Bonus points if you can tell us the conductor and the orchestra? 🤔
Premiered on This Day in 1943 – Symphony No. 8 by Dmitri Shostakovich 🎶
Said to be his "most tragic work," it was first performed by the USSR Symphony Orchestra under Yevgeny Mravinsky, to whom it was also dedicated.
🎧 Symphony No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 65: III. Allegro non troppo from BBC Legends, Vol. 1 – Evgeny Mravinsky & Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra
A little bit of calm on a Monday evening 🧘♀️
Symphony No. 5 in D Major by Ralph Vaughan Williams premiered on this day in 1943 🎶
Conducted by the composer, the first performance took place at BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall, by the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
Sir Henry Wood was originally intended to conduct but was not well enough, so the baton was quite literally passed to Vaughan Williams!
This recording is Sir Adrian Boult's 1975 Prom performance with the BBC Symphony Orchestra 🎻
Tell us your favourite performance of this magnificent piece...
Perhaps one of the most well-known "tunes" in Classical Music?
Elgar's 'Enigma Variations' premiered #otd in 1899 at St James's Hall in London 🎉
Here's an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the BBC Symphony Orchestra in rehearsal with the incredible Leonard Bernstein, ahead of their 1982 performance at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre 😮
Happy Birthday Igor Stravinsky 🥳
We are so fortunate to have a whole host of Stravinsky's music in our archives... which of the great composer's works could you listen to on repeat?
Let us know 👇
🎬 Leonard Bernstein's Homage to Stravinsky
Margot Fonteyn & Rudolf Nureyev 😍
Dancing the pas de deux from Giselle in 1962, one of their earliest collaborations 🩰
Their partnership at The Royal Ballet lasted many years performing the classics such as Sleeping Beauty, Swan Lake, and Romeo & Juliet ❤️
Share your favourite performance by Margot Fonteyn & Rudolf Nureyev 🩰
Relive musical history today as we share recordings from great conductors Leopold Stokowski & Sir Adrian Boult 🎵
Including music from Beethoven, Brahms & Schubert + never heard before recordings.
Available to purchase or listen to on your favourite streaming platform 🥳
We've picked 5 of the best British 20th Century conductors from our archives 🤩
Who would you add to the list? 🤔
Out 24th May 🙌
Leopold Stokowski’s eminence as one of the truly great conductors of the 20th century, in a career which spanned six decades, is exemplified in this 6CD set. It features BBC performances in stereo of many of the symphonies and works he performed in concert during his final years and, in many cases, premiered on record in his early years.
The set has been newly remastered to reflect Stokowski’s instructions on how he wanted his recordings to sound.
If you can't wait that long, you can listen to Manuel de Falla's 'El amor brujo: No. 8, Danza ritual del fuego' performed by BBC Symphony Orchestra, live at the Royal Albert Hall on your favourite streaming platform now 🤩
Premiered in Vienna on 7 May 1824, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony remains one of the most frequently performed symphonies in the world.
But did you know that Beethoven 9 also helped to shape technology?
During the 1980s, when record labels were deciding the size of the shiny new CD format, they needed a length that could accommodate the entirety of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony 💿
The benchmark?
A recording by legendary conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler.
We are proud to share the only release outside of Japan of this profound performance by the Vienna Philharmonic / Wiener Philharmoniker & Wiener Singverein, conducted by Furtwängler on May 30, 1953.
This historic recording took place at the Musikverein Wien, just a stone’s throw from where the premiere occurred over a century earlier.
