new release guide - Naxos International (Far East)

FEB-MAR 2013
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NEW RELEASE GUIDE
THIS MONTH’S HIGHLIGHTS:
Daniel Gottlob TURK
PRD/DSD350067
Franz SCHUBERT
Robert SCHUMANN
Catherine Zeta-Jones
The Runaway Bunny
900712
GPR11012
RR-130
There’s A Time
Krzysztof PENDERECKI
LDV10
HMC902145
Johann Sebastian BACH
8.572696
GP629-30
9272
Oistrakh Trio play Russian
Piano Trois
Schubert’s Complete Symphonies
Naxos International (Far East) Limited
5B, Blue Box Factory Building, 25 Hing Wo Street, Tin Wan, Aberdeen, Hong Kong Tel: 2951 9557 Email: [email protected]
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Heitor VILLA-LOBOS (1887–
1959): Symphony No. 3 ‘War’
Symphony No. 4 ‘Victory’
Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART
(1756–1791)
Missa brevis in D major, K.
194 • Missa brevis in B flat
major, K. 275 • Regina coeli
in B flat major, K. 127
São Paulo Symphony Orchestra •
Isaac Karabtchevsky
Villa-Lobos’ War and Victory
Symphonies were commissioned
by the Brazilian government
following the end of the country’s
involvement in World War I. Using
very large orchestral forces, and
conveying the composer’s feelings about the conflict with no sense of
triumphalism, the two Symphonies display a confident use of unusual
and evocative effects, such as the collage of fragments of the Brazilian
national anthem and La Marseillaise in the ‘Battle’ movement of the
Third Symphony. Villa-Lobos’s Symphonies Nos. 6 and 7 can be
found on Naxos 8.573043 in “superb… full-blooded” performances.
(ClassicalCDReview.com)
In 2011 Isaac Karabtchevsky became director of the Heliopolis
Symphony, an orchestra composed of young musicians, most of them
from disadvantaged communities in São Paulo, with which he has
developed educational and social projects. Between 1995 and 2001 he
was musical director of the La Fenice in Venice.
8.573151
George Frideric HANDEL
(1685–1759)
Concerti Grossi, Op. 6
Aradia Ensemble • Kevin Mallon
Handel’s Concerti Grossi contain
some of the finest orchestral
music of the eighteenth century.
The Op. 6 collection brims with a
wealth of variety, colour, and dance
rhythms – Polish and Pastoral
dances, courtly and fast ones – and
Handel’s customary self-borrowings and indeed borrowings from
other composers. The combination of full orchestra with a concertino
solo group of two violins and cello allows both breadth and intimacy,
producing concertos in the fullest sense. On this recording Kevin
Mallon incorporates the later oboe parts for Concertos Nos. 1, 2, 5 and
6, using them as a model for most of the other concertos. When the
oboes are silent, flutes or recorders are added, in line with eighteenthcentury practice.
8.557358-60 (3 CDs)
Krzysztof PENDERECKI
(b. 1933)
Piano Concerto
‘Resurrection’
Concerto for Flute and
Chamber Orchestra
Barry Douglas (piano)
Łukasz Długosz (flute)
Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra
Antoni Wit
Scored for a large orchestra, including triple wind and a raft of
percussion, Penderecki’s Piano Concerto, heard here in its 2007
revision first performed by Barry Douglas, renews the composer’s
direct involvement with the ‘grand’ concerto tradition that culminated
in Rachmaninov and Prokofiev. Its subtitle ‘Resurrection’ refers to
the melody based on a chorale of a non-religious character, which
gradually make its way into the foreground before emerging with
striking power at the work’s climax. The more modest forces used
in the Flute Concerto place no restriction on this work’s exceptional
emotional range and kaleidoscopic colours.
Łukasz Długosz has been the composer’s flautist of choice for
numerous performances of the Flute Concerto, and Barry Douglas
was soloist in the première of the revised Piano Concerto in 2007. The
pedigree of soloists, conductor and orchestra make these recordings a
‘must-have’ for all collectors.
8.572696
2
Elizabeth Cragg (soprano) • Deborah
Miles-Johnson (contralto) • Daniel
Auchincloss (tenor) • Lawrence White
(bass) • St Albans Cathedral Choir •
Sinfonia Verdi • Andrew Lucas
Allegro and Andante (Fantasia) in F minor, K. 608
Tom Winpenny (organ)
During his years in Salzburg, Mozart wrote a series of shorter mass
settings, for which he drew on the models of his senior colleague
Michael Haydn. Regina coeli reveals his supreme skill at writing for the
solo voice. The Missa brevis in D, K. 194 is a work of great solemnity,
employing a remarkable range of expressive contrasts, whilst the
Missa brevis in B flat, K. 275 is notable for its sublime lyricism and
grace. The Allegro and Andante in F minor, K. 608 is regarded
as Mozart’s finest work for the organ and has become one of the
cornerstones of the organ repertory.
8.573092
Leo FALL (1873–1925)
The Rose of Stambul
(operetta in three acts, sung in
English)
Kimberly McCord (soprano) • Alison
Kelly (soprano) • Erich Buchholz
(tenor) • Gerald Frantzen (tenor) •
Robert Morrissey (bass) • Chicago
Folks Operetta • John Frantzen
Leo Fall’s early career mirrored that
of his famous contemporary Franz
Lehár. Both were born in provinces of the Austro-Hungarian Empire,
and soon moved to the Imperial capital, Vienna. There they both
wrote a series of glorious operettas. Fall’s The Rose of Stambul, set in
Ottoman Turkey, is a sparkling masterpiece that ran for fifteen months,
the most successful such work since Lehár’s The Merry Widow,
composed eleven years earlier. The plot offers comedy, mistaken
identity, cultural misunderstandings, exoticism, and, of course, a
romance that must overcome various obstacles, while Fall’s melodies
are exquisitely beautiful, with numerous hit songs.
8.660326-27 (2 CDs)
Franz Anton HOFFMEISTER
(1754–1812)
Flute Concertos, Volume 1
Bruno Meier (flute)
Prague Chamber Orchestra
World Première Recordings
As prolific a composer as Haydn,
Franz Anton Hoffmeister was a
formative figure in his day, also
acting as a significant music
publisher for Mozart and Beethoven.
Meeting the tastes of the time with a perfect blend of grace and
artistry, both of these flute concertos are filled with radiant elegance
and catchy melodies, allied to symphonic dimensions and passages of
remarkable virtuosity for the soloist.
Franz Anton Hoffmeister might not leap out as an immediately
commercial name, but interest has been generated recently
through our acclaimed release of his unusual Double Bass Quartets
(8.572187). The flute world has already been stirred up in Europe
through these première recordings of Hoffmeister flute concertos in
their German edition (8.551292), and the time is ripe for this delightful
and entirely new classical repertoire to take on the world stage.
Flautist Bruno Meier has already had great success with his
German Flute Concertos album (8.570593), described as a “splendid
performance, rich in melodic charm and brilliant display, showing off
Meier’s exceptional artistry” by Classical Net.
8.572738
FEB-MAR 2013
Carlo Putelli (tenor) • Davide
Malvestio (bass) • Nuovo Coro
Lirico Sinfonico Romano • Orchestra
Sinfonica di Roma • Francesco La
Vecchia
Includes World Première Recording
Goffredo Petrassi was one of the
most important Italian composers of the twentieth century. Beginning
with the previously unrecorded Divertimento in C, this release focuses
on Petrassi’s compositions of the 1930s and 40s. Employing an
unusual mix of styles and idioms, as well as brief quotations from
Ravel and Stravinsky, the Partita was the first work to win him renown.
The eloquent Quattro inni sacri (Four Sacred Hymns), described
by the composer as ‘music of today for the faithful of today’, were
intended as an antidote ‘to the unctuous and conformist style in use
in our churches’ but, in reality, are only ever heard in the concert
hall. Soon after the start of the Second World War, Petrassi wrote his
meditative madrigale drammatico, Coro di Morti (Chorus of the Dead),
the composer’s first setting of a non-sacred text and perhaps his finest
achievement in the field of vocal music.
8.572411
Frederico de FREITAS
(1902–1980)
The Silly Girl’s Dance
The Wall of Love • Medieval
Suite • Ribatejo
Royal Scottish National Orchestra •
Álvaro Cassuto
Frederico de Freitas was one of
Portugal’s most prolific composers,
whose highly successful ballets are
inspired by local folklore and romance. The Silly Girl’s Dance is a work
of exuberant musical vitality about a timid village girl who turns out
to be the loveliest of them all. The Wall of Love describes innocent
amorous encounters, the Medieval Suite conjures ‘the fragrance of
medieval Portuguese poetry’, while dances, songs and ‘fiestas’ are
evoked in the lively Ribatejo.
Álvaro Cassuto is Portugal’s foremost conductor. He has a
discography encompassing over fifty recordings, among which a highly
successful ongoing series for Marco Polo and Naxos, initiated in 1997
and dedicated to Portugal’s most important composers, which has met
with enthusiastic and unanimous praise from the international press.
8.573095
PSALMS AND MOTETS FOR
REFLECTION
Choir of St John’s (Elora) • Michael
Bloss (organ) • Noel Edison
Choral elements from Protestant,
Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and
medieval traditions are included
in this anthology of anthems and
motets, many drawing inspiration
from the Psalms. They range from
sixteenth-century Germany (Eccard),
through the nineteenth-century Anglican tradition of Hanforth, Stainer
and Stanford and the twentieth-century Catholicism of Poulenc, to
contemporary England (Rose, Tavener, Harvey), Scotland (MacMillan),
Australia (Halley) and the USA (Paulus). Previous recordings from
the Choir of St John’s, Elora have been described as “a real joy”
(Gramophone on 8.557037, Faire is the Heaven), and “world-class…
sensational” (ClassicsToday.com on 8.554823, Psalms for the Soul).
Noel Edison serves as Organist and Choirmaster of St John’s Anglican
Church in Elora, one of the few fully professional church choirs
in Canada. He is conductor and artistic director of two worldclass
Canadian ensembles, the large-scale Toronto Mendelssohn Choir and
the chamber-sized Elora Festival Singers.
8.572540
FEB-MAR 2013
Ivan KARABITS (1945–2002)
Concertos for Orchestra
No. 1 ‘Musical Gift to Kiev’ •
No. 2 • No. 3 ‘Lamentations’
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra •
Kirill Karabits
Includes World Première Recording
Following Ukraine’s independence
in 1991, Ivan Karabits became the
country’s leading musical figure.
An inspirational composer, artistic
director and teacher, he absorbed into his own music three particular
traditions: Mahler, Shostakovich, and the folk-music of his native
country. The colourful, virtuosic and at times theatrical Concertos
for Orchestra reflect the influence of his friend and mentor, Rodion
Shchedrin. Following Karabits’ untimely death, his compatriot Valentin
Silvestrov composed two heartfelt memorials. The first of these, Elegie,
makes use of Karabits’ own unfinished pencil sketches which sit side
by side with Silvestrov’s own ideas as the piece progresses, almost as
if it were a dialogue between the two friends about their work.
Kirill Karabits was appointed Principal Conductor of the Bournemouth
Symphony Orchestra in 2009, his contract extended to the end of the
2015/16 season. He is the son of the composer Ivan Karabits.
8.572633
Simon MAYR (1763–1845)
Il sagrifizio di Jefte (Sacred
Oratorio)
Hrachuhí Bassénz (soprano) •
Stefanie Irányi (mezzo-soprano)
Robert Sellier (tenor) • Jochen
Kupfer (bass) • Simon Mayr Chorus
and Ensemble • Directed from the
harpsichord by Franz Hauk
World Première Recording
It is only in the last few years,
largely as a result of the pioneering performances of the Simon
Mayr Chorus and Ensemble conducted by Franz Hauk, that Mayr
has come to be valued as one of the most significant composers
of operatic and sacred music of his time. Il sagrifizio di Jefte (The
Sacrifice of Jephtha), first performed in 1795, is a dramatic oratorio
with a wealth of variety in both the vocal and instrumental writing,
which foreshadows the operas to come.
The Simon Mayr Chorus was established by Franz Hauk in 2003.
The repertoire of the chorus includes works from the sixteenth to the
twentieth century. A special emphasis is laid on authentic historical
performance and on the promotion of music by Simon Mayr at the
highest cultural level.
8.572719-20
Heinrich Wilhelm ERNST
(1812–1865)
Erlkönig, Op. 26 • Le
Carnaval de Venise, Op. 18
Etudes pour le violon à
plusieurs reprises
Variations brillantes sur un
Thème de Rossini, Op. 4
Feuillet d’album • Elégie sur
la mort d’un objet chéri
Trio pour un violon
Josef Špaček, violin • Gordon
Josef Špaček (violin) • Gordon Back (piano)
The Moravian Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst is a dazzling example of the
nineteenthcentury violinist-composer, of whom the greatest was Ernst’s
sometime rival, Paganini. Indeed it was the Italian who persuaded
Ernst to follow the life of a touring virtuoso, in which rôle he was to
perform with the greatest musicians in Europe, earning the admiration
of men such as Chopin and Mendelssohn. The Elégie sur la mort d’un
objet chéri, mentioned by Tolstoy in The Kreutzer Sonata, was one of
the best-known violin works of the century, and the Polyphonic Studies
offer a compendium of violin technique on a par with the works of
Paganini himself.
