaender, Peter Schreier, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau …BSO Recordings delves into its archives in considerable style. 

Read the Gramophone review

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