Press Room

Warner Classics & Erato releases: August 2025

Highlights include:

  • Joyce DiDonato headlines a new recording of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, recorded with Maxim Emelyanychev, Il Pomo d’Oro, and a cast featuring Michael Spyres and Fatma Said.
  • To celebrate the violinist’s 80th birthday on August 31, Warner Classics releases the complete Warner Classics recordings of Itzhak Perlman.
  • Cellist-composer Abel Selaocoe makes his orchestral recording debut with a performance of his first cello concerto, Four Spirits.

New titles

Four Spirits Concerto
Abel Selaocoe, cello and composer
Aurora Orchestra / Nicolas Collon, conductor
CD / Digital
Release date: Aug 15

Following the release earlier this year of his acclaimed second album, Hymns of Bantu, Abel Selaocoe makes his orchestral recording debut with a performance of his first cello concerto, Four Spirits.

Four Spirits is a groundbreaking work for cello, orchestra, and voice that draws on Selaocoe’s distinctive compositional voice to reframe the traditional concerto format. Serving as both composer and performer, Selaocoe sings melodies inspired by South African hymn and folk music in the Sotho and Zulu languages, while simultaneously playing the cello and leading the audience in collective vocal improvisations. Drawing on Selaocoe’s South African heritage, each movement of Four Spirits represents an aspect of township life.

Co-commissioned by BBC Radio 3, the Seattle Symphony, and South Africa’s Philharmonie Zuidnederland, the concerto was first performed by Selaocoe with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Taavi Oramo on March 23, 2023 at City Halls Glasgow. The album was recorded live at London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall in March 2025 with the Aurora Orchestra conducted by Nicholas Collon, and features percussionist Bernhard Schimpelsberger.

Purcell: Dido and Aeneas
Il Pomo d’Oro / Maxim Emelyanychev, conductor
With Joyce DiDonato, Michael Spyres, Fatma Said, Carlotta Colombo, Hugh Cutting, Beth Taylor, Laurence Kilsby, Alena Dantcheva, and Anna Piroli
CD / digital
Release date: Aug 22

Three-time Grammy-winning mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato stars as Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, captured live at Germany’s Essen Philharmonie during a celebrated 2024 European tour, of which The Times of London marveled: “I have never heard Purcell – any Purcell – delivered with more wit and character, panache and polish.” Highlights include DiDonato’s rendition of Dido’s famous lament, “When I am laid in earth,” a staple of the mezzo’s repertoire, although she only performed the opera in its entirety for the first time last year. Anchored by Il Pomo d’Oro and conductor Maxim Emelyanychev, the production also features Michael Spyres as Aeneas, Fatma Said as Dido’s companion Belinda, and Hugh Cutting as the Spirit, alongside Beth Taylor, Carlotta Colombo, Laurence Kilsby, Alena Dantcheva, and Anna Piroli.

DiDonato’s upcoming live dates include an opening night performance at California’s Festival Napa Valley on July 11.

Catalogue – boxed sets

Mikhail Pletnev: The Erato Recordings (1988-2001)
Mikhail Pletnev, piano and conductor
16-CD boxed set
Release date: Aug 22

Mikhail Pletnev, a virtuoso pianist of the Russian school, rose to global fame after winning the 1978 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition. Known for his formidable technique and deep musical insight, the pianist performs works by Scarlatti, Haydn, Beethoven, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, Scriabin, and others on this collected edition of his Erato recordings (originally released on Virgin Classics).

Itzhak Perlman: The Complete Warner Classics Edition
Itzhak Perlman, violin
78-CD boxed set
Release date: Aug 29

Born in 1945, Itzhak Perlman is still widely regarded as the supreme violinist of our time. Over the past 60 years, he has proven himself one of history’s greatest string players and an influential musician who is admired around the world, both by students of his instrument and by a broad swathe of the public.

Released in honor of his 80th birthday on August 31 this year, this comprehensive 78-CD edition features all the recordings Perlman made for EMI Classics, Teldec, Erato, and Warner Classics over a period of more than 40 years. The recordings document his collaborations with the world’s greatest orchestras and feature an array of superlative fellow soloists and conductors, including Martha Argerich, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Daniel Barenboim, Carlo Maria Giulini, Bernard Haitink, Lynn Harrell, Yo-Yo Ma, Zubin Mehta, Seiji Ozawa, André Previn, and Pinchas Zukerman.

Vinyl

Brahms: Double Concerto
Itzhak Perlman, violin; Yo-Yo Ma, cello
Chicago Symphony Orchestra / Daniel Barenboim, conductor
Vinyl
Release date: Aug 29

Featuring Itzhak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma, with Daniel Barenboim conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, this recording of Brahms’s Double Concerto was captured live at Chicago’s Orchestra Hall in 1996, and was originally released in 1997.

Upcoming Aug 2025 releases

New titles:

  • Aug 5: Vincent Dubois (organ), Eternal Notre Dame [Erato]
  • Aug 12: Lea Desandre (mezzo-soprano), Thomas Dunford (lute), Songs of Passion: Purcell, Dowland [Erato]
  • Aug 19: Alain Lefevre (piano), Consolation [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 19: Alexandre Desplat (conductor/composer), Alexandre Desplat: Film Music [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 26: Pene Pati (tenor), Il Pomo D’Oro, Serenata a Napoli [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 26: Shani Diluka (piano), Renaissance [Warner Classics]

Catalogue:

  •  Aug 5: Antonio Pappano, Angela Gheorghiu, Roberto Alagna, Puccini: Tosca (CD) [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 12: Sir Adrian Boult (conductor), Complete Warner Classics Edition – The Mono Recordings (36CDs) [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 19: Sir Simon Rattle (conductor), British Composers (including Britten, Elgar, Holst, Vaughan Williams, and Walton) (14-CD) [Warner Classics]
  • Aug 19: Carlo Maria Giulini (conductor), Mstislav Rostropovich (cello), Dvořák: Symphonies 7-9, Cello Concerto/Saint-Saëns: Cello Concerto (4 Hybrid SACDs)
  • Aug 26: Mstislav Rostropovich, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Tchaikovsky: Symphonies 1-6, Manfred, Francesca da Rimini, Romeo and Juliet (SACD)

Upcoming U.S. performances by Warner Classics & Erato artists

May news release
June & July news release

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