Iván Fischer's thrilling, instinctual BFO Mahler Five shows us what all the fuss is about.

Fischer and his Hungarians offer us a Mahler Three to live with.

In an exclusive interview with Limelight, Anna Netrebko speaks about life, art and the things she won't do anymore.

The Hungarian conductor on why Mahler’s Third is the perfect symphony and why he will never conduct the Eighth. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Iván Fischer brings refugees to his concert and says music must play its part in the humanitarian crisis. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Performances of Bartók’s Second Violin Concerto range from the romantic/rhapsodic (Shaham/ Boulez/BPO) to the gritty, abrasive and uncompromising (Mullova), with Mutter somewhere in- between. Thomas Zehetmair, a native of Salzburg, has been around for a long time but I wouldn’t have had him down as an arch exponent of the mighty Bartók Second Violin Concerto, one of the greatest concertos for any instrument of the twentieth century. Well, he is! There’s something excitingly kaleidoscopic and mercurial about this 1995 performance. His rhythms are nimble, his tone slender but full of coruscating folkloric colours. One thing I initially found disconcerting are his tempi: he takes 35’ over the work which makes it sound quite different; Shaham takes over 40’ which, I think, is closer to the norm. The Budapest Festival Orchestra, generally regarded for some years as Hungary’s premier ensemble, especially under Ivan Fischer, enhance the soloist and conductor in what amounts to a symphonic accompaniment wonderfully captured. The companion piece is Bartók’s First Violin Concerto, an early work sometimes dismissed as an expression of love-sickness over his inamorata, Stefi Geyer. It wasn’t discovered until after both the composer and Geyer had died, in 1956. It’s OK but very much a…