This week at Pristine we continue our celebration of Shostakovich’s legacy, fifty years after his death, with two electrifying 1952 recordings by Dimitri Mitropoulos and the New York Philharmonic. Zino Francescatti brings effortless brilliance to Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2, his luminous tone and poetic phrasing perfectly complemented by Mitropoulos’s alert, colourful accompaniment. Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony, born amid danger and political repression yet acclaimed as a triumphant act of survival, receives a performance of striking power, intensity and conviction.

Both sessions, captured at Columbia’s legendary 30th Street Studio, show Mitropoulos and his orchestra at their incandescent best. Newly restored in glorious Ambient Stereo XR sound, these performances leap vividly back to life — thrilling documents of artistry, courage and sheer musical brilliance.

We also celebrate Chopin with a 10% discount on all our recordings of his music this week.

Erich Kleiber’s 1954 Decca recording of Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier remains one of the great achievements of the post-war Viennese opera world. With the Vienna Philharmonic and a cast headed by Maria Reining, Sena Jurinac, Hilde Gueden and Ludwig Weber, Kleiber shapes Strauss’s luminous score with elegance, vitality and perfect balance — a reading steeped in Viennese style yet refreshingly unsentimental.

Tragically, Kleiber would die less than two years later in Zürich, bringing to an abrupt close one of the twentieth century’s most distinguished conducting careers. This beautifully restored edition preserves one of his final operatic masterpieces — a radiant Rosenkavalier whose warmth, humanity and grace have never faded with time.

We also celebrate the 190th birthday of Saint-Saëns with a 20% automatic discount on all his recordings at Pristine.

Between 1957 and 1961 Rudolf Serkin joined Eugene Ormandy and The Philadelphia Orchestra at Philadelphia’s Broadwood Hotel to record the two piano concertos of both Brahms and Mendelssohn. These sessions captured Serkin at the height of his powers: searching and monumental in Brahms, agile and brilliant in Mendelssohn, with Ormandy and his orchestra providing both symphonic weight and sparkling support.

Now heard in new Pristine XR remasterings, these four classic performances reveal Serkin’s unique blend of intellect, passion, and clarity, alongside the fabled Philadelphia sound in its prime. More than sixty years on, they stand as milestones of the stereo era, freshly vivid and undimmed in vitality.

We also celebrate this week's birthday of pianist Edwin Fischer with a 10% discount of all his recordings at Pristine.