Zubin Mehta and London Philharmonic Orchestra - Zubin Mehta conducts Strauss and Rimsky-Korsakov (2020)

All the music on this release tells a story. From the sweeping, epic adventures of the One Thousand and One Nights in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade to the simple beauty of daily family life in Strauss’s richly melodic Symphonia Domestica.

This is the first release on the LPO label with conductor Zubin Mehta, whose working relationship with the London Philharmonic Orchestra has spanned more than 30 years. The pieces were recorded live in concert, just a few years after his seminal recording with the Orchestra of Ravi Shankar’s Sitar Concerto No. 2 and the close relationship between conductor and Orchestra is apparent.

Zubin Mehta returns to conduct the Orchestra once again in November 2020 at Royal Festival Hall, with Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 and Shankar’s Sitar Concerto No. 2.

Strauss’s Symphonia Domesticais scored for huge forces and showcases the full scale of the Orchestra. Over five movements, it describes a day and night in the life of the Strauss family -mother, father and child. Written around the same time, for similar forces, it is a domestic counterpart to his Alpine Symphony, released on the LPO label in June 2018.

This is the first Rimsky-Korsakov release on the label. His unparalleled use of musical colour brings out every shade of the orchestra, in a thrilling performance under Zubin Mehta.