Country : Label : Genres and styles : Year : 2024

Top Albums of 2024 / Renaud Loranger, Festival de Lanaudière

· by Rédaction PAN M 360

To kick off 2025, PAN M 360 asked several of its partners’ artistic directors to suggest their 3 favorite albums of the past year.

Artistic Director of the Festival de Lanaudière, Renaud Loranger is also Vice-President of Artists and Repertoire for the huge European label Pentatone. Since 2016, he has steered the deployment of new internationally renowned artists and led highly creative projects, in addition to nurturing the label’s already extensive repertoire. Prior to this, he was an executive producer in the Artists and Repertoire division of the celebrated Deutsche Grammophon label, from 2011 to 2016. At the end of 2018, Renaud Loranger became Artistic Director of the Festival de Lanaudière, in the town where he grew up, Joliette. Simultaneously taking on a second colossal task, he wasted no time in revitalizing the Festival de Lanaudière artistically and keeping it at the pinnacle of classical festivals in Canada/Quebec. A musicologist, art historian, and man of letters, Renaud Loranger ticks all the boxes of an open-minded, enlightened, and rigorous artistic director, respectful of the legacy of periods prior to our own, and certainly of international calibre.

“I’m going to be very chauvinistic this year, but these three albums are among the ones I’m perhaps most proud of in my career”

A summit meeting between two legendary artists, Kožená and Minkowski, who had not met again on record for almost twenty years, surrounded by a first-class vocal cast and supported by a gleaming orchestra. Kožená, in her first Alcina, is simply stunning. The new reference version of the work.

You don’t expect Aimard to play Schubert, and he surprises you with every phrase, every inflection, in each of these precious miniatures that are too little known and too rarely played. Too easy for students and too difficult for pianists, as Arthur Schnabel said of Mozart – and the same applies here. The research into sound and color is astonishing. A superb recording.

One of the world’s most acclaimed phalanges, in its repertoire of choice – what more could you ask for? The Czech Philharmonic is custodian of one of Europe’s richest musical traditions (and not strictly speaking “national”: it was for them that Mahler wrote his Seventh Symphony), and their musical director Semyon Bychkov pulls out all the stops.

Latest 360 Content

Vitta Morales, Our Versatile Colleague

Vitta Morales, Our Versatile Colleague

Late-Night Warehouse Ambiance for Juan Atkins All-Nighter at the SAT

Late-Night Warehouse Ambiance for Juan Atkins All-Nighter at the SAT

Lifeguard – Ripped and Torn

Lifeguard – Ripped and Torn

Brainwasher – At Least It Beats an Actor

Brainwasher – At Least It Beats an Actor

Nicholas Daniel – Complete Works for Oboe by Madeleine Dring

Nicholas Daniel – Complete Works for Oboe by Madeleine Dring

Christine Tassan; Marie-Véronique Bourque – Bruissement boréal

Christine Tassan; Marie-Véronique Bourque – Bruissement boréal

Lanaudière Festival | Metropolitan Orchestra/Yannick Nézet-Séguin/Marc-André Hamelin: When Nature Drives the Concert

Lanaudière Festival | Metropolitan Orchestra/Yannick Nézet-Séguin/Marc-André Hamelin: When Nature Drives the Concert

Festival de Lanaudière | Sol Gabetta : Queen of the cello meets les Violons du Roy

Festival de Lanaudière | Sol Gabetta : Queen of the cello meets les Violons du Roy

The “rodas de samba” That Never End

The “rodas de samba” That Never End

Friday night at the Dômesicle – All night long with Jump Source

Friday night at the Dômesicle – All night long with Jump Source

Éli Doyon et la Tempête – Attraper le ciel avant qu’il tombe

Éli Doyon et la Tempête – Attraper le ciel avant qu’il tombe

Barbara Hannigan; Katia et Marielle Labèque – Electric Fields

Barbara Hannigan; Katia et Marielle Labèque – Electric Fields

Montreal Vocal Arts Festival | The Magic Flute to conclude ICAV’s opera month

Montreal Vocal Arts Festival | The Magic Flute to conclude ICAV’s opera month

Fire, Fungi, and Family Fun: The ShazamFest XX Experience

Fire, Fungi, and Family Fun: The ShazamFest XX Experience

Festival de Lanaudière | Kent Nagano: The eternal, and always welcome, return

Festival de Lanaudière | Kent Nagano: The eternal, and always welcome, return

Tyler, the Creator – DON’T TAP THE GLASS

Tyler, the Creator – DON’T TAP THE GLASS

Off Piknic with Gorgon City, Dennis Ferrer, Riordan, and Linska

Off Piknic with Gorgon City, Dennis Ferrer, Riordan, and Linska

Jeff Bridges – Slow Magic, 1977-1978

Jeff Bridges – Slow Magic, 1977-1978

Piknic Electronik | DJ Fuckoff Turns Up The Heat for Pep Rally

Piknic Electronik | DJ Fuckoff Turns Up The Heat for Pep Rally

Orford 2025 | Collectif9: folk that innovates and grooves

Orford 2025 | Collectif9: folk that innovates and grooves

Nuits d’Afrique 2025 | The next global star of Tuareg blues is born, and it is in Montreal

Nuits d’Afrique 2025 | The next global star of Tuareg blues is born, and it is in Montreal

Ruby Creek – Forget Me Not

Ruby Creek – Forget Me Not

Clipse – Let God Sort Em Out

Clipse – Let God Sort Em Out

Ross Lee Finney : Landscapes Remembered

Ross Lee Finney : Landscapes Remembered

Subscribe to our newsletter