My "Keep to Hand". Start of 2015

My “keep to hand” CD rack has only fifteen spaces, and these are occupied by recordings I am reluctant to shelve away more permanently, for the time being. The rack contents change over the course of the year and in no way reflect “best” or “favourite”; simply recordings I know I will want to come back to shortly. Some are there mainly because of the music; some because of the performances. Some have been there quite a long time. Some, a shorter time. At the start of 2015, the 15 slots in the rack are filled by (in random order):

• Wieniawski, Conus, Vieuxtemps violin concertos. Soo-Hyun Park. 69 minutes. Onyx. Lovely music. Well played by all concerned, and well recorded.
• Schubert – Quartet D810 and Quintet D956 – Pavel Haas Quartet. Supraphon. Probably a new classic recording of two classic chamber works.
• Schubert – Piano sonatas D850 / 958 / 959 / 960 – Leif Ove Andsnes. EMI
• Shostakovich – Violin Concertos 1 and 2. Christian Tetzlaff. Ondine
• Pergolesi – Stabat Mater. Julia Lezhneva / Philippe Jaroussky. Erato
• Khachaturian and Shostakovich violin concertos. James Ehnes. Onyx
• Sarasate – Fantaisies. Volker Reinhold. DGM. So good to have a collection of Sarasate opera fantasies, well played and in one place.
• Ravel / Shostakovich. Piano Trios. Smetana Trio. Supraphon.
• Janacek/ Smetana / Prokofiev. Josef Spacek. Supraphon
• Rachmaninov 3 / Prokofiev 2. Yuja Wang. DGG
• Igor Levit – Bach Partitas. Sony.
• Igor Levit – Beethoven late sonatas. Sony
• Marc-André Hamelin: Schumann / Janacek. Hyperion
•  Kreisler / Zimbalist / Ysaÿe – Fine Arts Quartet. Naxos. Rarely heard music, good to listen to, well played and recorded.
• Schubert – Sonatas D845 and 960. Maria Pires. DGG. Another instant classic recording.

Interesting how well the smaller European labels do (Supraphon, Onyx, Ondine, Sony-Germany). And how relatively young all the performers are (apart from Maria Pires). As all the voting forums say: this list is not necessarily representative !