Free CD for all donations over £40

Brahms' symphonies are among the most popular of all classical works, performed by hundreds orchestras worldwide every year.

Now your donation can help to expand the Brahms orchestral canon through the world premiere recording of Kenneth Woods orchestration of Brahms' epic Piano Quartet in A major, an orchestration dedicated to Stephen Jones and written for the Surrey Mozart Players.

Woods says the idea for the orchestration came to him in a sudden burst of inspiration while teaching chamber music on the Italian island of Ischia. "I was working with a dutiful pianist to try and come up with a more evocative approach to Brahms' magical opening, and suggested he imagine it being played by a quartet of horns. As soon as I made the suggestion, an orchestral version of the work began to unfold in my mind's ear."

Woods is by no means the first  to transcribe the music of Brahms. Brahms himself left us versions of his Variations on a Theme of Haydn for both orchestra and piano duet. More recently, composer Alan Boustead reconstructed the original nonet version of Brahms' Serenade no. 1 for Orchestra (Woods has recorded Boustead's transcription to much acclaim).

Most famous of all orchestrations of Brahms is probably Schoenberg's orchestration of Brahms' G minor Piano Quartet, sister work of this one. "When the inspiration for this orchestration of opus 26 came to me," says Woods, "I was so entranced by what I was hearing in my head that for several days, I forgot completely about Schoenberg's orchestration of opus 25. In the end, I think Schoenberg and I have taken very different approaches to our work."

At over 50 minutes, in its new orchestral colours, Brahms' magnificent opus 26 can now be experienced as a vintage Brahms symphony in all but name. 

This new Nimbus/ESO recording will help share this Brahmsian masterwork with music lovers worldwide.