The Telegraph Quartet makes their Azica Records debut, In this first installment we have two works that, as far as can be determined, have never been recorded together. They are equally unlikely to have appeared together on the same mainstream live concert program. Ravel’s only string quartet is often paired with Debussy’s only string quartet particularly to showcase their shared lineage of French Impressionism, and that Ravel’s design was strongly influenced by Debussy’s. Schoenberg’s first numbered quartet is most often programmed within the cycle of his own radically evolving quartets, or with the work of the larger “Second Viennese School”, perhaps even the quartets of his only teacher Anton Zemlinsky. Here, in a striking setting, two of the greatest 20th century composers share the program with two distinctively different masterworks that have a nearly identical chronology. Born one year apart (Schoenberg in 1874, Ravel in 1875), these contemporaries composed, premiered and published their quartets between 1902 and 1907 (Ravel first, then Schoenberg). 1904 saw the premiere of Ravel’s quartet just as Schoenberg began to compose his. This synchronicity in the first decade of the 20th century makes this pairing an extraordinary snapshot of the avant- garde: A time capsule.

The juxtaposition is a marvelous invitation for comparison and contrast. It presents two significantly divergent “schools” that nonetheless share some interesting traits. The history, temperament, life story and lasting influence of each composer portray them as wildly different, like two different musical species. But together, their quartets paint a vivid portrait of a shared moment within the long history of the string quartet genre

The c/o chamber orchestra is a collective of thirty young musicians from a dozen different countries. Playing without a conductor, the orchestra is dedicated to that particular collaborative process which is the essence of chamber music. For their first album, the members have chosen to highlight a genre more difficult to pin-point than one might think. Its very name, divertimento, implies that it is simply a diversion, light music for entertainment – but many of the best-known examples of the form transcend that definition. And as many composers have learned, even light-hearted music should be taken seriously: humor requires a master’s touch. The four works recorded here offer different perspectives on the genre, starting with Ibert’s seven-movement suite in which the composer constantly plays with the listener’s expectations. Some forty years before Ibert, his compatriot Émile Bernard composed a very different Divertissement. It is scored for double wind quintet, reminiscent of Mozart’s divertimenti and serenades for winds. But even though the music is melodious and carefree, the debt owed by Bernard to the German romantic composers is never far from the surface. A very special case is Bartók’s Divertimento for strings, composed just before the outbreak of World War II. The closing work on the album reunites the winds and strings of the c/o orchestra in a work written especially for this project by the American composer Michael Ippolito, who in his Divertimento pays full tribute to the contrast-rich nature of the genre.

This album contains the symphonic suite "Scheherazade" by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and the short composition "The Enchanted Lake" by his student Anatoly Lyadov.

In 1887-88, after the sudden death of his brilliant friend Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov composed those three orchestral works which crowned his Russian national period and has made his name a permanent part of the worldwide concert repertoire: the "Capriccio espagno"l, the symphonic suite "Scheherazade", and the concert overture "La Grande Pâque Russe". With Scheherazade Rimsky-Korsakov did not tell a story, he rather set individual, unconnected episodes and images to music.

Anatoly Lyadov has a reputation of being lazy – based solely on Rimsky-Korsakov’s opinion of him – yet his ambition was for every piece of music he created to be flawless. One consequence of this was that his entire œuvre consists entirely of miniatures. The "Enchanted Lake" does not tell a story but is purely impressionistic music about a Russian forest lake, on a level with Ravel and Debussy. Conductor Dmitri Kitayenko conducted various orchestras in Moscow, became chief conductor of the Moscow Philharmonic in 1976, and took over the Symphony Orchestra of the Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt am Main in 1990-96. He went on to hold principal positions with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, the Bern Symphony Orchestra, the KBS Symphony Orchestra in Seoul and finally, in addition to his worldwide activities as a guest conductor, was appointed Honorary Conductor of the Gürzenich Orchestra in Cologne.

Among Stephen Dodgson’s portfolio of more than 250 works are chamber operas, of which Margaret Catchpole: Two Worlds Apart is a most striking example. It is based on the true story of a woman who was convicted of the then capital crime of horse stealing and transported to Australia, and Dodgson conveys the romance and drama of the story with characteristic lyricism and rhythmic energy. Words are paramount for Dodgson, and his setting is vivid, immediate and tonal, with some swaggering rustic moments amidst the precise characterization and idiomatic instrumental writing.

Carlo Domeniconi is a master of guitar composition. His fusion of Western and Eastern elements is a distinctive feature of his writing, and this album presents a body of work for the unusual combination of mandolin and guitar. The large-scale Durandarte charts a medieval knight’s wild journey through the countryside, which is accompanied by poignant love songs, elegies, and agitated cross-rhythms. In Tarantula precox he summons up a dervish-like dance; while in the kaleidoscopic moods of Zemrude the Orient and the Middle East merge dramatically. All but one of these works have been composed especially for the Mare Duo. The Mare Duo has inspired numerous composers to enrich the repertoire for their formation, including Carlo Domeniconi, Jaime Zenamon, Konstantin Vassiliev, Jürg Kindle, Frank Wallace, Thomas Allen LeVines, Lars Wüller, and many others. The Mare Duo is also interested in performing the classical repertoire for their formation as well as playing innovative transcriptions. Annika and Fabian have released several solo, duo and chamber music albums with labels such as Naxos, Schott Music and Gyre Records, and they have appeared on TV productions including MTV Unplugged.

Donizetti’s Don Pasquale represents the high point of the Italian buffa tradition, a sparkling comedy using characters from commedia dell’arte in ways that are entertaining, witty and playful. It was the work selected by the Vienna State Opera for its 1977 tour through Austria. Starring famous singers like the bass Oskar Czerwenka, the great lyric tenor Luigi Alva and, on the cusp of international fame, Edita Gruberova (soon to become the ‘queen of bel canto’) – this filmed performance, in colour and sung in German, showcases an outstanding ensemble at the height of its powers.

Written for the Opéra in Paris, Gaetano Donizetti’s La Favorite contains some of his most famous arias. This superb production from the Donizetti Opera Festival in his birthplace of Bergamo returns the work to its rarely heard 1840 French grand opera origins, and uses the critical edition by Rebecca Harris-Warrick which includes all of the original ballet music and the cabaletta of the duet between Léonor and Alphonse. Set in 14th-century Spain, the tragic story is of a pious novice (Fernand) who falls in love with a noble lady and abandons the cloister. He becomes a war hero and asks the King for her hand, later finding out to his horror that she is Léonor de Guzman, the King’s beloved mistress.