"I am completely shaken - it was one of the greatest impressions of my life". This was the telegram Johann Strauss sent to Anton Bruckner in 1886 after the Vienna premiere of the 7th Symphony. The "waltz king", one of the best friends of the antipode Brahms, was one of the few musicians of the time who recognised artistic greatness without partiality. Indeed, this work is one of the most powerful and at the same time most intimate symphonies of the Romantic period. Ivor Bolton, who found one of the great musical loves of his life in Salzburg and worked on and recorded "all nines" by Bruckner with the Mozarteum Orchestra, is now a guest in the "Bruckner Year" 2024 (200th birthday) with the Sinfonieorchester Basel, of which he is now chief conductor. Bolton's loves also include his British compatriot Benjamin Britten, whose beautiful Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Orchestra features the prominent English singer Allan Clayton - and, on horn, Zoltán Mácsai, once principal horn in Salzburg, since 2016 in the Staatskapelle Dresden.