8.572575
3
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Goffredo PETRASSI (1904–
2003): Partita • Divertimento
Quattro inni sacri • Coro di
morti
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN
(1770–1827)
Piano Trios, Volume 5
Xyrion Trio: Nina Tichman (piano) •
Ida Bieler (violin) • Maria Kliegel (cello)
Dedicated to his friend and pupil
Archduke Rudolf, Beethoven’s
expansive Archduke Trio is his
greatest work in the genre, though
increasing deafness meant it also
signalled his final appearances as a
performer. The cheerful Piano Trio in E flat major is an earlier work,
though only discovered amongst the composer’s papers after his
death, and the Kakadu Variations is another good humoured work
based on a popular song of the day. With the American Record
Guide “impressed with every recording”, Volumes 1 (8.557723), 2
(8.557724), 3 (8.570255) and 4 (8.570943) are also available.
The Xyrion Trio’s cycle of Beethoven’s Piano Trios and other
chamber works has already established a firm following and wide
critical acclaim, with volume 3 (8.570255) described as “every bit as
exceptional as the first volume (8.557723)” by American Record Guide,
and volume 4 (8.570943) as “an unqualified success” (Fanfare).
This volume forms a climax for the whole series, including as it does
Beethoven’s masterpiece of the genre, the Archduke Trio.t
8.572343
Juan Carlos Rodríguez (piano)
Robert SCHUMANN
(1810–1856)
Vier Märsche, Op. 76 •
Vier Fugen, Op. 72
Sieben Klavierstücke in
Fughettenform, Op. 126
Album für die Jugend
(Additional Pieces)
Albumblatt für Klavier:
Ahnung
Schumann’s Four Fugues, Op. 72 were written during a period of illhealth in 1845 but these masterly pieces reveal nothing of his
private turmoil. The Album für die Jugend followed in 1848. In this
recording we hear the alternative version of Wilder Reiter (The Wild
Rider), with its slightly more ambitious ending, as well as those pieces
Schumann excised from the first edition. The Revolutionary
year of 1849 brought resurgence in his creativity in the form of the
Four Marches, Op. 76 which are imbued with a martial spirit. The
Albumblatt: Ahnung (Album Leaf: Foreboding) was only rediscovered
in 2007.
8.573094
Helmut WALCHA
(1907–1991)
Chorale Preludes, Volume 3
Delbert Disselhorst (organ)
Helmut Walcha was one of the
most influential organists of the 20th
century. His Chorale Preludes stand
as a testament to his enrichment of
the Lutheran tradition, building on
the inheritance of Baroque masters
to create works of great expressive
clarity and contrapuntal transparency, as well as introducing highly
individual organ colours and sonorities. Volumes 1 and 2 of this four
volume complete collection can be found on Naxos 8.572910 and
8.572911.
Easily one of the best known organists of his generation and
universally acclaimed for his recordings of the organ works of J.S.
Bach, the compositions of Helmut Walcha are in wide circulation
amongst organists the world over while regretfully remaining
unrecognized by record labels. This new four volume collection
corrects this state of affairs.
Delbert Disselhorst is Professor Emeritus of the University of Iowa. As
a recipient of a Fulbright grant in organ, he studied at the Staatliche
Hochschule für Musik in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, where he was
a student of Helmut Walcha.
8.572912
4
Camille SAINT-SAËNS
(1835–1921)
Piano Quartet in B flat
major, Op. 41 • Piano
Quintet in A minor, Op. 14 •
Barcarolle in F major, Op. 108
Fine Arts Quartet • Cristina Ortiz
(piano)
Saint-Saëns holds a vital place in the
history of French chamber music. At
a time when his compatriots were more devoted to opera and song,
Saint-Saëns (who wrote both, too) repeatedly produced chamber
music of compelling individuality and lasting significance. The 1875
Piano Quartet in B flat major, Op. 41 remains one of the great works
in the chamber repertory, a masterful example of the composer’s
organisational skill and lyric gifts. The gorgeous Barcarolle is followed
by the youthful Piano Quintet in A minor, Op. 14, a brilliantly confident
work with a concerto-like rôle for the piano.
Both the Quartet and Quintet are amongst Saint-Saëns’ most
important chamber works, the Quintet is a fiery youthful work, the
Quartet a fully mature work that is one of the greatest in the Piano
Quartet repertoire. There are a number of recordings of both works,
but the most obvious competitor is Hyperion’s set of the composer’s
chamber music.
8.572904
Gottlieb MUFFAT
(1690–1770)
Componimenti Musicali: No. 1
(Parthie in C major) • No. 7
Parthie in D minor
Parthie Parisien in A minor
Naoko Akutagawa (harpsichord)
Includes World Première Recordings
Gottlieb Muffat was the youngest son
of composer Georg Muffat, inheriting
a prodigious talent at the keyboard. The cosmopolitan nature of his
works shows the influence of French, German and Italian styles,
and his music was of such quality that it was extensively ‘borrowed’
by Handel. The elegant and at times spectacularly ornamented
and virtuoso Componimenti Musicali suites are amongst Muffat’s
few surviving works. Naoko Akutagawa’s recording of Graupner’s
Partitas (8.570459) has been described by MusicWeb International as
“captivating from beginning to end”.
8.572610
Samuel ADLER (b. 1928)
Cantos • Close Encounters •
Five Snapshots
David Fulmer (violin) • Randolph
Kelly (viola) • Amir Eldan (cello)
Kurt Muroki (double bass) • Ricardo
Iznaola (guitar) • June Han (harp)
The winner of many prestigious
awards for composition, Samuel Adler
is also Professor emeritus at the
Eastman School of Music. His Canto
series was written to meet the challenge of providing concert etudes for
every orchestral instrument. This program presents the complete Cantos
for solo string instruments, exploring the great possibilities in each
instrument from virtuoso feats to lyrical poignancy, ‘moody’ pensiveness
to sharply observed wit and humor. The duet Close Encounters
expresses ecstatic feelings of love, while the string trio Five Snapshots
reflects contrasting scenes of nature. Samuel Adler’s Of Musique and a
selection of other chamber works can be found on Naxos 8.559602. His
Fifth Symphony can be heard on 8.559415.
A prolific and gifted composer, Samuel Adler became professor of
composition at North Texas State University, in 1957, and in 1966 moved
to the Eastman School of Music, serving for twenty years from 1974 as
head of the composition department. He went on to teach at The Juilliard
School and has won considerable distinction in his long career, with a
series of compositions that range from the diatonic to the serial.
8.559743
FEB-MAR 2013
Mellissa Hughes (soprano) • David
Kravitz (baritone) • Rachel Barton
Pine (violin) • David Krakauer
(clarinet) • Christopher Thompson
(baritenor) • Steven Spooner (piano)
Imani Winds • Borromeo String Quartet
Mohammed Fairouz is one of the most frequently performed,
commissioned, and recorded composers of his generation, melding
Middle-Eastern music and poetry with Western structures to deeply
expressive effect. Native Informant, written for leading international
soloist Rachel Barton Pine, embodies Arabic fiddling motifs as well
as songful excitement, underpinned by a lament for the victims of the
Egyptian Revolution. The lullaby Tahwidah and the song cycle Posh
evoke tenderness and loss, whilst Jebel Lebnan was commissioned by
the Imani Winds and musically chronicles events from the Lebanese
Civil War and their effect on the current face of Lebanon.
LANDSCAPES:
Torke • Ticheli • Copland
Ji Hye Jung (marimba) • Steve
Leisring (trumpet) • Margaret Marco
(English horn) • University of Kansas
Wind Ensemble • Paul W. Popiel
Landscapes is a journey through
the rich tapestry of American wind
band music, performed by one of the
country’s leading ensembles. One
of Michael Torke’s most admired
works, Javelin has been described as a ‘sonic olympiad’, while his
arrangement of Mojave was made especially for Ji Hye Jung and the
University of Kansas Wind Ensemble. Frank Ticheli explores vibrant
colors in sound in his moving An American Elegy, while the Copland
arrangements encapsulate the depth and variety of his imagination.
Paul W. Popiel is the Director of Bands at the University of Kansas,
only the seventh person to hold this position in the band’s storied 125year history. He conducts the KU Wind Ensemble, directs the graduate
program in wind conducting, and guides all aspects of the university
band program.
8.559744
8.573104
Great Conductors • Sibelius Première Recordings
World première recordings, 1932-34
Mark Obert-Thorn, producer and audio restoration engineer
Jean SIBELIUS (1865–1957)
Symphony No. 4 in A minor, Op. 63
The Philadelphia Orchestra • Leopold Stokowski
Symphony No. 6 in D minor, Op. 104
Finnish National Orchestra • Georg Schnéevoigt
Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 105
BBC Symphony Orchestra • Serge Koussevitzky
Three historically significant première recordings of Sibelius symphonies are brought together on this reissue
for the first time. Finnish conductor Georg Schnéevoigt was close to Sibelius and a perceptive interpreter of his music, making this lucid and
controlled first recording of the Sixth Symphony following the death of Robert Kajanus, who was to have recorded the complete symphonies. Made
during the Great Depression, Leopold Stokowski’s compelling performance of the Fourth Symphony reflects the composer’s ‘solitude and pain’.
Renowned Russian conductor Serge Koussevitzky directs Sibelius’s final Seventh Symphony in a famously intense live performance.
8.111399
Franz SCHUBERT
Winterreise Op. 89 D. 911
Wolfgang Holzmair
Andreas Haefliger (piano)
Wolfgang Holzmair is a regular performer in concert venues throughout the world. His prominence in the UK
continues with performances at the Wigmore Hall on 3rd February and 23rd July, St. Albans Organ Festival and in
Norwich on 31st January.
C5149
100 Sacred Choral
Masterworks
MOZART • SCHUBERT
• BEETHOVEN • BACH •
MENDELSSOHN • VERDI
Various Artists
C7155 (5 CDs)
FEB-MAR 2013
MASSES
MOZART • HAYDN •
SCHUBERT • WEBER •
BEETHOVEN • CHERUBINI •
GOUNOD
Various Artists
C7161 (10 CDs)
5
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Mohammed FAIROUZ
(b. 1985)
Native Informant – Sonata
for Solo Violin • Tahwidah
Chorale Fantasy • Posh • For
Victims • Jebel Lebnan
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Felix WEINGARTNER
(1863-1942)
Symphony No. 7
Maya Boog • Franziska Gottwald
• Rolf Romei • Christopher Bolduc
• Babette Mondry • Tschechischer
Philharmonischer Chor Brünn •
Sinfonieorchester Basel •
Marko Letonja
Weingartner’s symphonies.
A landmark recording in being
the first ever complete survey of
Symphony No. 7 calls for a full orchestra, reinforced brass, choir, four
vocal soloists and solo organ – all skilfully blended together to create
an impressive work and one which ought to be better known in the
symphonic repertoire.
777103-2 (SACD)
Complete Organ Works
Friedhelm Flamme
The composers on this title were
all active in the Baltic Sea region.
Friedhelm Flamme plays the organ
in St. Mary’s Church, Helsingoer,
which has been restored with a quasichamber-musical sound including a
subdued and elegant bass volume,
reed pipes of vocal character, and a
treble to imitate the human voice.
Friedhelm Flamme’s last release on CPO (Praetorious Organ Works
777345-2) received an excellent review and was awarded 5 stars by
Choir & Organ Magazine.
777502-2 (SACD)
Johan Gottfried Hendrik
MANN (1858-1904)
Clarinet Concerto • Violin
Concerto • Feest Praeludium
• Troisième Suite
Sebastian Manz • Akiko Yamada
Osnabrücker Symphonieorchester •
Hermann Bäumer
death in 1904.
Gottfried Mann was a Dutch
composer and conductor who has
sunk into relative obscurity since his
The rebirth of a genuine masterpiece that originally enjoyed great
renown and was played from Russia to America, the Clarinet Concerto
for unknown reasons simply vanished from the clarinet repertoire.
This highly virtuosic and melodious piece is brought back to life by
Sebastian Manz a rapidly rising star of the clarinet world.
777620-2
Michael PRAETORIUS
(1571-1621)
Ostermesse • Easter Mass
Weser-Renaissance Bremen,
Manfred Cordes
After the successful release of
Advent and Christmas music by
the early baroque master Michael
Praetorius, CPO are pleased to
present the world premiere recording
of his Easter Mass.
The extant Wolfenbüttel church constitution of 1569 enables us to
experience the Mass with the parts and in the order that it would have
been celebrated during Praetorius’ term as chapel master.
999953-2
6
Franz LEHÁR (1870-1948)
Der Göttergatte
Liesl Andergast • Hennry Herze •
Anton Dermota • Franz Borsos • Fred
Liewehr • Lizzi Holzschuh
Wiener Rundfunkorchester & Chor •
Max Schönherr
Der Göttergatte is Lehár’s one and
only comic operetta parodying the
ancient Greek gods.
This historical recording from 1945 (a few weeks prior to the end
of World War II) is a genuine gem and could not be topped by any
new recording. The cast is simply dazzling, headed by Vienna’s then
leading Mozart tenor Anton Dermota.
777029-2 (2 CDs)
Felix DRAESEKE (1835-1913)
Complete Symphonies
NDR Radiophilharmonie Hannover
Jörg-Peter Weigle
Dubbed ‘the mighty warrior’ by Franz
Liszt, Draeseke was one of the most
gifted composers of the New German
School. From the late nineteenth
century until the early twentieth
century Draeseke’s music was held
in great esteem and performed by first-class artists of his time.
Draeseke’s complete symphonic oeuvre is now available in this special
priced box set.
