Symphony No.2 & No.4 by Philharmonia Orchestra

Johannes Brahms

Philharmonia Orchestra

Symphony No.2 & No.4

Price: € 25.95
Format: CD
Label: Signum Classics
UPC: 0635212013229
Catnr: SIGCD 132
Release date: 01 September 2008
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2 CD ✓ in stock	€ 25.95	Buy

Label
Signum Classics

UPC
0635212013229

Catalogue number
SIGCD 132

Release date
01 September 2008

Album

Artist(s)

Composer(s)

About the album

Symphony No. 2
Its idyllic nature, sheer tunefulness and general sunny disposition earned Brahms an unmitigated triumph in its premiere performance in Vienna in 1877. Since then, it has been described as the sunny counterpart to the storm clouds of his First Symphony.

Symphony No. 4
This work conveys Brahms’ imaginative writing combining sheer intelligence with unexpected comic turns. The Finale is still considered to be one of the most exhilarating movements in the entire orchestral repertoire.

The Philharmonia Orchestra is widely recognised as the UK’s finest orchestra with an impressive recording legacy. Christoph Von Dohnányi has been principle conductor for the past 11 years and in the coming season will be made Honorary Conductor for life.

Artist(s)

Philharmonia Orchestra

The Philharmonia was founded in 1945 by EMI producer Walter Legge, and has worked with a who’s who of 20th- and 21st-century musicians. Finnish conductor Santtu-Matias Rouvali took up the baton as Principal Conductor in September 2021. The sixth person to hold the title, he is known for his expressive, balletic conducting style and irrepressible energy.
Herbert von Karajan, Otto Klemperer, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Arturo Toscanini, Riccardo Muti and Esa-Pekka Salonen are just a few of the great artists to be associated with the Philharmonia, and the Orchestra has premiered works by Richard Strauss, Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Errollyn Wallen, Kaija Saariaho and many others.
Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall, in the heart of London, has been the Philharmonia’s home since 1995.
The Orchestra also has residencies at venues and festivals across England, each embracing a Learning & Engagement programme that empowers people to engage with, and participate in, orchestral music.
The Philharmonia’s international reputation is built in part on its extraordinary 79-year recording legacy, which in the last ten years has been built on by pioneering work with digital technology. The Orchestra’s installations and VR experiences have introduced hundreds of thousands of people to the symphony orchestra. The Philharmonia has won four Royal Philharmonic Society awards for its digital projects and audience engagement work. The Philharmonia is the go-to orchestra for many film and videogame composers in the UK and Hollywood, and its music-making has been experienced by millions of cinema- goers and gamers. It has recorded over 150 soundtracks, with film credits stretching back to 1947. Since 2023, the Orchestra has released live recordings on its own label, Philharmonia Records, in collaboration with Signum Records.
The Philharmonia has over 2m listeners each month on Spotify, and a vibrant YouTube channel with over 140,000 subscribers. The channel features free performances; instrument guides; interviews with artists; and in-depth documentaries.
The Philharmonia is an official partner of Classic FM and broadcasts extensively on BBC Radio 3.
The Philharmonia is a registered charity, proud to be supported by Arts Council England, many generous individuals, corporate supporters and Trusts and Foundations.
A team of 80 outstanding musicians from 16 countries, the Philharmonia looks forward to bringing music into your life, through great concerts, recordings and ground-breaking projects, for many years to come.

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Christoph von Dohnányi (conductor)

Composer(s)

Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. His reputation and status as a composer is such that he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow.
Brahms composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works. He worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim (the three were close friends). Many of his works have become staples of the modern concert repertoire. Brahms, an uncompromising perfectionist, destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished.
Brahms has been considered, by his contemporaries and by later writers, as both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is firmly rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, his contribution and craftsmanship have been admired by subsequent figures as diverse as Arnold Schoenberg and Edward Elgar. The diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahms's works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers. Within his meticulous structures is embedded, however, a highly romantic nature.

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