{"title":"Leonard Bernstein","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"west-side-story","title":"West Side Story","description":"Nothing can compare with Bernstein’s own accounts of his music. The best recordings are still the ones he made with the New York Philharmonic for Columbia, when scores such as Candide and West Side Story were still “new” music. Originally produced by John McClure, this recording of the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story has never been bettered, not even by Bernstein himself. – Ted Libbey, author of \u003ci\u003eThe NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection\u003c\/i\u003e, reviewing a previous release of the Symphonic Dances\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e All tracks have been digitally remastered.\u003cbr\u003e This is part of Columbia Records' Columbia Broadway Masterworks series.\u003cbr\u003e Record buyers who had not seen the show that opened on Broadway in 1957, could hardly believe their ears when this dramatic, early stereo album reached the stores soon afterwards. Classical composer Leonard Bernstein and newcomer Stephen Sondheim's spellbinding score combined exquisite ballads such as \"Maria\" and \"Tonight\" with streetwise numbers such as \"Gee, Officer Krupke\" and the exhilarating \"America.\" Carol Lawrence, Larry Kert and Chita Rivera led the superb young cast, and the album stayed for 120 weeks in the US chart but fared poorly on its UK release. In 1991 it was inducted into the NARAS Hall of Fame.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":46907749499160,"sku":"886919484120","price":8.98,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/35755359_sd.jpg?v=1697475120"},{"product_id":"bernstein-west-side-story-arr-for-violin-and-saxophone-qu","title":"Bernstein: West Side Story (Arr. For Violin And Saxophone Qu","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis recording is of Leonard Bernstein’s seminal musical, West Side Story, in a unique arrangement for violin and saxophone quartet made by composer-conductor Henk Huizinga, performed by Gwendolyn Masin and the Melisma Saxophone Quartet. The unusual combination of instruments works superbly: the violin line soars, often taking the main vocal melody, while the winds show their versatility with sonorities ranging from earthy to delicate. You get all the favorites, including \"Somewhere,\" \"Tonight,\" \"Gee, Officer Krupke,\" and \"America.\"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Orchid Classics","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":46908260450584,"sku":"5060189561452","price":16.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3862691-3521199.jpg?v=1777681799"},{"product_id":"bernstein-mass-titus-norman-scribner-choir-942791","title":"Mass","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhen Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis asked Bernstein to compose a piece for the 1971 inauguration of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., he was eager to honor the occasion with a new, large-scale work because he knew he had always wanted \"to compose a service of one sort or another.\" Bernstein made a surprising choice: the Roman Catholic Mass. But instead of a straightforward, purely musical setting of the Latin liturgy, he created a broadly eclectic theatrical event by placing the 400-year-old religious rite into a tense, dramatic dialog with music and lyrics of the 20th century vernacular. (Sony)\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":46908320088344,"sku":"194398905624","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3992094-2738271.jpg?v=1722625917"},{"product_id":"leonard-bernstein-10-album-classics","title":"Leonard Bernstein - 10 Album Classics","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe ultimate selection of Leonard Bernstein’s benchmark recordings \u0026amp; perfect introduction to his work as a conductor, composer and pianist. Includes Beethoven’s “Eroica” and Dvorák’s “New World” Symphonies, among others. The re-masterings in this new collection are the best ever issued, selected from the recent Leonard Bernstein - The Composer and Leonard Bernstein – Remastered editions. (Sony)\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":46908567912728,"sku":"196587913427","price":24.98,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/4211175-2991122.jpg?v=1777612677"},{"product_id":"bernstein-conducts-beethoven","title":"Bernstein Conducts Beethoven","description":"\u003cp\u003e“No composer has ever lived who speaks so directly to so many people”, said Leonard Bernstein of Ludwig van Beethoven. The great German composer, born in 1770 – 250 years ago in 2020 – had a gift for communication through music that links him directly to Bernstein, one of the 20th century’s