777786-2 (3 CDs)
Dora PEJAČEVIĆ (1885-1923)
Chamber Works
Piano Quintet Op. 40
String Quartet Op. 58
Piano Quartet Op. 25
Impromptu Op. 9
Oliver Triendl
Quatuor Sine Nomine
This is CPO’s second release of
Pejačević’s chamber music. The
internationally active and renowned
Sine Nomine Quartet from Switzerland and Oliver Triendl are
outstanding advocates on behalf of this versatile composer.
The last movement of the Piano Quintet Op. 40 is a highlight; with a
solemn introduction and animated theme, which pervades the entire
movement with kinetic energy.
777421-2 (2 CDs)
Johann GRABBE
(1585-1655)
Madrigals & Instrumental
Works
Weser-Renaissance Bremen
Manfred Cordes
Comparable to Heinrich Schütz
as a composer but not as well
known, Grabbe is regarded as an
important mediator of Italian vocal
artistry in the north-western region
of Germany. Since he was influenced by Franco-Flemish polyphony
and the English compositional style, he embodied the leading musical
trends of his time.
This release continues CPO’s new series in musicians and music of
the Weser-Rennaisance in northern Germany.
777662-2
FEB-MAR 2013
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
conducted by Carl Davis
At four in the afternoon a single blast of cannon fire signals the opening of the gates of many a stately home in
summer and thousands of picnickers pour into grounds, set up camp and prepare to listen to preordained set of
classical hits.
This is a re-issue of an album first issued 1992 celebrating the years that Carl conducted Summer Concerts it is a
unique collection of popular works presented in unfamiliar but stunning arrangements.
Finlandia is recorded adding a new choral arrangement with an fervently patriotic American text,
The 1812 Overture recorded with a choral arrangement using Tsarist text
Pomp and Circumstance March No.1 sung with its ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ text.
Elgar’s outrageously elaborate arrangement of Parry’s Jerusalem.
The version of Souza’s Stars and Stripes March is arranged by David Cullen into an orchestral explosion.
Recorded in Abbey Road Studios this is a memorable album of Carl conducting Classical Festival Favourites.
CDC020
Schubert’s Complete
Symphonies
Symphonieorchester des
Bayerischen Rundfunks • Lorin
Maazel
With his works by single
composer, Lorin Maazel made
history as Chief Conductor of
the Symphonieorchester des
Bayerischen Rundfunks. After the
successful release of the album
containing the complete symphonic works of Anton Bruckner, the
BR-KLASSIK label now presents the complete symphonies of Franz
Schubert, recorded in 2001. The present Chief Conductor of the
Munich Philharmonic had already conducted Schubert’s “Unfinished
Symphony” at the age of eight.
900712 (3 CDs)
Celloquy
Ani Aznavoourian (cello)
Lera Auerbach (piano)
Lera Auerbach’s 24 Preludes for
violoncello and piano (1999) receives
its world-premiere recording on
Celloquy in a performance by Ani
Aznavoorian, an award-winning
American cellist of international
stature, and Auerbach, a Russianborn virtuoso pianist and one of the
most widely-performed composers of the new generation.
Auerbach is the youngest composer on the roster of Hamburg’s
prestigious international music publishing company Hans Sikorski,
home to Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Schnittke. “Her music is lyrical,
passionate, and often seems to straddle the past and present,”
observed the host of a recent Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
program devoted to Auerbach’s multi-faceted career.
CDR90000137
J.S BACH
St John Passion
Jeanette Köhn • Mikael Bellini • Mikael Stenbaek • Håkan Ekenäs • Lars Johansson Brissman
St Jacobs Chamber Choir • REbaroque
Maria Lindal • Gary Graden
PRCD2065
Carl Philipp Emanuel BACH
(1714–1788)
Johann Christian BACH
(1735–1782)
Johann Sebastian BACH
(1685–1750)
Johannes BRAHMS
(1833-1897)
The Symphonies
Chamber Orchestra of Europe
Paavo Berglund
Anastasia Injushina (piano)
Hamburger • Camerata
Ralf Gothóni
Anastasia Injushina, prize winner
of the ARD competition in Munich,
has performed internationally and has made numerous recordings
for radio and television. She has also performed chamber music
with some of the world’s top musicians. In 2009 she became Artistic
Director of the “Springlight Chamber Music Festival” in Helsinki.
The Hamburger Camerata is known for its wide-ranging and
sophisticated output, its commitment to the Classical repertoire and to
contemporary music.
ODE 1224-2
FeB-MAR 2013
honour of his memory.
Paavo Berglund (1929–2012) is
considered to be one of the most
acclaimed Finnish conductors of the
last few decades. This highly praised
symphony cycle is re-released in
The Chamber Orchestra of Europe, hailed as one of the finest ensembles
in the world, has released over 100 recordings with the world’s leading
conductors and soloists, winning several prestigious awards.
Present day performances of Brahms symphonies with smaller string
forces are rare, but there is evidence that the size of orchestra in Brahms’s
time was not fixed and, indeed, Brahms’s own orchestra in Meiningen
performed his fourth symphony with almost the same forces as are used
on this recording.
ODE 1229-2T (3 CDs)
7
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Carl Conducts…
Classical Festival Favourites
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Gustav MAHLER
Symphony No. 1
Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra • Hartmut Haenchen
Symphony No. 8 • ‘Symphony of a Thousand’
Rita Cullis • Angela Maria Blasi • Ofelia Sala (SOPRANO) • Reinhild Runkel • Catherine Keen (MEZZOSOPRANO) • Glenn Winslade (TENOR) • John Bröcheler (BARITONE) • Kurt Rydl (BASS) • National Choir of the
Ukraine ‘Dumka’ • Ukrainian Radio Choir • Dresden Philharmonic Children’s Choir • Netherlands Philharmonic
Orchestra
Hartmut Haenchen was born in Dresden in 1943. He was awarded first prize at the Carl Maria von Weber
Competition in that city in 1971. During the 1972–3 season he made his debut at the Berlin State Opera, directing
Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov. He appeared there regularly until 1986. From 1973 to 1976, Haenchen was
conductor of the Dresden Philharmonic and a regular guest with the Dresden State Opera. Subsequently, he began to make regular appearances at
Berlin’s Komische Oper.
In 1986, Haenchen became music director of the De Nederlandse Opera (DNO) in Amsterdam and chief conductor of the Netherlands Philharmonic
Orchestra (NPO). His Ring cycle in Amsterdam was an outstanding success and will be revived in 2012–14. He has collaborated with La Scala,
Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and the Opéra National de Paris, and performed with orchestras throughout the world including the
Berlin Philharmonic and Concertgebouw. Projects have included a Mahler cycle with the Orchestre du Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie. In October
2008 he was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit of the Republic of Germany, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to music and the arts.
ICAC 5094 (2 CDs)
Ludwig Van BEETHOVEN
Piano Sonata No. 3
Maurice RAVEL: Valses
nobles et sentimentales
Fryderyk CHOPIN
Nocturne op.27 No.2
Ballade No.1
Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein (1887–1982) was
one of the greatest pianists of the
twentieth century. After brief studies with Paderewski in Switzerland in
1903, Rubinstein moved to Paris, where he met Ravel and Dukas, and
played Saint-Saëns’s G minor Concerto to the composer’s approval.
He made his debuts in the USA in 1906 and London in 1912. He was
a superb performer of Chopin and his 1960s recordings of nearly
all Chopin’s solo piano music have been considered essential to
any record collection since their release. He was also a formidable
interpreter of Spanish music.
ICAC 5095
Franz SCHUBERT
Symphony No. 4
Benjamin BRITTEN:
Serenade for tenor, horn and
strings Jean SIBELIUS
Symphony No.2
Sir John Barbirolli
Sir John Barbirolli (1899–1970),
born in London of Italian and French
parentage, is remembered above all
as conductor of the Hallé Orchestra in Manchester, which he helped
save from dissolution in 1943 and conducted for the rest of his life.
Earlier in his career he was Arturo Toscanini’s successor as music
director of the New York Philharmonic, serving from 1936 to 1943.
He was also chief conductor of the Houston Symphony from 1961 to
1967, and was a guest conductor of many other orchestras, including
the BBC Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, the
Philharmonia, the Berlin Philharmonic and the Vienna Philharmonic,
with all of which he made recordings.
ICAC 5096 (2 CDs)
Johannes BRAHMS (1833-1897)
Grzegorz Nowak Conducts Brahms
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: Grzegorz Nowak
This five CD set features a brand new recording of the complete set of Brahms' majestic symphonies (Nos 1 - 4).
The set also includes a selection of Brahms' most popular shorter works, from the musical merriment of the
Academic Festival Overture, to the emotional and volatile Tragic Overture and the masterly Variations on a Theme
by Haydn. The final disc is dedicated to the lyrical Serenade No.1 in D major, symphonic in conception but with a
much lighter touch and full of whimsy
Grzegorz Nowak is the Principal Associate Conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and has led the
Orchestra on tours to Switzerland, Turkey and Armenia and in numerous appearances in London and throughout the UK. He has recorded
an extensive range of key classical repertoire with the RPO, including Dvořák's Symphonies Nos 6-9, Shostakovich's Symphony No.5 and
Mendelssohn's 'Scottish' and 'Italian' Symphonies.
RPO SP 038
THERE’S A TIME
DOUG MACLEOD
Doug MacLeod is a unique, powerful guitarist with a rich and soulful voice, singing original songs based on his own
life and experiences. This is ‘Genuine Original Acoustic Music’ at its very best.
13 new MacLeod originals highlight this richly detailed recording by Grammy® winning engineer Keith Johnson,
done at Skywalker Sound in Marin County, CA. This trio performance features Doug’s longtime bassist Denny Croy
and Jimi Bott, one of the most recorded, awarded and respected blues drummers in the world.
Doug uses 4 strikingly different sounding guitars: 3 National Reso-Phonic instruments, including a 12-string, and his
old Gibson C-100, the guitar he calls ‘Little Bit’ because each time he plays her a little bit more of her falls off!
RR-130
8
FEB-MAR 2013
Andrzej Kosendiak (conductor)
The works of Grzegorz Gerwazy
Gorczycki are today recognized both
as valuable records of early Polish
music and above all as compositions
of great aesthetic value. They
constitute a concert repertoire yet
fulfill a somewhat different function
than during the composer’s times.
Musicians, reaching today for the works of the Wawel Kapellmeister
written three centuries ago, search for specific interpretive means of
attaining an optimal sound and extracting fully the artistic qualities of
his music. A perfect outcome of such research is the performance of
works featured in this recording.
Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH
Marcin MARKOWICZ
Karol SZYMANOWSKI
Bridge
Lutosławski Quartet
Jakub Jakowicz (violin)
Marcin Markowicz (violin)
Artur Rozmysłowicz (viola)
Maciej Młodawski (cello)
ACD 186
ACD 172
Krzysztof WOŁEK
Elements
Agata Zubel (soprano) • Krzysztof Wołek (live electronics) • Szymon Bywalec (conductor)
Orkiestra Muzyki Nowej (OMN)
Krzysztof Wołek (born in 1976 in Bytom, Poland) is a composer, electronic music performer, concert organizer
and educator. He is a passionate advocate of contemporary acoustic and electronic music and multimedia
compositions. His interdisciplinary in­ter­ests resulted in annual concerts organized under his supervision and in
collaborative works with dancers and visual artists. Even the short description above is informative as concerns
the position of the artist in the environment of new music, where a composer not only writes his works on
manuscript paper, but also takes on an active role during performances as an improviser or performer of the
live electronics portion of the work. In recent decades contemporary music has embraced a variety of multimedia arts, requiring the mastery of
new technology (not only using but also developing software that serves the score as well its amalgamated sound in real time) and remaining in
symbiotic coexistence with other art forms, expanding a purely acoustic layer with visual layers, either with theatrical and paratheatrical or cinematic
and paracinematic elements contained often within a video component. It is within these creative currents that Krzysztof Wołek finds a myriad of
possibilities for his artistic expression.
ACD 188
Dmitry SHOSTAKOVICH
Symphony No.8 in C minor
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Gennady Rozhdestvensky (conductor)
Composed during the Second World War, Shostakovich’s Eighth Symphony is a powerful work that juxtaposes
music of unremitting bleakness and moments of shattering brutality, ending in a tentative expression of optimism.
Today it stands not only as a chilling reminder of some of the darkest days of the 20th century, but also as a
reminder of Shostakovich’s acute musical imagination and craftsmanship. Gennady Rozhdestvensky conducts the
London Philharmonic Orchestra in this live 1983 concert recording from Royal Festival Hall.
LPO-0069
Membra Jesu nostri
Vocal Works by Dietrich
Buxtehude
Knabenchor Hannover (Hanover
Boys Choir) • Himlische Cantorey •
Barockensemble L’Arco • Jörg
Breiding
A spirited interpretation and authentic
colours of sound are the unmistakable
hallmarks of the recording of the
cantata cycle ‘Membra Jesu Nostri’,
performed by the Knabenchor Hannover (Hanover Boys Choir). The
Knabenchor is joined here by the Himlische Cantorey and the Baroque
ensemble L’Arco. Both ensembles have appeared in numerous
concerts together with the choir under the direction of Jörg Breiding.
This disc features three vocal works by Dietrich Buxtehude, performed
in historically adequate manner – this entails the use of period
instruments as well as the performance by a boys’ choir. Even if the
historical performance context is not documented with unshakeable
certainty by sources, the present recording gives an impression of how
these works may have been heard in Buxtehude’s day.
