Gramophone Magazine

In this month’s cover feature, Richard Wigmore tells the story of Haydn’s visits to London, which crowned the composer’s international reputation and won him fame and fortune. To mark both the Christmas season and Sir John Rutter’s 80th birthday, Editor Martin Cullingford travelled to Cambridge to talk to the Director of Music at King’s College, Daniel Hyde, about the choir’s latest album. And as always in December, our reviewers name their favourite recordings of 2025 in our annual Critics’ Choice feature. Meanwhile, our Christmas Round-up offers a one-stop run-down of the best of this year’s festive releases. Elsewhere in the issue, in this month’s Icons Andrew Mellor introduces the work of the Finnish operatic bass Matti Salminen; Classics Reconsidered sees Charlotte Gardner and Rob Cowan return to the Hyperion recording of Fauré’s Piano Quartets by Domus, which won a Gramophone Award in 1986; and Collection explores Ravel’s piano cycle Le tombeau de Couperin, in honour of the composer’s 150th anniversary - which versions does Jed Distler recommend? In our Contemporary Composers Pwyll ap Siôn explores the music of the American composer David Conte and recommends some listening, while in this month’s Musician & the Score, Mark Pullinger talks to the conductor Vasily Petrenko about Rachmaninov’s choral symphony The Bells. Plus, as always, we review the latest classical recordings and name the best our Editor’s Choices.