The Dallas Symphony Orchestra and music director Fabio Luisi, Louise W. & Edmund J. Kahn Music Directorship, has announced their first album recording of Luisi’s tenure. Brahms Symphonies No. 1 & 2 will be released on the DSO’s in-house label, DSO Live, next Friday, September 16, 2022. The album is the first recording of a complete Brahms Symphony cycle that Luisi and the DSO will continue to record. The recording will be available as a 2-CD set as well as a digital download at retailers including Apple Music, Spotify and Idagio.
Both releases were recorded live at Dallas’s Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center. Brahms’s Symphony No. 1 was recorded September 16–19, 2021. The performances marked the start of Luisi’s second season as music director following a pared-down inaugural season during the pandemic. The Second Symphony of Brahms was recorded in a special series of concerts in February 2022 as the orchestra was able to welcome larger audiences to the space. Both recordings were engineered by Soundmirror and Dirk Sobotka.
Luisi was keen to begin his recordings in Dallas with the symphonies of Brahms. He observes:
“I think Brahms is one of the most important composers for a symphony orchestra. Each of the four symphonies is very different from the other. At the start of my tenure as Music Director, these are ideal pieces to begin our collaboration and partnership. I am able to share my ideas of interpretation and craft the kind of sound that I would like from the orchestra. We learn so much from each other by performing the symphonies of Brahms.” Luisi continues: “To record and release the complete cycle is a statement – it is an artistic statement of who we are as an orchestra now and where we are going as an ensemble. The Dallas Symphony has a rich history and a number of music directors with different styles. With Brahms, we are presenting ourselves in a different way than before. This is our Brahms, and this is how we will shape the Romantic repertoire.”
“It is exciting to share our first album from this new era of the Dallas Symphony,” says Kim Noltemy, Ross Perot President & CEO of the DSO. “The DSO has an incredible recording history going back to the 1940s under Antal Doráti. We look forward to continuing this tradition with the first of a complete Brahms cycle.”
The DSO has a tradition of powerful performances turned recording, tracing its origins to a concert given by a group of 40 musicians conducted by Hans Kreissig in 1900. The orchestra, like the city, in the midst of its Industrial Period, evolved in both size and stature until it was able to appoint the eminent Hungarian conductor and composer Antal Doráti as music director in 1945. Doráti transformed the ensemble into a fully professional orchestra that won national attention through a series of RCA recordings, expanded repertoire, more concerts and several national network radio broadcasts.
At the same time Dallas’ skyline was undergoing a seemingly daily change thanks to the real estate boom, Mexican-born conductor Eduardo Mata was appointed music director in 1977, and the orchestra embarked on its second major period of growth and success which included recordings and continued touring. During his tenure the Dallas Symphony also saw the opening in 1989 of its permanent home, the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, as one of the only major building projects in Dallas during the late 1980s. Andrew Litton also brought the Dallas Symphony national and international exposure through recordings, telecasts and tours during his tenure from 1994 through 2006. Jaap van Zweden took the helm as music director in 2008, and the orchestra continued to flourish under his dynamic leadership. Named Musical America’s Conductor of the Year 2012, van Zweden completed his ten-year tenure at the DSO in May 2018.
In June 2018, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra named Grammy Award-winning Italian conductor Fabio Luisi as its next music director. Over the next two years, Luisi developed a close rapport with the orchestra through a series of acclaimed performances, before assuming the Louise W. & Edmund J. Kahn Music Directorship in September 2020. Luisi looks to continue the tradition of growing the company in both acumen and renown alongside the city of Dallas.