ROP7006
FeB-MAR 2013
Johann Sebastian BACH
Mass in b minor BWV 232
St Thomas’s Boys Choir Leipzig
Leipzig Baroque Orchestra
Thomas Cantor
The Leipziger Volkszeitung heralded
the performance of the B minor Mass
given by Thomanerchor Leipzig
(St Thomas’s Boys Choir) at the
closing concert of the Bachfest 2006
in St Thomas as ‘a new, sounding
benchmark – for Bach in and from Leipzig’. The boys were on equally
‘breath-taking form’ when they recorded their highly acclaimed
interpretation on CD in the same year. This high-end CD edition
includes a comprehensive booklet with extensive notes on the work
and its performers. St Thomas’s Boys Choir (St Thomas’s Boys Choir)
is accompanied by the Leipziger Barockorchester and the renowned
soloists Ute Selbig, Susanne Krumbiegel, Elisabeth Wilke, Martin
Petzold, and Gotthold Schwarz. In short, a magnificent recording of
the B minor Mass, which is frequently apostrophised as Bach’s ‘opus
summum’: the work in which the great cantor of St Thomas takes stock
of his artistic lifetime achievement.
ROP4009/10 (2 CDs)
9
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Grzegorz Gerwazy Gorczycki
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Richard WAGNER
transcribed for solo
piano by August Stradal,
Volume One
Die Walküre • Siegfried
Götterdämmerung
Wesendonck Lieder
Juan Guillermo Vizcarra (piano)
The Czech-born pianist and writer
August Stradal (1860–1930) – a
student of Bruckner and disciple of
Liszt – was one of the more prolific transcribers of the nineteenth and
earlier twentieth centuries, producing a vast quantity of piano music,
including Liszt’s orchestral works, most of the Bruckner symphonies, a
good deal of the Baroque (not least a huge amount of Bach) and much
more, most of it phenomenally difficult to play. This series of recordings
presents his Wagner transcriptions, cast in the best barnstorming
virtuoso tradition.
TOCC0151
Egon KORNAUTH
Jonathan Powell (piano)
The music of the Czech-born
Viennese composer Egon Kornauth
(1891–1959) was once a staple of
Austrian concert-halls, though it
has largely been forgotten in the
half-century since his death. In this
pioneering recording Jonathan Powell
uncovers the many strands that fed
into Kornauth’s rich and full-blooded
soundworld – dark, late-Romantic harmony, inventive counterpoint,
rhythmic assiduity, a fondness for folk-music and, not least, a
straightforward melodic charm.
TOCC0159
David MATTHEWS
Music for Piano
Laura Mikkola (piano)
Orchestra Nova (orchestra)
George Vass (conductor)
In his piano music, as in his
symphonies and string quartets, the
English composer David Matthews
(b. 1943) marries the idiom of
classical tradition with that of his
own day. His 2009 Piano Concerto,
Mozartian in spirit, contains both a tango and a blues; his Piano
Sonata of 1989 includes jazz elements, and his 1997 Variations
feature both blues and a homage to Beethoven. The moods range
from contemplative introspection to fiery, rhythmic energy, captured
here in feisty performances by the Finnish pianist Laura Mikkola, whom
the composer describes as ‘a marvellous exponent of my music’.
TOCC0166
Ludwig Van BEETHOVEN
PIANO SONATAS Opp. 27
Appassionata, 31/2 Tempest,
31/3
Svjatoslav Richter
Svjatoslav Richter created a stir
in New York in the fall of 1960
by justifying Romain Rolland’s
judgement of the Appassionata, i.e.
‘a flood of fire in a bed of granite’. A
true selfportrait of the artist according
to the critics, amazed by his violent and tragical vision in contrast
with the one of the 18 Sonata, pastoral and sober. He adored this
old fashioned suite, without any slow movement, allying the baroque
Morart to the Schumanian forest. He amazes in the famous Tempest
more an intimate reflexion than a Shakesperian wrathful fury.
PRD/DSD350066
10
Phillip RAMEY: Piano Music,
Volume Four: 1959–2011
Stephen Gosling (piano)
The piano music of the American
composer Phillip Ramey (born
in 1939) is rooted in the motoric
athleticism of Prokofiev and Bartók,
tempered with sober lyricism, spicy
modernist dissonance and a fresh
approach to the grand Romantic
gesture. This fourth Toccata Classics
album includes the virtuosic Cossack Variations, the mercurial
Epigrams, Book Two and Lament for Richard III, a dramatic characterstudy of a famous historical villain. Two sonatas add further substance
to a varied programme: No. 3, serially inflected and culminating in a
barbaric finale; and No. 7, infused with declamatory rhetoric, quirky
rhythm and engaging melody.
TOCC0153
Franz LISZT (1811–1886)
The Complete Symphonic
Poems
Risto-Matti Marin (piano)
Liszt’s Czech student August Stradal
(1860–1930) transcribed his thirteen
Symphonic Poems for solo piano
in versions which demand almost
superhuman virtuosity.
Stradal’s transcriptions transform
these revolutionary orchestral
compositions into viable and effective piano works, faithfully preserving
their masterly musical substance.
This series will present not only Stradal’s transcriptions of the
Symphonic Poems but also a number of grandiose paraphrases,
almost all in their first recordings.
TOCC 0092
Bernhard SEKLES (1872–
1933): Chamber Music
Solomia Soroka (violin and viola)
Noreen Silver (cello)
Phillip Silver (piano)
Bernhard Sekles (1872–1933)
was one of the leading figures in
German music in the first decades
of the twentieth century, prominent
as composer, educator and
administrator.
In 1928, as director of the Hoch Conservatorium in Frankfurt, he
established the first academic programme in jazz studies, an act of
courage and conviction that unleashed furious attacks from the Nazi
press.
His own music, banned during the Third Reich, has been virtually
forgotten, although he composed in all major genres, including opera,
symphony, lieder and chamber music.
TOCC 0147
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Piano sonatas D 845 & 850
Svjatoslav Richter
Juxtaposition of the First and
Seconde Grande Sonate for
pianoforte of 1825, one a
melancholic, intimate effusion that
will not smile even in its concluding
rondo, voluntarist and threatening;
the other, brimming with frothy
joy close to a stylized Tyrolienne,
then a refined Ländler whose emotional invention heralds Bruckner,
followed by a moderato as light as it is timeless in its innocent,
inalterable gaiety. A portrait such as only Richter the painter knew
how to compose.
PRD/DSD350067
FEB-MAR 2013
Adrian WILLAERT
The Motets Musica Nova
Singer Pur
Deutsche Radio Philharmonie,
Christoph Poppen
This disc continues Poppen’s
Tchaikovsky cycle with the German
Radio Philharmonic on Oehms.
Even though Tchaikovsky believed
that he had ‘written himself out’ after
his Fourth Symphony, he composed the fifth within a few weeks. The
premiere was only moderately successful, but today, Symphony No. 5
is one of Tchaikovsky’s most popular works.
OC763
The Motets of Willaert have a
mysterious reputation as they
were originally performed only
in clandestine circles for a few
initiates until Alfonso II d’Este had a
collection published in 1559 (Musica
Nova, Venice).
Singer Pur are a world renowned a capella singing group with a
large audience and following. They have won many international
competitions, and have appeared on numerous TV shows. The
ensemble is stylistically diverse performing music from the medieval
right up to the avant-garde.
OC835 (3 CDs)
Claude DEBUSSY
Maurice RAVEL
French Piano Music
BRAHMS: Sonata for Piano
No. 1 • KRIEGER: Estudos
Intervalares • SCHUMANN: 3
Fantasy Pieces Op. 111 •
HÖLLER: Sonata for Piano
No. 3
Benjamin Moser
Benjamin Moser came to international
attention in June 2007 as a prizewinner in the prestigious Tchaikovsky
competition in Moscow. In January of
that year he also won first prize in the
International Young Concert Artists
Auditions in New York.
This programme was chosen by Moser to celebrate the 150th
anniversary of Debussy (2012).
OC423
Fabio Martino
This CD is by prize-winner Fabio
Martino (music competition of the
Cultural Committee of German
Business) and was produced in cooperation with the Bavarian
Broadcasting Company.
This release includes two world premiere recordings of works by Edino
Krieger and York Höller.
OC427
Richard WAGNER
Der Ring des Nibelungen
Richard WAGNER
Overtures & Preludes
Struckmann • Naef • Polaski • Piland •
Franz • Tomlinson • Koch
Hamburg Philharmonic & State Opera
• Simone Young
the last several years.
Featuring Simone Young – this
box set includes a booklet and 14
individual CDs in cardboard cases,
each with a motif of the individual
editions that have been issues over
OC929
Richard WAGNER
The Britannic Organ,
Volume 5
Nikolai in Kiel.
This title was recorded on the
double organ of Hauptkirche St.
OC690 (SACD)
Delian Quartett
Gérard Caussé (viola)
OC844 (2 CDs Digipack)
Robert SCHUMANN
Dichterliebe Op. 48
Alban BERG
Sieben Frühe Lieder
After Crescendo reported in detail
about the ‘shooting stars, Delian
Quartett’ in 2008, the magazine
Ensemble and a number of other
specialist publications have also
acknowledged the extraordinary
development of the group resulting
in several features and promotion.
OC796
J. S. BACH
Cantatas
Arnold Bezuyen • Jura Margulis
Arcis-Vocalists München
Barockorchester L’Arpa Festante •
Thomas Gropper
The Dutch tenor Arnold Bezuyen
has appeared internationally on
the stages of the Teatro alla Scala,
Bayreuth Festival, Covent Garden
and the Vienna State Opera. He
made his debut at the MET last
OC857
FeB-MAR 2013
Hansjörg Albrecht was nominated
for a Grammy in the category of
‘Best Classical Instrumental Solo’ for
his outstanding interpretation of The
Planets by Holst.
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN
The Welte Philharmonie Organ
season.
Hansjörg Albrecht
OC425
11
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Peter I. TCHAIKOVSKY
Symphony No. 5
Slavonic March
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Verdi il Trovatore
ED SPANJAARD
Leoncavallo Pagliacci
Roberto Paternostro
Opera in Ahoy choir • Louis Buskens
Netherlands Ballet Orchestra
Il trovatore ,an opera in four acts by
Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto
by Salvadore Cammarano, based
on the play El Trovador (1836)
by Antonio García Gutiérrez.
Cammarano died in mid-1852
before completing the libretto. This
gave the composer the opportunity to propose significant revisions,
which were accomplished under his direction by the young librettist
Leone Emanuele Bardare, and they are seen largely in the expansion
of the role of Leonora. The opera was first performed at the Teatro
Apollo, Rome, on 19 January 1853 where it “began a victorious march
throughout the operatic world. Today it is given very frequently and is a
staple of the standard operatic repertoire. It appears at number 23 on
the Operabase list of the mostperformed operas worldwide.
Roberto Paternostro
Budapest Opera Chorus
Budapest Opera Children’s Chorus
Budapest Opera Orchestra
Leoncavalli’s Pagliacci remains one
of his unique masterworks. Around
1890, when Pietro Mascagni’s
Cavalleria rusticana premiered,
Leoncavallo was a little-known
composer. After seeing its success,
he decided to write an opera in response, in one act and composed
in the verismo style. Leoncavallo claimed that he took the inspiration
for the story of Pagliacci from a real-life incident from his childhood.
This was a murder in 1865, where the victim was a Leoncavallo family
servant, Gaetano Scavello. The murderer was Gaetano D’Alessandro,
with Luigi D’Alessandro, Gaetano’s brother, as an accomplice to the
crime.
T2CD2012064 (2 CDs)
T2CD2012065
Christoph BERNHARD &
Christian HERWICH
Baroque Lieder
Hamburger Ratsmusik • Klaus
Mertens • Simone Eckert • Ulrich
Wedemeier • Michael Fuerst
The famous bass baritone Klaus
Mertens in a program of enchanting
lieder from the baroque era.
Christoph Bernhard was one of the
first composers who was appointed
by the Dresden court to compose for its famous orchestra, later on
in his life he moved to hamburg, where he worked until his death.
He was one of the fisrst composers who was seriously involved in
composing lieder. His pupil Christian Herwig followed this tradition.
Together, they created a base for the rich German lied tradition,
later perfected by composers such as Haydn, Mozart, Schubert and
Schumann.
T2CD2012074
Georg Friedric HANDEL
Messiah
Leonard Bernstein (conductor)
New York Philharmonic
Westminster Choir
Handels Messiah has been
recorded many times and in many
settings with various ensembles.
Authentic, romantic, theatrical, it is
a masterpiece that can be heard in
many styles and looses nothing of
its strength. Bernstein recorded the Messiah back in the fifties and the
result is astonishing. With Bernstein the result is obviously dramatic,
theatrical and very intense. And unorthodox as Bernstein in this
recording used his own edition which regrouped and reordered the
numbers into a “Christmas section” and an “Easter section”
T2CD2012075 (2 CDs)
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN
Complete piano concertos
Thomas MORLEY
Madrigals and Canzonetta
for 2-5 voices
Wilhelm Kempff (piano) • Berliner
Philharmoniker • Paul van Kempen
(conductor)
Wilhelm Kempff was one of the
true poets mongst pianists. His
Beethoven performances have been
famous ever since he recorded them
for the first time in the early fifties.
In this reissue of the famous
recording with the Berlin Philharmonic and Paul van Kempen we hear
Kempff in one of his best recordings ever.
T2CD2012076 (3 CDs)
Nina Fischer (sopran) • Marie Bo
(mezzo-sopran) • Christian Hauskov
(tenor) • Johannes Rebel (bariton)
Peter Lindeman Jørgensen
Morley was born in Norwich, in
East England, the son of a brewer.