great musical communicators. This is nowhere more clear than in a work like the Ninth Symphony, with its rousing message of universal brotherhood. Bernstein was also a significant interpreter of Beethoven’s music, and recorded much of it multiple times. Celebrating Beethoven’s 250th anniversary and following Bernstein’s centenary in 2018, Sony Classical is proud to re-release Bernstein’s first recorded cycle of Beethoven symphonies, made with the New York Philharmonic between 1958 and 1964. Also included are a collection of Beethoven overtures, first released in 1970, and the Missa solemnis recording of 1960. All recordings are newly or recently remastered. Soloists include Martina Arroyo in the Ninth Symphony, and Eileen Farrell and Kim Borg in the Missa solemnis. Bernstein described Beethoven’s work as “Perhaps the closest music has ever come to universality”, an aim to which Bernstein himself aspired through his composing and education work, as well as his conducting. These recordings, presented in vivid detail, are a testament to two great musical communicators.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":46908569321752,"sku":"190759704820","price":55.98,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3738292-2518457.jpg?v=1722626025"},{"product_id":"bernstein-music-for-string-quartet-copland-elegies-for-violin-and-viola","title":"Bernstein: Music for String Quartet - Copland: Elegies for Violin and Viola","description":"\u003cp\u003eNavona Records is proud to present MUSIC FOR STRING QUARTET; the world premiere recording of renowned composer Leonard Bernstein’s long-lost work. Composed by an 18-year-old Bernstein during his studies at Harvard; the piece has been steadfastly shepherded from its re-discovery to this historic release by former Boston Symphony Orchestra Librarian John Perkel; and is performed here by Lucia Lin; Natalie Rose Kress; Danny Kim; and Ronald Feldman. “Movement I” and the newly-discovered “Movement II,” which was found within the U.S Library of Congress; are accompanied here by the seldom-recorded duo piece Elegies for Violin and Viola by composer Aaron Copland; a musical mentor; collaborator; and dear friend of Bernstein’s.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Navona","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":47105301152024,"sku":"808857088895","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/4237949-3144021.jpg?v=1777534465"},{"product_id":"bernstein-complete-solo-piano-music","title":"Bernstein: Complete Solo Piano Music","description":"\u003cp\u003eBernstein's piano output reflects the various strands of his multifaceted personality, in works as different as Touches (1981) and, at the other end of the scale, his often tender, sentimental Anniversaries. Taken together his piano works form a musical diary tracing the breadth of his experiences and ideas. Four of his Five Anniversaries (1949-51) appear as themes in his violin concerto, the Serenade after Plato’s “Symposium.” The personal commemorations he created were not portraits so much as self-portrayals, revealing different aspects of his own multi-faceted personality. To play these works well requires an understanding of the various elements that made up the Bernstein persona. The Italian pianist Michele Tozzetti brings out the heartfelt tenderness of most of these tributes, the Jewish elements and the dance rhythms. In the Anniversary dedicated to Aaron Copland (in Seven Anniversaries, 1943), Tozzetti captures the sound and spirit of the man Bernstein called ‘my first friend in New York, my master, my idol, my sage, my shrink, my guide, my counselor, my elder brother, [and] my beloved friend.’ The pianist reveals a delicate sense of sonority along with fine dynamic control in For Paul Bowles, and brings an idiomatic edginess to For Sergei Koussevitzky. He also injects youthful vigor into Bernstein’s Sonata (1937), a probing work rich in counterpoint, written when the composer was still a student. Also on this recording are Non Troppo Presto, a manuscript discovered in the Leonard Bernstein archive at the Library of Congress; and Touches: Chorale, Eight Variations and Coda, commissioned by the Van Cliburn Piano Competition in 1981. Its bluesy chorale is identical to Virgo Blues, written for his daughter, Jamie on her twenty-sixth birthday in 1978. Bernstein dedicated this work ‘to my first love, the keyboard’. In Michele Tozzetti’s hands, that love is beautifully realized.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Piano Classics","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":47105301414168,"sku":"5029365101745","price":21.