Ravel La Valse

In 1906, Maurice Ravel made some sketches for a tribute to Johann Strauss, the Waltz King. By the time he got back to it, World War I had ravaged Europe, and Ravel's tribute had turned into something much darker.

Handel's Messiah

However you like your Messiah - big or intimate, modern or period, authentic or interpreted - when you listen you become part of an almost 300-year tradition of what may be classical music's most beloved masterpiece.

Bruckner Symphony No. 4

Bruckner's Symphony No. 4 "The Romantic" was a departure from his usual symphonic testaments of faith. It's a journey into the Age of Chivalry, of knights, quests, and - above all - the hunt.

Strauss: Metamorphosen

"Richard Strauss' Metamorphosen for 23 Solo Strings was his musical response to a life, and a world, gone to pieces."

Charles Ives Symphony No. 3 & 4

With 19th-century Americana spirit, MTT and the SF Symphony, pianist Peter Dugan, and the SFS Chorus’s musical candor and clarity add an evocative recording of Ives’s songful Symphonies Nos. 3 and 4 to the SFS Media label’s Grammy award-winning discography.

Bach Orchestral Suite No. 4

Bach's Orchestral Suite #4 is a dazzling combination of rhythmic complexity and sonic brilliance; all the more amazing in that he wrote it (most likely) just for fun!

Shostakovich Symphony No.7 Leningrad

Shostakovich's 7th Symphony became a symbol of the wartime alliance between the US and the USSR. But the road to victory is never easy, and it wasn't long before both the musical and the political symbols of that alliance disappeared