Most likely he was a singer in the
local cathedral from his boyhood,
and he became master of choristers there in 1583. However, Morley
obviously spent some time away from East England, for he later
referred to the great Elizabethan composer of sacred music, William
Byrd, as his teacher; while the dates he studied with Byrd are not
known, they were most likely in the early 1570s. In 1588 he received
his bachelor’s degree from Oxford, and shortly thereafter was
employed as organist at St. Paul’s in London.
T2CD2012078
Johannes BRAHMS
Zigeunerlieder and other choral works
Read by Benjamin Soames
The first eleven Zigeunerlieder, in a well-chosen sequence must be understood as a story, says Brahms. Brahms
put the songs to music either in Thun, Switzerland in the summer of 1887, or in the winter 1887/88 on a
train during a stopover in Budapest. Then followed four Lieder in 1891 together with the vocal quartets and
Nächtens Sehnsucht (Text: Franz Theodor Kugler), followed by op. 112 .The Zigeunerlieder can be seen as both
the vocal counterpart of the Hungarian dances and as the counterpart of the exotic Liebeslieder-Walzer op. 52
and 65. The cycle owes its popularity to the great interest in folk music in the 19th century. Wrongly gypsy music
was largely equated with Hungarian folk music.
The first performance of the Lieder op. 103 took place on 31 October 1888 in Berlin. The cycle was a great success from the start.
Very seldom recorded, this reissue on United Classics gives us the chance to hear these wonderful works and enjoy them to the fullest.
T2CD2012079
12
FEB-MAR 2013
Anthony Rooley (director) • Emma
Kirkby (soprano) • Evelyn Tubb
(soprano) • Joseph Cornwell (tenor)
Andrew King (tenor) • Richard
Wistreich (bass) • David Thomas
(bass)
In spite of Angelo Notari living to
the age of ninety-seven, we know
relatively little about his life. Born
in Padua, Italy, he came to settle in
England at the beginning of the seventeenth century where he was
one of a handful of Italian musicians employed at the courts of Charles
I and Charles II, as well as other nobility. His beautiful music is seldom
performed and this recording by Anthony Rooley and Emma Kirkby
now makes a long awaited return to the catalogue!
T2CD2012080
ROSSINI
Il Barbiere di Siviglia
Orchestra & Coro del •
Teatro Regio di Torino
Bruno Campanella (conductor)
This recording, made in the early
nineties with Rockwell Blake as a
frivolous and dynamic Barbiere,
has a wonderful chamber music
feel to it. Campanella lets the music
flow in a very natural way and as a
result, we hear a very bright and airy
version of the Barbiere in the great Italian tradition.
T2CD2012120 (3 CDs)
THE BRITTEN COLLECTION
The Sixteen & Harry Christophers
This superb collection, released in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Britten’s birth, features all three of The
Sixteen's celebrated Britten recordings.
Arguably the most famous British composer of the 20th century, Benjamin Britten possessed a formidable talent
and distinctive style. His remarkable career spanned over 40 years and this collection of choral works features a
fascinating selection of music from throughout his life.
Works include Hymn to the Virgin, a piece originally conceived during his school days; A Boy was Born which
first brought him to the public’s attention; the much-loved A Ceremony of Carols - a masterpiece composed on board ship as Britten returned to
England from the USA in 1942; and the Choral Dances from ‘Gloriana’ with tenor soloist Ian Partridge.
COR16107 (3 CDs)
Gustav MAHLER
Symphony No. 6
Sharon BRAUNER sings
Yiddish Evergreens
Lounge Jewels
Vienna Symphony Orchestra
Fabio Luisi
Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 6
recorded under the direction of Chief
conductor Fabio Luisi, Symphony
No. 6.
This album encompasses a whole
new musical presentation of
wonderful well known evergreens
sung in the Yiddish language.
WS003
88765444062
ANDREAE: Trio f-moll for piano, violin and violoncello op. 1
SCHUBERT: Andante un poco moderato from the piano trio op.99
KÄSER: Piano trio Nr. 1
LEE: Sonorletten for piano trio and electronic
SCHUMANN: Liehabers Ständchen, op. 34,2 adapted for piano trio
Wahlverwantschaften
Absolut trio
SM180
Richard WAGNER
Der Ring des Nibelungen – Great Scenes
Bayreuth Festival Chorus • Bayreuth Festival Orchestra
Christian Thielemann (Conductor) • Tankred Dorst (Director)
‘This set is essential’ concluded Gramophone of the Ring cycle from the home of Wagner performance, the
Bayreuth Festival, when this 2008 production was issued complete. Among the most distinguished Wagner
conductors of our age, Christian Thielemann leads a performance of masterful pacing and burning conviction that
features richly detailed interpretations from many of today’s most experienced interpreters of their complex and
glorious roles. Now distilled on to two discs, here is The Ring in a nutshell.
OA CD9011 D (2 CDs)
FeB-MAR 2013
13
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Angelo NOTARI
The first new music, 1613
CLASSICAL MUSIC
The Russian Archives
Oistrakh Trio play Russian
Piano Trois
Oistrakh Trio
areas of its output: piano trios.
Spanning three CDs and providing
hours of fascinating listening, this
compilation surveys an important
facet of the Russian school through
detailing one of the lesserknown
The compilation begins with Tchaikovsky's famous A minor Trio
Op.50, a work that effectively initiated the in memoriam trio and which
pays homage to the late death of the composer's friend Rubinstein
through its virtuoso pianism. From Glinka's offering, a terse and cyclic
piece that draws on the Italian cantilena and displays elements of the
Weber-esque leitmotif, to Rimsky-Korsakov's C minor Trio -- a rarity
among the composer's mature works -- the set also details Taneyev's
symphonically-scaled Trio in D Op.22, modelled on Tchaikovsky's
work and which recalls elements of the master's style through its use
of eleven variations. Rachmaninoff's Trio élégiaque No.2 follows,
written in response to the death of Tchaikovsky, and Shebalin's work,
composed 1907, completes the set.
9272 (3 CDs)
Marco FRISINA (b.1954)
Passio Caeciliae
Flavio Scogna (conductor) • Barbara
Vignudelli (Soprano) • David Sebasti
(Narrator) • Coro Musicanova (Choir)
• Nova Chamber Orchestra
After studying composition at the
Conservatory Santa Cecilia in
Rome, Marco Frisina enrolled at a
theological college, and was ordained
as a priest in 1982. He carries out
his ministry in Rome, where he founded and directs the Choir of
the Diocese of Rome, which he recently took on tour to the USA. In
addition to his sacred vocal works, Frisina has also composed scores
for several religious-themed films. The Passio Caeciliae describes the
martyrdom of Caecilia, a maiden of noble descent in the 2nd century,
a creature of light, love, faith and innocence, who is put to death in
her own home. The Passio is a tableau of nine scenes from her life,
from her conversion to Christianity to her ultimate love song for Christ,
before dying as a martyr.
Characteristics of Frisina's work can be found in the lush harmonisation
of the choral movement 'Psalm 45', which is undoubtedly a highlight of
the recording, and acclaimed Italian soprano Barbara Vignudelli sings
the protagonist role, with David Scogna narrating. Organist Lorenzo
Macrì, Coro Musicanova and the Nova Amadeus Chamber Orchestra
are conducted by Flavio Emilio Scogna.
9405
BEETHOVEN • DEBUSSY •
SCHNITTKE • VAN BREEN
Flavours
Amber Docters van Leeuwen (cello)
Taisiya Pushkar (piano)
Opening the collection is Debussy's
technically demanding Sonata in D
minor, a staple of the cello repertoire.
The whimsical motives, repetitive tones
and scales of this work give way to
the ingenious combination of atonality
and Romantic lyricism of Schnittke's Sonata No.1, which is followed by
Beethoven's visionary Sonata No.5 in D, a homage to J.S. Bach.
Amber Docters van Leeuwen took her tuition with Dmitri Ferschtman at
the Royal Conservatory of the Hague in her native country. Then she
moved to New York where she continued her studies at Stony Brook
University and the Manhattan School of Music. A recipient of several
major awards, including the National Cello Competition's first prize in
Amsterdam and the Samuel Mayes Memorial Cello Award, Amber is
famed for her varied concert programmes in which she combines music
from all eras, contrasting established classics of the cello repertoire
with contemporary works.
9416
14
The Russian Archives
Rozhdestvensky conducts
SHOSTAKOVICH
Gennady Rozhdestvensky (conductor)
Here the maestro conducts an
all-Shostakovich programme,
beginning with the towering
'Leningrad' symphony. Dedicated to
Russia's struggle against fascism,
to the composer's native city, this
programmatic work -- charged
with the sinister events of 1941 -- is followed by the lesser-known
Symphony No.9 -- music that presents an immediate contrast to
the first through its airy, serene mood. The Suites on Verses of
Michelangelo Buonarroti Op.145a form the centrepiece of compilation;
taking eight sonnets and three poems as its basis, this highly
philosophical piece -- which deals with themes such as anger over
injustice in the world -- precedes the monumental Tenth Symphony,
as much a portrait of Stalin as a conveying of human feelings and
passions. Another suite -- The Bolt, based on the ballet composed
between 1930 and 1931 -- completes the line-up.
9273 (3 CDs)
Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH
(1906-1975)
Piano Concertos
Three Fantastic Dances
Paavo Berglund (conductor) •
Cristina Ortiz (piano) •
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
One of the most celebrated
composers of the 20th century,
Dmitri Shostakovich's output includes
symphonies, concertos, operas and
film scores, among others. With his career constantly hampered by
political intervention and the social pressures of Stalin's Soviet Union,
the Russian Maestro's works are now considered to go some way to
providing a chronicle of life during the period.
This disc includes the two Piano Concertos; the first was originally
intended to be a concerto for trumpet, but during the composition
process the piano was added and eventually became the focus of
the piece: it is unmistakably reminiscent of Shostakovich's vaudeville
jazz suites. The Second Piano Concerto was written shortly after
Stalin's death, and embraces the new sense of freedom felt by
Shostakovich after this event; containing references to Beethoven
and Rachmaninoff, it is largely mellow in tone and has become one of
the composer's most popular works. The collection culminates in the
Three Fantastic Dances, Shostakovich's first pieces for piano. Each of
these much-loved compositions represents a different folk dance, with
the lively and capricious first followed by the serenity of the second
and thereafter the frenetic pace of the final dance.
9412
Philip GLASS
Solo Piano Music
Jeroen van Veen
Accepted onto the early admissions
programme of the University of
Chicago, Philip Glass graduated
aged just nineteen with a degree
in Mathematics and Philosophy,
practising the piano in his spare
time. Subsequently studying at the
Juilliard School, Glass's name has
since become synonymous with
the minimalist style. His film compositions have earned him a Golden
Globe as well as three Academy Award nominations.
This selection of pieces showcases Glass's music for solo piano,
with each of the works baring the hallmarks of minimalism. Among
the pieces featured in the collection is Metamorphosis, a set of five
variations that evolve over the course of the entire work to create a
stirring final movement. Also present are extracts from the soundtrack
of Stephen Daldry's film The Hours, as well as 'Truman Sleeps' from
The Truman Show (which earned Glass a Golden Globe award for
'Best Original Score'). The collection ends with the 'Trilogy' Sonata,
containing piano transcriptions of Glass's three 'portrait' operas:
Einstein on the Beach, Satyagraha and Akhnaten.
9419 (3 CDs)
FEB-MAR 2013
Jeroen van Veen
Born in 1923, Simeon ten Holt was a
leading Dutch composer who came
to attention following studies in Paris
with Honegger and Milhaud. His
music is best described as minimalist,
and draws on the principles of
Western harmony as well as those of
aleatoricism.
This 5CD compilation is dedicated to Ten Holt's music for piano, an
instrument that dominates his output and which for him contained all
the possibilities he needed as a composer. Undoubtedly the most
famous work featured is Canto Ostinato -- a piece of stretched tones
and fixed parts which, depending on the amount of repetition/phrasing/
emphasis and volume as determined by the individual performer,
provides for an almost endless range of performances. The process of
listening to this music is similar to that of experiencing a ritual, and the
same can be said of the other works on the compilation: Natalon in E,
Aforisme II, the four Solos Devils Dances and Eadem Sed Aliter, the
latter of which demands a high level of skill through the 'two sixteenths'
separation between the left and right hand.
9434 (5 CDs)
The Russian Archives
Richter plays Beethoven
Sviatoslav Richter
Did Richter give more concerts than
any other pianist of the 20th century?
It's certainly possible. He shunned the
high life and lights to set up a festival
in a barn in southwest France; to
drag himself across the plains and
mountains of Soviet Russia, playing
Hindemith and more to audiences
who likely had never even heard a
piano -- as well as getting in six hours of practice.
Such was his appetite for making music, and his scorn for the merrygo-round of record companies and ritzy recitals. This release focuses
on his mastery of Beethoven: strong and determined, as you'd expect
from a pianist who was always his own harshest critic, and capable of
thundering heights of eloquence, but more often bringing out
Beethoven the quixotic poet in, say, the questing opening movement of
Op.110 or the mysterious Arietta which concludes the composer's cycle
of 32 sonatas. A complementary recording of the Third Concerto is
made with Kurt Sanderling, one of the most durable and understanding
of his conducting partners.
94399 (3 CDs)
Scarlatti and the
Neapolitan Song
Sonatas and Canzonas
Pieter Jan Leusink, Nicol Matt
(conductor) • Ruth Holton, Marjon
Strijk (Soprano) • Marcel Beekman,
Nico Van Der Meel, Knut Schoch
(Tenor) • Bas Ramselaar (Bass)
Holland Boys Choir
Netherlands Bach Collegium
Written to exalt the glory of God and
to facilitate Lutheran worship, Johann Sebastian Bach's sacred cantatas
stand among the highest achievements of Western musical art. This
acclaimed recording sees the works performed in their entirety by a
stellar line-up of musicians that includes the renowned Holland Boys'
Choir and period-instrument ensemble Netherlands Bach Collegium.
