Gramophone has been the world’s leading authority on classical music since 1923. With 13 issues a year every edition will enrich your classical music knowledge with in-depth interviews and features about composers past and present, plus established and new artists from across the globe. Each issue includes over 100 reviews of the latest CDs, downloads, DVDs and books all written by our globally acclaimed panel of expert critics. Gramophone is the magazine for the classical collector, as well for the enthusiast starting a voyage of discovery.


The trial issue features an in-depth retrospective on Schubert’s Winterreise, with input from some of the leading performers of the song cycle, including Jonas Kauffman, Ian Bostridge, Gerald Finley and Brigitte Fassbaender.


It also includes an interview with the San Francisco Symphony’s conductor, Michael Tilson Thomas; the New York Philharmonic’s Music Director, Alan Gilbert, discusses Nielsen’s Fifth Symphony; plus we look back at the remarkable career of American soprano Leontyne Price.


Also featured in the trial issue: we analyse the breakthrough works of John Adams, we reconsider Sir Thomas Beecham’s classic recording of Puccini’s La bohème, and we recommend the very best recordings of Rachmaninov’s Symphony No 2.

Please note: This is the North American edition of Gramophone. It includes all the pages of the UK edition and also a specialised 16 page supplement each issue, “Sounds of America”. This details the most exciting musical developments across North America as well as reviewing the most interesting specialist American releases.

Latest issue

For the December issue of Gramophone, on sale from November 29, Michelle Assay interviews those closest to Vladimir Horowitz and gains a fascinating insight into the pianist whose influence continues to resound, 30 years after his death. Elsewhere, as we approach the end of Mieczyslaw Weinberg’s centenary year, David Fanning explores this prolific composer’s incredibly diverse output; plus, Peter Quantrill interviews the conductor Andris Nelsons who, whether he’s conducting the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra in Bruckner or the Vienna Philharmonic in Beethoven, is able to find a profound connection with his musicians.

And there’s more! Also in this issue, one of the biggest of the year, we profile the best international competitions in our annual Competitions Guide; plus, in ‘Critics’ Choice’, we ask each of our writers to name his or her favourite recording from 2019. You’ll find all our usual features included, too, such as Gramophone’s Collection which, this issue, focuses on Richard Strauss’s controversial Symphonia domestica. And, as always, don’t miss our expert critics’ opinions of the newest classical releases, including, for December, a Christmas round-up by Andrew Mellor; which will be named Editor’s Choice, and which overall recording will be crowned Recording of the Month?