As with just about all the Mahler symphonies, Abbado has made multiple recordings of the Fifth, but this, his first, remains his finest, and an exceptional performance by any standard. It has all of the famed Chicago virtuosity but also a welcome attention to detail and willingness to savor a phrase that you almost never find with Solti’s Chicago Mahler. It’s great to hear a coda to the second movement that for once does not sound anti-climactic. We expect the horn playing in the scherzo to be stunning, and so it is, but the music also has grace, charm, and plenty of atmosphere at an appropriately relaxed basic tempo that, as you can hear, leaves plenty of space for the big moments to expand.

Inspired by a desire to offer my own kids a fresh guide to the orchestra, Philharmonia Fantastique was created to showcase both the artistic and technical wonders of the medium. Like its predecessors Peter & the Wolf and Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, it colorfully presents the instruments of the orchestra in the medium of a film soundtrack. Philharmonia Fantastique uses both musical genre and electronic sounds for characterization: noir-ish jazz for the woodwinds; bending lyricism in the strings; dark techno for the brass; drum-corps in the percussion; and, for our Sprite protagonist, a simple yet harmonically wandering piano melody.

A whole piano revolution was launched in the west (meaning USA) in October and early November 1960. Richter had arrived. He came and conquered. Both in Chicago, where RCA recorded the Brahms Piano Concerto No 2 and New York, where he launched his career outside Russia with performances, not of the usual piano career intros of Tchaikovsky or Grieg, but a bunch of Beethoven Piano Sonatas…

Carlo Maria Giulini conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in a Grammy winning performance of Gustav Mahler’s four-movement Symphony No. 1 in D. If you want a Mahler First above all for beauty of tone and phrasing and precision of ensemble, then this is a plain first choice. In addition Giulini’s qualities suit this work. For all the orchestral sophistication, he has a transparent honesty which accords well with Mahler in ‘Wayfaring Lad’ mood. Nor does he use the Chicago orchestra’s virtuosity to whip up excitement in fast tempo.

Lang Lang's debut recording for Deutsche Grammophon showcased the young pianist's extraordinary gifts in celebrated recordings of Tchaikovsky's and Mendelssohn's First Piano Concertos. Mentor Daniel Barenboim led the forces of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. This disc is guaranteed to make any serious music-lover pause. Here is youth, freshness, force and agility, with no hint of the routine.

By 1957 Erick Friedman was regarded as one of the most promising and talented young American violinists, the artist who just might become the next Heifetz. Instead, he became a student of Heifetz and put his burgeoning career on hold for three years. While he enjoyed great success in the early '60s, his star quickly dimmed and he eventually branched out into teaching and conducting. This RCA "Red Seal" 1962-63 recordings featuring Erick Friedman and the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Malcom Sargent & the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Walter Hendl, perform violin showpieces by Saint-Saëns, Paganini, Ravel and more.

In 1974, Carlo Maria Giulini and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra recorded Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 2 in C minor for EMI, an unusual selection for the time but one the conductor had chosen among a number of core works he wished to interpret with this orchestra. The Bruckner's Ninth dated from 1976, with Chicago Symphony Orchestra, is among the finest ever recorded. The CSO's brass players were born to play Bruckner, and Giulini combines toughness with an Italianate singing quality to make the third movement particularly memorable and elegiac.