The cantatas are directed by Pieter van Leusink, one of Holland's
leading Bach experts. From the plaintive opening of Weinen, Kleinen,
Sorgen, Sagen ('Weeping, lamenting, worrying, fearing') BWV12 to
the triumphant D major chorus in Man singet mit Freuden vom Sieg
BWV149, the works traverse a wide range of themes and moods,
having been written for a variety of occasions throughout the liturgical
year. In bringing together proclamation, amplification and interpretation
of scripture in order to teach and persuade the listener, they are highly
dramatic and lyrical pieces, ones that delight today's listener for the
sheer beauty of their music.
94365 (50 CDs)
COSTE • BROBOWICZ
GIULIANI • LEGNANI
MERTZ • REGONDI
Fantasias on Operas
Roch Modrzejewski
The collection begins with Coste's
light and lively interpretations of
Bellini's Norma and Il pirata, followed
by Legnani's Cavatina from Ernani by
Verdi, a simple piece that makes full
use of all facets of the guitar. Then
come the variations on a theme of Rossini's Otello, by the immensely
important guitarist Giuliani, who shows off his skill by combining simple,
natural harmonisation and texture at the outset and a brilliant vitality and
vigour in the final section. Bobrowicz was known to his contemporaries
as the 'Chopin of the guitar', and his Variations on Bellini's I Capuleti
e i Montecchi display a romantic nostalgia and a regal finale. Mertz
explores all sound colours of the guitar in the beautiful Marino Faliero
after Donizetti, and the collection ends with the Variations on an air from
Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi by Regondi: a work full of innovative
modulations and rich texture which transcended the boundaries of
19th-century guitar composition.
94446
François COUPERIN (16681733): Concerts Royaux
Letizia Calandra (soprano)
Francesco Cera (harpsichord)
The disc combines several of
Scarlatti's keyboard sonatas with
Neapolitan songs by various
composers of the era, exploring
the influences of these songs on
Scarlatti's sonatas. Scarlatti's style
is notable for its improvisatory nature as well as its incorporation of
elements of Spanish and Portuguese folk music (the composer having
spent time in Lisbon, Seville and Madrid), and among the Neapolitan
songs featured on the disc is the immensely popular Lo guarracino, a
fast-talking and high-spirited number that narrates the story of a fish,
and the lilting La Nova Gelosia. Two extracts from operas -- 'So' li
sorbe e le nespole amare' from Leonardo Vinci's Lo cecato fauzo and
'Chi disse ca la femmena' from Giovanni Battista Pergolesi's Lo frate
'nnamorato -- are also present, both of which feature a light-hearted
portrayal of women. Out of the many versions of the song Quanno
nascette ninno, the one by the Nuova Compagnia di Canto Popolare
was chosen for this disc, thanks to its fascinating minor modulation.
94488
FeB-MAR 2013
J. S. Bach (1685-1750)
Complete Sacred Cantatas Sämtliche geistliche Kantaten
Anna Starr (oboe) • Jane Gower
(bassoon) • Ayako Matsunaga,
Stefano Rossi (violin) • Cassandra L.
Luckhardt (viola) • Job ter Haar (cello)
Michael Borgstede (harpsichord) •
Musica ad Rhenum Ensemble
Jed Wentz (conductor)
It was here that he composed the
Concerts Royaux and the GoutsRéunis (or Nouveaux Concerts) for the entertainment of the aging King
Louis XIV. Each includes the florid ornamentation typical of the French
Baroque and is extremely adaptable, essentially written for a treble
and bass instrument and continuo. They appeared in the same volume
as Couperin's third harpsichord book, and the writing of several has
a strong harpsichord feel, suggesting that solo performance on this
instrument was also a possibility. The fourteen Concerts vary in style,
containing elements of both the French and Italian tradition, but all
are testament to the sophistication and decadence of Versailles in the
18th century. The Eighth Concert 'dans le goût théâtral' is undoubtedly
a highlight: a tribute to Jean-Baptiste Lully, beginning with an opulent
French overture and 'Grand Ritournelle' and continuing with eight
further varied movements.
94489 (3 CDs)
15
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Simeon ten Holt (1923 - 2012)
Solo Piano Music Vol. 1-5
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Rimsky-KORSAKOV (18441908): Cantatas
Victor Popov (conductor)
Moscow Symphony Orchestra
This disc brings together the great
composer's cantatas. The Poem
about Aleksey, the Man of God Op.20
originally appeared as a chorale in
his opera The Maid of Pskov, and
Rimsky-Korsakov later created a
separate work from it. The Song of
Oleg the Wise Op.58 is written in a
marital style, as befits the subject matter of the ruler and warrior Oleg;
Switezianka Op.44, a cantata for two soloists, is of a similar style.
Also on the disc is From Homer Op.60, a tantalising glimpse of what
might have been if Rimsky-Korsakov had continued to write his opera
based on Homer's Odyssey; the work is made up of the intended
orchestral introduction and opening chorus of the opera. It depicts the
storm that washes Odysseus onto the shores of Phaecia, and shows
the composer's talent for writing for female voices, including a trio
(soprano, mezzo-soprano, contralto) and a female chorus.
The cantatas feature the Chorus of the Moscow Academy of Choral
Art and the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, as well as a host of
accomplished soloists.
94495
Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791 1864): Robert le Diable
Daniel Oren (conductor)
Symphonic Orchestra of the Teatro
Robert le Diable was an immediate
success after its premiere at the
Paris Opéra in 1831 and brought
Meyerbeer's career to new heights.
With a libretto by Eugène Scribe
and Casimir Delavigne, it narrates
the tale of Robert, determined to
marry his sweetheart Isabelle, and the influence of his mysterious
friend Bertrand, who is entrusted with a mission to possess Robert's
soul for the Devil. The original production was a lavish affair, setting
a new record for the most amount of money ever spent on set and
costume and thus catering for the expensive taste of the 19th-century
Parisian audience. Meyerbeer used many combinations of instruments
to convey different moods -- the use of two orchestras to portray the
deafening expanse of Hell, for example -- and his innovative use of
dramatic devices, such as chorus members singing into cardboard
cones, would have delighted the 19th-century audience.
94604 (3 CDs)
Johannes BRAHMS (18331897): Lieder
Lenneke Ruiten (soprano)
Hans Adolfsen (piano)
Although Johannes Brahms
(1833--1897) is best known for his
symphonies, string quartets and
piano music, he was also a prolific
writer of lieder, composing over 200
pieces in the medium. This charming
collection celebrates his wonderfully
rich, lyrical style through detailing 27
such works -- ones which span much of his 40-year song career.
The earliest works on the compilation date from his second lieder
collection, Op. 6, composed when Brahms was just eighteen years old.
Also touching on his Op. 14 and Op. 16 collections (Brahms gave the
first performance of Ein Sonett Op. 14 No. 4 with Julius Stockhausen),
the collection features two songs from Op. 48 -- of which the
Liebesklage des Mädchens 'vibrates with marvellous originality and
the deepest heartfelt pain', according to the great Bach biographer
Philipp Spitta. From Op. 85 to Op. 95, we explore the late period of a
composer who set verses by such iconic poets as Geibel, Heine and
Goethe. Maienkätzchen Op. 107 No. 4 is the final song to be featured.
Performing these works is the celebrated young Dutch soprano
Lenneke Ruiten, who enjoys a busy career as a recitalist, concert
soloist and opera singer. She is joined on the recording by talented
pianist (and composer) Hans Adolfsen.
94611
16
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN
(1770-1827): Piano Concertos
Nos. 3 & 5 ''Emperor''
Christoph Eschenbach (piano)
Boston Symphony Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
Beethoven's piano concertos are
cornerstones of the keyboard
repertoire, and yet in their time they
formed the subject of much cynical
debate: the sounds that we are today
adjusted to were difficult for the ears of concert-goers then, and any
unexpected turns in the music were deemed whimsical and purposefully
audacious. Today we appreciate them as part of a continuous story that
Beethoven is trying to communicate: inspiring, grand and poetic are just
some of the words that come to mind when describing these works.
This release focuses on the Third and Fifth piano concertos -- the
former composed in 1800 and dedicated to Prince Louis Ferdinand of
Prussia (the score was still in progress when the composed debuted the
piece from memory); the latter, branded the 'Emperor' by Beethoven's
publisher, one of his boldest and most heroic statements: a work of
military atmosphere, famous for its hushed transition from the slow
movement to the finale. The Fifth Piano Concerto finally achieved
popularity in the second half of the nineteenth century when it was taken
up by Liszt and other virtuoso soloists.
94602
Franz LISZT (1811-1886)
Wagner & Verdi Transcriptions
Michele Campanella (piano)
'Incredible One' is only one of dozens
of adulatory salutations to be found
in Liszt's letters to Wagner, and
Liszt's devotion to Wagner and his
music caused him to devote his
purse and his art to Wagner's cause.
The Wagner transcriptions are the
largest group of Liszt's piano works on
operatic themes. Most of them are straightforward transcriptions, but it is
the very essence of Liszt's homage that we see in the introductions and
codas, where he is able to offer a most personal reflection.
The 'transcriptions' and then 'reminiscences' of Verdi's music are (by
and large) much more free both with their originals and with his own
reputation, dating as they do from a maturity when he no longer felt the
need to gratify any expectations of virtuoso brilliance. This is certainly
the case of the Danza sacra e Duetto finale from Aida, which Michele
Campenella considers 'even more remarkable than the original'.
94610
Georg Ludwig BÖHM (16611733): Complete Harpsichord
and Organ Music
Simone Stella (organ & harpsichord)
Spanning 4 CDs and presenting over
three hours of absorbing listening,
this charming release explores the
musical output of Georg Böhm -one of the most important German
organists and composers around the
turn of the 18th century, and who is
considered to have had a major influence on the training of Johann
Sebastian Bach.
The compilation focuses on the main nucleus of Böhm's output, his
works for keyboard, and divides equally into those for harpsichord and/
or organ. Of chief interest among the pieces for the former instrument
are the 11 Suites, works that were probably written for domestic
performance, and these are joined by a range of other genres
also common to the period. From the French Overture style of the
Prelude in F to the art of variation that is the Chaconne in G, Böhm's
compositions abound in inventive detail, and we soon move onto the
works for organ -- where the composer's most important contribution
to North German keyboard music, that of the chorale partita, comes to
the fore.
94612 (4 CDs)
FEB-MAR 2013
Miguel Rincón (baroque lute)
The young Spanish lute virtuoso
Miguel rincón, who already worked
with some of most prominent
characters in the field of Early Music,
presents for his solo debut album
two of his own transcriptions of the
works for violin solo by J.S. Bach.
Such arrangements were quite common at Bachs time, and Bach
himself was well-acquainted with the lute. Miguel rincón explores the
tonal and emotional potential of his instrument to its full extent. He
creates a richness and complexity of sound that one is not familiar
with from the original violin version. Here we are being introduced to a
new, very personal and at the same time virtuosic and powerful Bach,
ready for the stage, which in the final Chaconne reaches a fulminant
point of culmination, offhandedly upstaging quite a few rock guitar
heroes of the last decades.
CD-16295
Zia
Del Sol String Quartet
The Zia Indians’ symbol for the
sacred sun captures the adventurous
spirit and global pulse of this CD
from Sono Luminus and the award
winning Del Sol String Quartet.
The composers represented—
Gabriela Frank, Lou Harrison, José
Evangelista, Reza Vali and Elena
Kats-Chernin—all trained in the
Western European tradition, reach back to ancient and traditional
folk music sources and cultures from Peru, Turkey, Spain, Iran, and
Uzbekistan in creating vibrant new music for string quartet.
While the five contemporary composers on this CD are deeply tied
to the Western European music tradition--especially its system of
notation--they draw on ancient and traditional folk music from four
corners of the world and make it new by incorporating techniques such
as inventive intonations or heterophony.
DSL-92164
¡España!
ALBÉNIZ • FALLA • RAVEL
RODRIGO
From the late 19th century onwards,
following in the wake of Goya, Spain
experienced a creative explosion
that was to manifest itself in all
the arts, including music. This set
is an invitation to discover these
composers who transcribed the
innermost depths of their country’s
soul in works that were nonetheless closely related to developments
elsewhere in Europe – hence the presence here of Ravel, the most
Spanish of French musicians, alongside de Falla, Albéniz, Rodrigo, and
Mompou.
2908530.34 (5 CDs)
J.S. BACH
Violin Concertos
Petra Müllejans • Gottfried von der
Goltz • Katherine Schreiber (violins)
Freiburger Barockorchester
Probably written for the virtuoso
Kapelle at Cöthen (BWV1042) or the
concerts of the Leipzig Collegium
Musicum which the composer often
directed himself from the violin,
Bach’s three well-known violin concertos are joined here by the splendid
Concerto for three violins BWV1064, reconstructed from the surviving
version for three harpsichords. A dazzling firework display under the
bows of the matchless violinists of the Freiburger Barockorchester.
