From the exuberant Mahler to the eclectic experience of Hermès: Our best classical recordings of 2025 | classical music

TThe survey of the new releases that my colleagues and I enjoyed most in 2025 differs in one important respect from previous years’ lists. This year’s top ten does not contain any series. There has been a profound change in record companies’ policies regarding how and what they record. It now seems impossible to think of compelling studio recordings of opera in the last century, and even the release of audio-only recordings taken directly from live opera house performances often seems less viable than a DVD release of the same production.

Some specialist labels dedicated to specific areas of the operatic repertoire continue the fine work: opera figures prominently in its pro-zine mission on behalf of neglected French composers, while Opera Rara continues its campaign for forgotten, mostly 19th-century, mostly Italian scores, which this year included the original 1857 version of Verdi’s Simone Boccanegra. Other companies continue to find treasures in Europe’s inexhaustible Baroque archives, while the London Symphony Orchestra, under its own label, has continued to issue Simon Rattle’s Janacek series taken from his concert performances with the orchestra at the Barbican, the latest release being Geneva. If full operas are remarkably rare on major company schedules, two exceptions this year were Decca’s version of Flying Dutchman from Oslo, with Liz Davidsen and Gerald Finley, and Deutsche Grammophon’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, part of Andris Nelsons’s Shostakovich series based in Boston, both of which proved less than overwhelming.

Other areas of recorded repertoire have continued to expand in their own, often haphazard, ways. While the central symphony repertoire generally remains oversubscribed, such that, for example, a new cycle of Beethoven’s symphonies must have a selling point other than their intrinsic musical value, some composers seem immune to overcrowding: there are at least two high-profile Mahler cycles in the works, and although the final part of Simeon Bychkov’s series with the Czech Philharmonic, the Third Symphony, was disappointingly lackluster, as was the By Simon Rattle. Accounting for the Seventh, with the Bavarian Radio Symphony was anything but, and belongs among the best versions of this puzzling work available on disc.

The series of recordings of the mostly British music of John Wilson and the London Sinfonia often revisit well-explored areas as well, but the quality of the orchestral playing is always so high that it justifies the release itself. Likewise, the transcendent level of performance on their own label from the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Kirill Petrenko needs no excuse, but this year’s Schoenberg set is exceptional even by usual Berlin standards, because it includes a remarkable account of a true rarity, the oratorio Die Jakobsleiter, a trunk containing, as Petrenko demonstrates, some of the greatest music of Schoenberg’s period freely adequate during the First World War.

As is the case almost every year, there are more superior piano music discs than can reasonably be included in a report like this. There was no room, for example, for Alice Sarah Ott’s soulful survey of John Field’s serene music, or Ravel’s sparkling homage to Bertrand Chamayo, or Tamara Stefanovic’s sparkling accounts of twentieth-century piano sonatas by Shostakovich, Eisler, Bartok, and Boulez. The disc release of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto, which Yeonshan Lim won in the 2022 Van Cliburn Competition to launch itself globally, is a document for posterity, while Pierre-Laurent Aymard’s performance of a generous suite of miniatures in György Kurtag’s Jatékok, recorded in the composer’s presence, has unrepeatable authority.

Although there were many concerts paying tribute to Pierre Boulez on his centenary, there were few new discs that marked the event, although Quatuor Diotima’s first recording of the definitive version of Livre pour Quatuor, and especially the pairing on Bastille Musique for Éclat/Multiples and Sur Incises, were important additions to Boulez’s discography. Luciano Berio’s centenary has been shamefully neglected, both in the concert hall and on disc, but Diotima’s recording provided another birthday tribute that was just as important, as they celebrated Helmut Lachenmann’s 90th birthday with admirably authoritative accounts of his three string quartets.
Andrew Clements

Our top 10 albums of 2025

1. Schoenberg: Violin Concerto, Verklärte Nacht, Die Jakobsleiter/Berlin Philharmonic/Petrenko
(Berliner Orchestra)

“An impressive ensemble… In a brilliant account of the Violin Concerto, the soloist, Patricia Kopacinskaja, transforms what can sometimes seem a somewhat conventional four-square piece into something that continually surprises.” Read the full review.

2. Mahler: Symphony No. 7 / Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra / Rattle
(BR Classic)

“It is the sheer brilliance of the BRSO’s playing that captures the attention, with every detail and musical effect bursting with vitality, all captured perfectly in a far better sound than any of Rattle’s previous releases.” Read the full review.

3. Courtage: Gaticook/Pierre-Laurent Aymard
(pentagram)

“Entire worlds of expression are encapsulated in a few bars, and listening to Eimard’s exemplary performances provides as important an insight into Kurtag’s highly personal musical thinking as any of his wide-ranging and more ‘generic’ pieces. Játékok is one of the major achievements of the last half-century, and Eimard is the perfect guide.” Read the full review.

4. Tree/Hermes Experiment
(Delphian)

“Beautifully thought out and rewardingly eclectic…The Hermès Experience has become a liberating force in contemporary music.” Read the full review.

5. Boulez: Éclat/Multiples/Collegium Novum Zürich/Wendeberg
(bastille music)

“Outstanding precision and accuracy.” Read the full review.

6. Ravel: Nash Band
(agate)

“It is the attention to detail of color and tone that really makes these performances pop, as the instruments combine to capture the dazzling light and interesting shadow, which are the quintessential features of Ravel’s music. Read the full review.

7. Walton: Symphony No. 1; Cello Concerto, etc./Sinfonia London/Wilson
(Chandos)

“John Wilson’s lively, yet penetrating, style combines with the orchestra’s trademark brilliance to fit Walton’s music like a glove.” Read the full review.

8. Bach: The Key to Good Mood, Book One / Mahan Isfahani
(Hyperion)

“Isfahani comes to these pieces with his own very personal ideas about how to present and perform them, and there is real feeling in his performance of each introduction and fugue that defines its own dramatic space… His choice of tempo is uncontroversial, and his shaping of each movement is wonderfully clear.” Read the full review.

9. Lachenmann: Quatuor Diotima
(pentagram)

“Quatuor Diotima has been working on this music with the composer for 25 years, and their performances have enormous authority and confidence, drawing you into their strange and compelling world. It’s a wonderful experience.” Read the full review.

10. Chromatic Renaissance: Ecom. xaudi
(winter and winter)

“This disc gets more fascinating and engaging the more you listen to it. Read the full review.

We’ve also given five-star ratings to:

Organized Delirium: Piano Sonatas by Boulez, Shostakovich, Bartok and Eisler/Tamara Steycom. fanovich
(pentagram)
“Stevanovic’s dazzling performance conveys a sense of complete command and authority in every bar.” Read the full review

Vikingur Olafsson: Action 109
(Deutsche Grammophon)
“Traditionalists may shy away, but for those willing to go along with him, Olafsson opens transcendent vistas on a brave new world.” Read the full review

Iberia/Royal Liverpool PO/Hinduyan
(agate)
“An hour and a quarter of musical sunshine.” Read the full review

Yunshan Lim: Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3
(decca)
“It seems like every technical challenge in keyboarding is easily overcome, but the brilliance is…always part of a bigger picture, without diminishing the excitement of such an amazing thing.” Read the full review