--- We are pleased to announce that worldwide downloads have been re-enabled. However, physical product shipments to EU countries remain on hold ---

Bernstein: Wonderful Town - Sir Simon Rattle, Danielle de Niese, Alysha Umphress – LSO Live

Bernstein: Wonderful Town

  • Release date: 7 September 2018
    LSO0813 | 0822231181323

    SACD Hybrid | Jewel case
    Booklet notes in English, French and German
    SACD incl. 2.0 stereo | multi-channel 5.1
    Total playing time: 68m

    Producer: Andrew Cornall
    Engineering: Classic Sound Ltd
    Recorded live in DSD 128FS at the Barbican Hall, London, 16-21 December 2018

  • ★★★★★ ‘Already the second strongest contribution to this year of Bernstein.’
    Kultur Radio

    ★★★★★ 'The recording, in concert at the Barbican Hall in London, is airy and beautiful in relief’
    ON Magazine

    ★★★★ 'Purchasers of the disc will lose nothing of the exhilaration of the live performance.’
    Financial Times

    ‘The performance has exactly the right infusion of theatrical vividness.’
    Classical CD Choice

    'You can feel Rattle urging the strings to melt at the start of the love songs, and zing in the upbeat numbers'
    Stereophile

    'A significant centenary tribute to Lenny'
    MusicWeb International

    Concert reviews

    ★★★★★ ‘Infectious.’
    Financial Times

    ★★★★★ ‘The saxophone-enriched orchestra and London Symphony Chorus were on terrific form.’
    The Times

    ★★★★ ‘An unqualified, uncomplicated delight.
    The Guardian

    ★★★★ ‘Umphress and de Niese were both impressive in the lead roles.’
    The Arts Desk

£9.99

Sir Simon Rattle
London Symphony Orchestra


Sir Simon Rattle and the London Symphony Orchestra pay homage to former LSO President Leonard Bernstein with a new recording of Wonderful Town that captures the energy and excitement of sold-out performances from December 2017. 

Bernstein’s five-time Tony award-winning musical follows sisters Ruth and Eileen on their quest to make it big, pursuing careers in writing and acting from their cramped basement apartment in New York’s bohemian Greenwich Village. Fresh from rural Ohio, the sisters end up getting more than they bargained for, realising that life in the Big Apple is not as glamourous as it may seem.

A bright and cheery love letter to the city that never sleeps and the colourful characters inhabiting it, Wonderful Town draws on Fields and Chodorov’s 1940 play My Sister Eileen, which itself is based on a series of autobiographical short storied by the ‘real-life’ Ruth McKenney.

Bernstein’s infectious score includes classic numbers such as ‘Ohio’, ‘One Hundred Easy Ways’, and ‘A Little Bit in Love’, as well as a riotous conga that had delighted audiences dancing in the aisles of the Barbican hall.

Composer   Leonard Bernstein
Conductor   Sir Simon Rattle
Soloists   Danielle de Niese, Alysha Umphress, Nathan Gunn, Duncan Rock
Performers   London Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Chorus

Track list

1-11: Wonderful Town, Act I:
Overture
No. 2, Christopher Street
No. 3, Ohio
No. 4, Conquering New York
No. 5, One Hundred Easy Ways to Lose a Man
No. 6, What a Waste
No. 8, A Little Bit in Love
No. 9, Pass the Football
No. 10, Conversation Piece
No. 11, A Quiet Girl
No. 12, Conga!

12-20: Wonderful Town, Act 2:
No. 13, Entr’acte
No. 14, My Darlin’ Eileen
No. 15, Swing!
No. 16, Quiet Incidental
No. 16a, Ohio (Reprise)
No. 17, It’s Love
No. 18, Ballet at the Village Vortex
No. 19, Wrong Note Rag
No. 19a, Finale. It’s Love (Reprise)

Also available on