Royal Liverpool Philharmonic - Recordings

Recordings

The society made its earliest recordings in 1943; the first was Walton's Belshazzar's Feast, and the second was Bliss' Piano Concerto, with Solomon as soloist, and conducted by Adrian Boult. In 1998 the orchestra became the first in Britain to own and run its own record label, known as RPLO Live. This was a company created by the members of the orchestra, using the technical expertise of its own members to create recordings of live performances, with the performers, conductor and soloists being equal shareholders. As a recording orchestra the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra has a varied and critically acclaimed discography throughout the era of recording, the famous Messiah and Dream of Gerontius early LPs with Sargent and notable first recordings of British works, e.g. Frederick Delius and Arthur Bliss with Groves and Handley. In particular, and more recently, Libor Pešek made a number of award winning recordings with the RLPO of Czech composers, including symphonies and orchestral music of Antonín Dvořák and Josef Suk. The RLPO's catalogue also includes a symphony cycle and other works by Beethoven with Sir Charles Mackerras, Britten, Mahler symphonies with Schwarz, Pešek and Mackerras, as well as many works of Rachmaninov, Smetana, Richard Strauss with those conductors. A full Vaughan Williams symphony cycle and other works with Vernon Handley was also made, several of them receiving best recording in category of The Gramophone magazine's recommendations. Many of these recordings feature the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Choir. A complete cycle of all six symphonies by the Danish composer Carl Nielsen, in a new edition, has been released by the RLPO and Douglas Bostock. Petrenko undertook to record all of the Shostakovich symphonies as well as those of Rachmaninov with the Piano Concertos. The recording of Tchaikovsky's Manfred Symphony and The Voyevoda was Awarded Best Orchestral in the Gramophone Award 2009. and the Shostakovich Symphony No 10 received the same award in 2011. Much of this legacy is due to the availability of the Hall for recording and rehearsal purposes and is now supplemented by The Friary which is the venue for the outreach programme 'In Harmony' in the West Everton district of the city.