Gramophone Classical Music Podcast

Dalia Stasevska, Chief Conductor of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, has launched a new project, ‘Dalia’s Mixtape’, for Platoon. Leading her BBC orchestra, she has recorded ten works by ten modern composers, each shedding a new and different light on the symphony orchestra and what it can do. Breaking with tradition, the project will unfold piece by piece over the next half year. And each work will be accompanied by a podcast focusing on the music.

In this first episode, hosted by Gramophone’s Andrew Mellor, Dalia’s guest is the Scottish composer and performer Anna Meredith whose work, Nautilus, originally conceived for electronics, is presented in a new acoustic guise. She, Andrew and Dalia discuss the work’s origins and its transformation into a vibrant new work for a traditional symphony orchestra.

Produced by Platoon and Gramophone.

For this week's Gramophone Podcast, Editor Martin Cullingford is joined by soprano Nardus Williams and Director of the Dunedin Consort John Butt to talk about their new album exploring the music Handel wrote during his years in Rome, a young composer still in the early stages of his creativity. 'Handel in Rome' is released on Linn Records, and available now.

Klaus Mäkelä has been named Riccardo Muti's successor at the helm of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, a role he assumes in 2027 alongside the post of Chief Conductor of Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. Meanwhile, he remains committed to his two European orchestras, the Orchestre de Paris and the Oslo Philharmonic.

Following his Decca debut recording, of the complete Sibelius symphonies in Oslo, Mäkelä has made two much-admired recordings of music commissioned by Serge Diaghilev. The first of these, made with the Orchestre de Paris, was released early last year – Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring and the complete Firebird ballet – and James Jolly spoke to the conductor by Zoom back in February 2023 as Klaus was in Cleveland conducting performances of Mahler's Fifth Symphony.

Gramophone Podcasts are given in association with Wigmore Hall

The great Polish pianist and conductor Krystian Zimerman came to London last October to collect his Gramophone Award, his seventh, for his latest DG album of music by Karol Szymanowki. James Jolly caught up with him on the morning of the ceremony, and their conversation ranged widely.

The complete piano trios of Dvořák is the topic this week, as Editor Martin Cullingford catches up with pianist Boris Giltburg, violinist Veronika Jarůšková and the cellist Petre Jarůšek, who have just recorded them for Supraphon.