The Spin Doctor Europadisc's Weekly Column

Label Focus: Capriccio

2nd September 2025

The Vienna-based Capriccio label has been going for over 40 years now. Originally a German company based near Cologne, its early recordings included a focus on early music (with some excellent Baroque vocal recordings by Das Kleine Konzert under Hermann Max), as well as neglected Austro-German works which have since become one of its most distinctive strengths. Financial difficulties led to the firm’s artistic director, Johannes Kernmayer, rescuing its back catalogue and relaunching the label in Austria. There, through a... read more

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Landmark Recordings: Marin Marais’s complete ‘Pièces de viole’

28th August 2025

As we’ve previously observed, mention the great recording projects of the past, and certain achievements immediately spring to mind: Solti’s groundbreaking (and still earth-shattering) account of Wagner’s Ring on Decca, Antal Doráti’s complete survey of Haydn’s symphonies with the Philharmonia Hungarica for the same label, the Harnoncourt-Leonhardt period-instrument cycle of all Bach’s sacred cantatas (not to mention subsequent complete cycles from Gardiner, Koopman and Suzuki), and the complete Schubert Lieder on Hyperion.... read more

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Celebrating Coleridge-Taylor

20th August 2025

Although these days larger than some British cities, the South London suburb of Croydon is not known for its composers. Alongside more recent candidates such as singer-songwriters Kirsty MacColl (1959–2000) and Ralph McTell (b.1944), there are such figures as William Hurlstone (1876–1906) and Joseph Holbrooke (1878–1958). But undoubtedly Croydon’s most famous composer-son is Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875–1912), who achieved immortality through the astonishing turn-of-the-century success of his cantata Hiawatha’s Wedding... read more

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More on Shostakovich

12th August 2025

Last week’s piece marking this year’s Shostakovich anniversary certainly stirred up some debate, and we’re grateful to all those who took time to respond. Like a recent article in BBC Music in which several critics owned up to their own musical deaf-spots (‘Hero or hype?’, August), it stirred up some strong feelings on both sides of the Shostakovich divide. A particular thank-you to the respondent who suggested I listen to Kurt Sanderling conducting the 15th Symphony: I duly searched out his Cleveland recording, and found... read more

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My Shostakovich Problem

5th August 2025

This week, many in the world of classical music will be marking the 50th anniversary of the death of Dmitri Shostakovich. Widely regarded as the leading composer of symphonies and string quartets of the mid-20th century, Shostakovich’s international reputation has only grown in the years since his death. With the backlash against musical modernism in the West, his music has appealed to younger audience in a way that previously only Mahler had (in the wake of Luchino Visconti’s influential 1971 film Death in Venice). For... read more

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