HMC902145
Giovanni Battista PERGOLESI
Septem verba a Christo in cruce moriente prolata
Sophie Karthäuser (soprano) • Christophe Dumaux (countertenor) • Julien Behr (tenor) • Konstantin Wolff (bass)
Akademie für Alte Musik • René Jacobs
Now attributed to Pergolesi on the basis of recent research, the ‘Seven Words of Christ’ has been regarded as ‘one
of the most heartfelt works of art, full of profound tenderness and an all-conquering sense of beauty’ [Hermann
Scherchen, on its discovery in 1930]. However, his judgment has remained unheeded and only the discovery of
two more manuscripts in the abbeys of Kremsmünster and Aldersbach, by the musicologist Reinhard Fehling,
prompted the firm of Breitkopf & Härtel to publish a critical edition.
In principle this recording follows the Breitkopf edition. Its editor very kindly gave René Jacobs facsimiles, not only the individual parts from
Kremsmünster (his principal source), but also those from Metten and Zurich. Pergolesi’s work, probably composed between 1730 and the year of
his early death, 1736, was intended for an extra-liturgical devotion on Good Friday. This major discovery of the Neapolitan Baroque was given its
concert premiere at the Beaune Festival in July 2012, a few days before this world premiere recording.
HMC902155
DEBUSSY,C. • DUPONT,G.
FERROUND, P. • HAHN, R.
KOECHLIN,C. • POULENC, F.
RAVEL, M. • SATIE, E.
SCHMITT, F. • SEVERAC, D.
Satie & Compagnie
Anne Queffélec (piano)
From the poetry of Debussy to the
nostalgia of Ravel, from the humour
of Satie to the insouciance of Poulenc, the French music of the early
decades of the twentieth century was created by fine minds capable
of grasping delicate nuances, infinite variations of light on the natural
world and the human soul. From the gentlest im pressionism to the
most outrageous surrealism, the pathways of French music are many
and varied - and immensely colourful.
MIR189
FeB-MAR 2013
FAURE, G. • SAINT-SAENS, C.
Violin works
Deborah Nemtanu (violin)
Orchestre de chambre de Paris
Thomas Zehetmair
Saint-Saens and Faure, two leading
representatives of Late Romanticism,
teacher and pupil linked by the same
musical ideal. Both of them, with the
fire of youth or in their full maturity,
produced tender, luminous works. Confronted with Wagnerian mists,
they brightened the French musical landscape. At her desk as leader of
the Orchestre de chambre de Paris or as soloist, the violinist Deborah
Nemtanu presents her vision of the last French Romantics.
MIR193
17
CLASSICAL MUSIC
J. S. BACH: Sonata BWV
1001 & Partita BWV 1004
CLASSICAL MUSIC
Glen ROVEN
The Runaway Bunny
Francis POULENC
Goodnight Moon • The Story
of Barbar
Catherine Zeta-Jones • Michael
Douglas • Mark Stone • Trio21 •
Jason Wirth • GPR Choir
Oscar™ Winners Catherine ZetaJones and Michael Douglas join
forces and perform these beloved
musical compositions based on three children's masterpieces.
Catherine narrates the Piano Trio Version (with Trio 21) of The
Runaway Bunny, the contemporary classic by Glen Roven; Michael
narrates the beloved The History of Babar, with the brilliant score
by Francis Poulenc. English Baritone Mark Stone sings Roven's
Goodnight Moon along with the GPR Festival Choir. This is the perfect
gift for the young and the young at heart.
GPR11012
SONDHEIM • PORTER •
GERSHWIN • PIAF • ARLEN
Diva on Detour
Patricia Racette
Acclaimed as the Madame Butterfly
and Tosca of her generation, Patrica
Racette has appeared in the most
prestigious opera houses of the
world including the Metropolitan
Opera, San Francisco Opera, Lyric
Opera of Chicago, Royal Opera
House, La Scala, Paris Opera and the Bayerisch Statsopera.
It is a little know fact that Racette actually started out as a Cabaret
Artist and DIVA ON DETOUR is a return to her beginnings as she
“belts out” the Classics from the Great American Songbook.
This live recording of her intimate evening of songs by Stephen
Sondheim, Cole Porter, George Gershwin, and Edith Piaf is a treat for
all music and theatre lovers.
GPR10013
Dolce Napoli The Neapolitan Songs
Charles Castronovo and Sweet Nectar (Italian Folk Band)
Internationally celebrated tenor, Charles Castronovo celebrates his blood-lines with his album of Neapolitan
Songs. Accompanied by Sweet Nectar, Castronovo performs some of the best known and most beloved Canzone
Napoletana including, Maria, Mari, Santa Lucia, Malafemmena, Catari, Scetate, Come Faccette Mammetta.
Several of the songs are also sung in new English translations by Glen Roven.
Castronovo has sung in all of the world’s leading opera houses including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden,
Vienna State Opera, Berlin State Opera, Paris Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Munich, Theatre Royale de la
Monnaie, Brussels, and the Metropolitan Opera in NYC, in addition to the Salzburg and Aix en Provence Festivals.
GPR12012
Piotr-Ilitch TCHAÏKOVSKI
César FRANCK
Claude DEBUSSY
L'Art D'André Cluytens
Orchestre National de France
André Cluytens (conductor)
Emil Gilels (piano)
Walter Gieseking (piano)
The following three previously
unissued recordings are Tahra's
homage to the Franco-Belgian
conductor André Cluytens (1905-1967). His biographer Erick Baeck
wrote: "Measure and lyricism, morale and sensuality, rigor and
suppleness, ardor and enthusiasm characterize Cluytens' art of
conducting. The quality of his interpretations results from an opulence
of colors, great suppleness of phrasing, an inimitable agogic subtlety
and his natural musicality which emanates from the contagious joy of
making music. Emotion, dynamics and rhythmic pulsation are always
controlled with great taste".
TAH741
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV, N.
Scheherazade
RODRIGO, J.
Concierto de Aranjuez
Angel Romero (guitar)
Israel Philharmonic Orchestra
Ryan McAdams
HEL02-9662
18
SCHUMANN, R.
Fantasy, Kreisleriana
Joaquín Achúcarro
One of the most important Spanish
pianists today, Joaquín Achúccaro
has made landmark recordings of
the Goyescas and the Nuits dans les
Jardins d'Espagne.
It would be a mistake however to
categorize him as a mere specialist
of Spanish music. German music features prominently in his repertoire,
Beethoven, Brahms and Schumann in particular.
Extraordinarily attentive to the specificities of Schumann's rhythms,
Joaquín Achúccaro's recording of the Fantaisie and the Kreisleriana
highlights the essence of these works, made even more fascinating by
the exceptional richness of his touch.
LDV10
Après un rêve
Nemanja Radulovic (violin)
Marielle Nordmann (harp)
The young violinist Nemanja
Radulovic unites his fire and
modernity to the supreme elegance
of harpist Marielle Nordmann and the
resulting dialogue of the two soloists
only connects essential matters
as the music bursts into light as it
reflects the comprehensive musical
partnership they have of many years between them.
This unconventional pair offer a programme of sparkling delicacy with
angelic music ... a sense of sharing ... and captivating results.
TR174
FEB-MAR 2013
Vanity Fair, with its rich cast of
characters, takes place on the
snakes-and-ladders board of life.
Amelia Sedley, daughter of a wealthy
merchant, has a loving mother to
supervise her courtship. Becky
Sharp, an orphan, has to use her
wit, charm, and resourcefulness to
escape from her destiny as a governess. This she does ruthlessly,
musing: ‘I think I could become a good woman, if I had £5000 a year’.
Thackeray’s story is set at the time of the battle of Waterloo, in which
the Sedley fortunes are lost - and Amelia is back to square one - while
Becky rises with contemptuous ease.
NA0120 (25 CDs)
Read by Laura Paton
Fiery, strong-willed Deb Grantham,
who runs a gaming house with
her aunt, is hardly the perfect
wife for the young and naïve Lord
Mablethorpe. His lordship’s family
are scandalised that he proposes to
marry one of ‘faro’s daughters’, and
his cousin − the proud, wealthy Max
Ravenscar − decides to take the matter in hand. Ravenscar always
gets his way, but as they lock horns, he and Miss Grantham become
increasingly drawn to each other. Amidst all the misunderstandings
and entanglements, has Ravenscar finally met his match?
NA0132 (4 CDs)
A Musical Journey: ITALY
Lucca • Tivoli • Tuscany • Liguria
• Lake Bolsena
A Musical Journey: LUCCA • ITALY
The Old City • Orsetti Palace •
San Martino Cathedral
Our tour starts with the Baroque Villa Mansi
in Lucca, followed by Hadrian’s villa at
Tivoli. Other sites include the villages of
Cinque Terre on the Ligurian coast, Lake
Bolsano and Chianti.
Our journey takes us principally to the old
city of Lucca, for centuries independent until
seized by Napoleon, who made his sister,
Elisa Baciocchi, and her husband its rulers.
Lucca was the birth-place of Boccherini and
of Puccini and for some time Paganini was
employed at the Baciocchi court.
Music by J. S. Bach
The music for our journey is by Johann
Sebastian Bach, who spent his life in his
native Germany, but drew on influences from
Italy and France in a late Baroque synthesis. The three Violin Concertos
heard were written during Bach’s period as Court Music Director from
1717 to 1723 at the small court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen,
where his duties involved secular rather than sacred music. 2.110327
Music by Vivaldi
Violinist, priest and most prolific composer,
Antonio Vivaldi was born in Venice in 1678 and spent most of his life
there, associated for much of the time with the Ospedale della Pietà, a
charitable institution for girls, with a strong musical tradition. The music for
the tour is taken from concertos for various wind instruments. 2.110323
A Musical Journey: RUSSIA / UKRAINE
St Petersburg • Crimea • Odessa
Music by Tchaikovsky
The places visited include St Petersburg, Peter the Great’s new westward-looking capital, and the traditional capital,
Moscow. In Ukraine we see Odessa with the famous Potemkin Steps and something of the surrounding countryside of a
region that for long offered holiday resorts to those living in Moscow or St Petersburg.
The music of the Russian composer Tchaikovsky has come to enjoy wide popularity throughout the world. He lived at
a time when composers were creating a new national form of Russian music, and this element of national inspiration
he was able to combine with a sound and acceptable command of technique and particularly of colourful orchestration.
His Symphony No. 6, Pathétique, was the last of his symphonies, first performed a few days before his sudden and
unexpected death in 1893, which it seemed to portend. Other music consists of two dances from his opera Eugene
Onegin, elements that have a poignant part to play in the drama.
2.110293
Richard STRAUSS
Der Rosenkavalier
Opera Australia Chorus
Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra
Der Rosenkavalier, the most successful
opera of Richard Strauss and Hugo von
Hofmannsthal’s partnership, is a story
of love, lust and human frailty. The story
is not complicated but it soars and dips
on Strauss’ music with Hofmannsthal’s
expressive libretto. With Cheryl Barker in
the role of the Marschallin, who can fail to be moved by her poignant
portrayal of facing the final loss of youth and her young lover?
Count Octavian, Catherine Carby, has the vibrant voice of a young
man who has his life to enjoy with no thought of anything but pleasure
and the Marschallin’s company – until he meets the beautiful and
innocent Sophie von Faninal, played by Emma Pearson. The boorish
Baron Ochs auf Lerchenau is superbly exposed by Manfred Hemm, his
Viennese accent lending authenticity.
OPOZ56027BD (Blu-ray) /
OPOZ56026DVD (DVD) / OPOZ56028CD (CD)
FEB-MAR 2013
AUDIO BOOKS
Read by Georgina Sutton
Georgette HEYER
Faro’s Daughter (Abridged)
SOUVENIR
TrondheimSolistene
What we recorded in May 2011 was
published exclusively as high resolution
audio files, by streaming and on vinyl. Then
our recordings from October will add up to a
full release on Pure Audio Blu-ray in August
2012.
The music captured by 2L features
Norwegian composers and performers, and
an international repertoire reflected in the Nordic atmosphere. The
surround sound recordings of Lindberg Lyd not only transforms the
entire listening experience, more radically, these innovative recordings
overturn some very basic concepts regarding how music is played
and even composed. 2L emphasizes surround sound with Pure Audio
Blu-ray and HiRes file distribution, and have garnered no less than 12
American GRAMMY nominations over the past six years.
2L-090-CD-J (Blu-ray)
19
DVD / BLU-RAY
W.M. THACKERAY
Vanity Fair (Unabridged)
DVD / BLU-RAY
Giovanni Battista PERGOLESI
L’OLIMPIADE
Raúl Giménez • Lyubov Petrova • Yetzabel
Arias Fernández • Jennifer Rivera • Sofia
Soloviy • Academia Montis Regalis
Alessandro De Marchi (Conductor) •
Italo Nunziata
With Olimpiade the famous poet Metastasio
created one of the most popular librettos
of the 18th century. It was set to music by
over 60 baroque and classical composers
including Vivaldi, Caldara, Hasse,
Cimarosa and Donizetti. Pergolesi’s
composition from 1735 was one of the earliest adaptations.
In the 2011 Jesi production of L’Olimpiade a large part of the
auditorium is taken up by a cross-shaped platform. This is where the
characters of the drama are introduced, where they elaborate their
plans and express their innermost feelings, their sufferings and hopes,
while the supreme ritual of the ancient Greek world, the Olympic
Games, is celebrated on a distant stage: that event upon which their
lives – and all prospects of happiness or otherwise – depend.
101650 (2 DVDs) / 108064 (Blu-ray)
Benjamin BRITTEN
Owen Wingrave
Gerald Finley • Peter Savidge • Hilton
Marlton • Josephine Barstow • Anne
Dawson • Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester
Berlin • The Choristers of Westminster
Cathedral Choir • Kent Nagano (Conductor)
Margaret Williams (Director)
Andrew Burden (Narrator)
When Britten started to work on Owen
Wingrave he conceived the opera both
for performance on stage and for TV
production. In fact the first TV production of
Owen Wingrave was broadcast in 1971, two years before the staged
premiere at Covent Garden. This 2001 production, made for Channel 4
television, intriguingly tells the drama of Owen, who refuses to follow a
military career like his ancestors. The story, in which pacifi sm makes
up the main theme, was written by Henry James, and the libretto
adapted by Myfanwy Piper.