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3905594.jpg?v=1777674790"},{"product_id":"bernstein-symphonies-nos-1-2","title":"Bernstein: Symphonies Nos. 1 \u0026 2","description":"\u003cp\u003eAt the age of 21, Leonard Bernstein wrote what he described as a ‘Hebrew song’ using a text from the Lamentations of Jeremiah. Three years later the song became the final movement of his Symphony No. 1 and in January 1944 Bernstein himself conducted the première of the work. What is being lamented is the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC, but according to the composer, he primarily wanted to convey the text’s ‘emotional quality’. The first movement thus aims to parallel in feeling the intensity of the prophet’s pleas while the scherzo gives a general sense of the destruction and chaos. Being a setting of the biblical text, the third movement is naturally more literary: the cry of Jeremiah, as he mourns his beloved Jerusalem. During the next few years, Bernstein’s career as a conductor took flight, while the musical On the Town made his name on Broadway. Towards the end of the 1940s he returned to the symphonic genre, however – once more with an extra-musical inspiration. W.H. Auden’s poem The Age of Anxiety is set during the recently concluded war, and falls – like the symphony – into six sections during which four characters express their anxieties, hopes and the quest for meaning and identity. Bernstein chose to portray all four characters via a single instrument, the piano, but he did not want to label the work a piano concerto. The instrument does however come to the fore at various points and in one of the final sections Bernstein supplies what is arguably the most exuberant and rhythmically dazzling display of piano writing in the symphonic literature. For this Christian Lindberg and the Arctic Philharmonic have enlisted the aid of Roland Pöntinen, while Anna Larsson is the soloist in Jeremiah.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BIS","offers":[{"title":"SACD","offer_id":47105301610776,"sku":"7318599922980","price":15.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3782260-2540379.jpg?v=1777781724"},{"product_id":"bernstein-broadway-to-hollywood-live","title":"Bernstein: Broadway to Hollywood (Live)","description":"\u003cp\u003eSOMM Recordings celebrates the centenary of Leonard Bernstein’s birth in style with a remarkable 1993 live broadcast recording – never before issued and newly mastered – with the Hannover Philharmonie conducted by Iain Sutherland. Five of Bernstein’s era-defining works for Broadway and Hollywood revel in his inexhaustible gift for memorable melodies. (SOMM)\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"SOMM Recordings","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":47105302069528,"sku":"748871500228","price":15.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3809497.jpg?v=1777657903"},{"product_id":"bernstein-rhapsody-in-blue-an-american-in-paris","title":"Bernstein: Rhapsody in Blue - An American in Paris","description":"\u003cp\u003eThis tremendous release from Sony’s “Great Performances” series pairs two separate Leonard Bernstein recordings of George Gershwin classics. Leading the Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bernstein’s 1959 recording of “Rhapsody in Blue” is coupled with his 1958 performance of “An American in Paris,” with the New York Philharmonic. Sony has also included bonus recordings of Bernstein’s “Symphonic Dances” from West Side Story and the symphonic suite from On the Waterfront. You’ll be amazed at the clarity of these remastered performances.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":47105422852376,"sku":"886977004322","price":11.98,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/2803790.jpg?v=1778807765"},{"product_id":"bernstein-conducts-stravinsky-bernstein-new-york-philharmonic-boston-symphony-orchestra-london-symphony-orchestra","title":"Bernstein Conducts Stravinsky  Bernstein, New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra","description":"\u003cp\u003e“The last great father-figure of Western music” was how Leonard Bernstein eulogized Igor Stravinsky in 1972 before his homage concert in London a year after the composer’s death. Stravinsky’s works, he asserted, “sum up and embrace all of music itself – from primitive folk art to highly sophisticated serialism, from rarefied church music to outspoken jazz.” Sony Classical is pleased to collect these performances and talks in this new 8-album box set.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sony Masterworks","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":47242816291096,"sku":"194398542027","price":36.98,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/files\/3945942-2697228.jpg?v=1722625892"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0687\/4346\/3192\/collections\/Bernstein.jpg?v=1702920057","url":"https:\/\/hbdirect.com\/collections\/leonard-bernstein.oembed","provider":"HBDirect","version":"1.0","type":"link"}