A new Mariinsky label release with Denis Matsuev

The Mariinsky label is pleased to announce the release of a new disc featuring recordings of Dmitry Shostakovich’s First and Second Piano Concerti and Rodion Shchedrin’s Fifth Piano Concerto by Denis Matsuev and the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra under the baton of Valery Gergiev.

The disc will be released in February 2012. This release will be the second joint recording by Denis Matsuev and the label; the first came in February 2010 with the release of a recording of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto and Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. This latest release marks the logical continuation of a series of recordings of masterpieces of 20^th century Russian piano music.

The label’s most recent recordings drew rave press reviews in leading European music publications. Britain’s International Record Review called the DVD of Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies “outstanding.” In its review of the recording of Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor featuring Natalie Dessay, France’s Classica magazine commented that Valery Gergiev was a conductor “who takes your breath away,” imbuing the musical text with “life and colour,” while Germany’s respected Das Opernglas magazine stressed that Natalie Dessay created “drama not through pressure and the strength of her voice, but through her incredibly powerful acting skills.”