The Canadian baritone Gerald Finley stars as Owen with Peter
Savidge, Hilton Marlton and Josephine Barstow at his side. The
production was directed by the award winning TV director Margaret
Williams. Highly acclaimed conductor Kent Nagano is the musical
director of this performance featuring the Deutsches Symphonie
Orchester Berlin.
100373
Gioachino ROSSINI
Il Barbiere Di Siviglia
Cecilia Bartoli • David Kuebler • Gino Quilico
Carlos Feller • Stuttgart Radio Symphony
Orchestra • Choir of Cologne City Opera
Gabriele Ferro (Conductor)
Michael Hampe (Stage Director)
Rossini was 24 years old when in 1816
he wrote his seventeenth and most
famous opera The Barber of Seville in
an astonishing three weeks. Michael
Hampe’s humorous direction of his 1988
liveperformance at the Schwetzingen
SWR Festival stands out with its fast tempo that makes for a highly
exuberant production. Ezio Firgerio’s appealing stage and Mauro
Pagano’s colourful costumes heighten the comic effect. The musical
direction of conductor Gabriele Ferro strikes a beautiful balance
between a vibrant orchestral performance and a superb ensemble of
singers. The irresistible Cecilia Bartoli as Rosina leads a cast that also
includes David Kuebler, Gino Quilico and Carlos Feller.
102305
20
Johann Sebastian BACH
St. Matthew Passion
Mark Padmore • Peter Harvey • Maria
Espada • Ingeborg Danz • Renate Arends •
Barbara Kozelj • Peter Gijsbertsen • Henk
Neven • Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Amsterdam • Netherlands Radio Choir &
National Children’s Choir • Iván Fischer
This 2012 recording of the most influential
and wide spread oratorio by Johann
Sebastian Bach features the Hungarian
conductor Iván Fischer, a visionary in
his field, with the Royal Concertgebouw
Orchestra in Amsterdam. The double choir is the essential musical
aspect on which Iván Fischer’s interpretation of Bach’s St. Matthew
Passion is based. Only by consistently seizing on that duality will all
the complementary layers stand out as they should. He describes this
essential fundamental aspect as follows: “You can’t do the St. Matthew
in an unreligious way. The only approach is from a deep, universally
religious feeling.”
101676 (2 DVDs) / 108075 (Blu-ray)
Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART
Le Nozze Di Figaro
Knut Skram • Ileana Cotrubas • Kiri Te
Kanawa • Benjamin Luxon • Frederica
Von Stade • The London Philharmonic
Orchestra • The Glyndebourne Chorus
John Pritchard (Conductor)
Peter Hall (Stage Director)
Le nozze di Figaro, Mozart’s timeless opera
buffa, is one of the greatest of all operatic
masterpieces. It is based on Beaumarchais’
comedy Le Mariage de Figaro and tells
the tale of the servant Figaro, who is
about to marry the maid Susanna. Count Almaviva, keeping an eye
on Susanna himself, tries to prevent this marriage with the help of
Bartolo, the doctor, but is continually thwarted.
This classic 1973 production by legendary director Peter Hall features
a cast of renowned opera singers lead by Kiri Te Kanawa as the
Countess, arguably her fi nest role and certainly the role that made
her an international superstar. Knut Skram’s charming and charismatic
take on the character of Figaro complements Ileana Cotrubas’ gentle
Susanna, and also noteworthy is the outstanding performance by
Frederica von Stade as Cherubino.
102301
Giuseppe VERDI
La forza del destino
Violeta Urmana • Carlo Guelfi • Marcello
Giordani • Julia Gertseva • Roberto
Scandiuzzi • Bruno De Simone • Orchestra
and Chorus of The Maggio Musicale
Fiorentino • Zubin Mehta (Conductor)
Nicolas Joël (Stage Director)
La forza del destino (The Force of Fate),
premiered in St. Petersburg 1862, is one of
Verdi’s most important opera compositions.
Its plot is complicated and combines a
sequence of interlaced unfortunate strokes
of fate. Donna Leonora is the centre of events, together with her
brother Don Carlo di Vargas and her lover Don Alvaro.
The story was originally set in 18th century Spain, however the French
director Nicolas Joël established the action in a slightly later period, in
the time of the Empire, the early 19th century.
The 2007 performance at the beautiful Maggio Musicale theatre in
Florence, conducted by Zubin Mehta, who is a frequent guest artist
there, stars Violeta Urmana as Donna Leonora with Carlo Guelfi and
Marcello Giordani as Don Carlo and Don Alvaro.
107325 (2 DVDs) / 108046 (Blu-ray)
FEB-MAR 2013
Opéra National De Paris:
The Ballet Classics
COPPÉLIA
Luciano Pavarotti • Maria Chiara • Ghena
Dimitrova • Nicolai Ghiaurov • Teatro alla
Scala • Lorin Maazel (Conductor)
Léo Delibes • Charline Giezendanner •
Mathieu Ganio • Pierre Lacotte • École de
Danse de l’Opéra national de Paris •
Orchestre de l’Opéra national de Paris
David Coleman (Conductor)
NABUCCO
Leo Nucci • Maria Guleghina • Miroslav
Dvorský • Giacomo Prestia • Wiener
Staatsoper • Fabio Luisi (Conductor)
SIMON BOCCANEGRA
Plácido Domingo • Anja Harteros • Ferruccio Furlanetto • Fabio Sartori
Teatro alla Scala • Daniel Barenboim (Conductor)
DVD / BLU-RAY
The Verdi Opera Selection:
Volume II
AIDA
PAQUITA
Edouard Delvedez & Ludwig Minkus
Agnès Letestu • José Martinez • Karl
Paquette • Les Premiers Danseurs et le Corps de Ballet de l’Opéra
national de Paris • Orchestre de l’Opéra national de Paris • David
Coleman (Conductor)
GISELLE
107526 (4 DVDs)
Adolphe Adam • Laëtitia Pujol • Nicolas Le Riche • Marie-Agnès Gillot
Wilfried Romoli • Les Premiers Danseurs et Corps de Ballet de l’Opéra
national de Paris • Orchestre de l’Opéra national de Paris
Paul Connelly (Conductor)
107532 (3 DVDs)
WAGNER
DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN –
BOX SET
DAS RHEINGOLD
DIE WALKÜRE
GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG
SIEGFRIED
De Nederlandse Opera Netherlands
Philharmonic Orchestra
(Götterdämmerung & Die Walküre)
The Hague Philharmonic (Das Rheingold)
Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra (Siegfried)
Hartmut Haenchen (Conductor) • Pierre Audi (Director)
This 1999 production of The Ring was the first to be based on
the definitive complete edition of Wagner’s music. Pierre Audi’s
production for the Netherlands Opera blends the lyrical, mythical and
philosophical qualities of Wagner’s tetralogy into a profound unity.
PROKOFIEV
ROMEO & JULIET
Federico Bonelli • Lauren Cuthbertson •
Alexander Campbell • Bennet Gartside
Dawid Trzensimiech • Vale Rihristov •
Christopher Saunders • Christina Arestis •
Gary Avis • Orchestra of the Royal Opera
House • Barry Wordsworth (Conductor)
Given its premiere by The Royal Ballet
in 1965 with Rudolf Nureyev and Margot
Fonteyn dancing the title roles, Kenneth
MacMillan’s first full-evening ballet
has become a signature work for the
Company, enjoying great popularity around the world. From the
outset, the production teems with life and colour as the townspeople,
market traders and servants of the rival Montagues and Capulets go
about their daily business in vibrant crowd scenes.
OA1094BD (11 DVDs)
Giuseppe VERDI (1813-1901)
LUISA MILLER
Surian • Luperi • Álvarez • Demuro •
Franci • Siwek • Nucci • Cedolins •
Lungu • Nikolic • Villari
Orchestra E Coro Del Teatro Regio Di
Parma
Donato Renzetti • Denis Krief
C Major’s Tutto Verdi project continues with
a production of Luisa Miller.
The opera was based on the play Kabale
und Liebe by Friedrich von Schiller and
features a Great cast of singers including
Marcelo Álvarez, Leo Nucci, Fiorenca Cedolins and Giorgio Surian.
722808 (DVD) / 722904 (Blu-ray)
OA1100D (DVD) / OABD7116D (Blu-ray)
Giuseppe VERDI (1813-1901)
Il Corsaro
Ribeiro • Lungu • Salsi • Dalla • Benetta •
Bonfatti • Papi • Villari
Orchestra E Coro Del Teatro Regio
Di Parma
Carlo Montanaro • Lamberto Puggelli
C Major presents a production of Il
corsaro, performed in 2008 at the Verdi
Festival in Parma.
Written in 1848, this three-act opera is
based on Lord Byron's poem The Corsair.
722408 (DVD) / 722504 (Blu-ray)
GIUSEPPE VERDI (1813-1901)
LA BATTAGLIA DI LEGNANO
Iori • López Linares • Theodossiou • Richards
Orchestra E Coro Del Teatro Lirico
“Giuseppe Verdi” Di Trieste Boris Brott • Ruggero Cappuccio
C Major presents a World Première on Blu-ray of Verdi’s opera La Battaglia di Legnano, as part of their Tutto Verdi
project.
The opera is based on the play La Bataille de Toulouse by Joseph Méry.
The performance is conducted by Boris Brott, who served as Assistant Conductor to the New York Philharmonic under
Leonard Bernstein, and Music Director and Conductor for the Royal Ballet.
722608 (DVD) / 722704 (Blu-ray)
FEB-MAR 2013
21
DVD / BLU-RAY
J. S. Bach - St. Matthew Passion
Barenboim plays Beethoven Piano
Sonatas Vol. 4
Piano Sonatas Nos. 22 to 28
Werner Güra • Stephen Morscheck • Lucy
Crowe • Christine Rice • Nicholas Phan •
Matthew Brooks • Bertrand Grunenwald
Orchestre de Chambre de Paris, Schola
Cantorum of Oxford • Maîtrise de Paris
John Nelson • Directed by Louise Narboni
Daniel Barenboim (piano)
Jean-Pierre Ponnelle (Director)
In the fourth part of five DVDs, seven-time
GRAMMY® Award-winning pianist and
conductor Daniel Barenboim performs
Sonatas 22 to 28 of the so-called
'New Testament' of music, Ludwig van
Beethoven's thirty-two piano sonatas.
The St. Matthew Passion is the third part of
‘The Soli Deo Gloria Collection’ conducted by
the American John Nelson who is well known
for his interpretations of Romantic works.
This monumental piece, composed by
J.S. Bach, recounts the dramatic story of the capture and crucifixion
of Jesus Christ, it presents a profound, dramatic, lyrical and
contemplative work.
The concert features the excellent Orchestre de Chambre de Paris, as
well as two internationally acclaimed choirs: the Schola Cantorum of
Oxford (one of the oldest choirs in the UK) and the Maîtrise de Paris
with origins back in the 12th century.
Composed over twenty-five years and
embodying the shift of musical taste from the Classic to the Romantic,
their performance requires a musician of extraordinary versatility.Daniel
Barenboim is one such pianist – his recordings run the gamut from
Bach and Mozart to Bruckner and Bartók. Infollowing in the footsteps of
such masters as Artur Schnabel, Barenboim truly shows himself to be
among the greatest living musicians.
3079658 (2 DVDs)
2066508 (2 DVDs)
Hans Pfitzner: Palestrina
DVOŘÁK • MOZART • BARTÓK
Bayerisches Staatsorchester
Simone Young.
Directed for stage by Christian Stückl
Zubin Mehta
Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra
Requiring 38 soloists, chorus and large
orchestra, "Palestrina", Hans Pfitzner's
(1869-1949) "most important work"
(Süddeutsche Zeitung), is a challenging
opera to stage. Written in a lush lateRomantic idiom, the masterpiece weaves
a fictitious tale around Giovanni Pierluigi
da Palestrina, one of the most important
Renaissance composers and renovators of sacred music, who fears
losing his creative powers and his role in society.
2072524
Zubin Mehta, at the age of only twenty-six,
became the youngest person ever to head a
major American Orchestra.
In sixteen years as music director of the
Los Angeles Philharmonic he elevated the
orchestra to international top rank.
The aim of the new series is to make
accessible to music lovers and collectors top-quality recordings
documenting extra-special concert performances that were hitherto
unreleased or were no longer available, either for the first time or as
re-releases on DVD and Blu-ray Disc.
2072244
The Berlin Kroll Opera House
The middle of Germany
A film by Jörg Moser-Metius
Founded in 1844 as an “exclusive amusement establishment”, the Kroll opera left deep traces in the history of Germany.
This Documentary produced by Jörg Moser-Metius (Winner of the Silver Berlin Bear) tells the remarkable story of the
famous Kroll opera house by including historical material as well as eye witness reports and references up to the present
day. It illustrates the eventful days under conductor Otto Klemperer, following its inglorious appearance as an alternative
seat of the Reichstag where Hitler passed the “Enabling Act”, up to the year 1990 when nothing is left of the building.
Moreover, the film captures the architectural, political and social developments of the center of Berlin as a place where
“German history became manifest”.
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Our Labels
Soli Deo Gloria
22
SIMAX
classics
FEB-MAR 2013