This brand new Christmas album from The King’s Singers features 25 tracks covering everything from contemporary choral gems and folk songs through to well-loved carols. Dotted throughout the album are several of the most famous English church carols, which take The King’s Singers right back to their earliest singing days, and which also reflect the group’s heritage at King’s College, Cambridge. In Christmas Carols with The King’s Singers, the group bottle that frosty, moonlit, fireside Christmas wonder and pour it into their sound.

The King’s Singers have represented the gold standard in a cappella singing on the world’s greatest stages for over fifty years. They are renowned for their unrivalled technique, versatility and skill in performance, and for their consummate musicianship, drawing both on the group’s rich heritage and its pioneering spirit to create an extraordinary wealth of original works and unique collaborations.

REVIEWS:

If you love a capella men’s ensembles in Christmas music the King’s Singers are for you. This new album has some of the most beautiful ensemble singing I’ve heard in a long time. The arrangements are all tasteful and the singing, both in solos and ensemble, exquisite. These are not the same singers that recorded some truly ugly arrangements in some truly ugly albums several decades ago. Back them there seemed to be an attempt by their producers to make the King Singers more “withit” by recording them in arrangements that someone deemed funny or original. Since then someone brought the group back to what they do best. There are a number of familiar carols here (`Ding! Dong! Merrily on High!’, `Tomorrow Shall be my Dancing Day’, etc.), but also some newer carols that are really lovely (`The quiet heart’, `The little road to Bethlehem’, `O, do not move’). What a suitable disc for a wintry evening by the fire! Notes, texts, and translations.

-- American Record Guide

In conceiving his inaugural season as Music Director of the Cincinnati Symphony, Louis Langtree wanted to celebrate the Orchestra’s rich tradition of excellence and its legacy of introducing the world to new works. Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait had its world premiere performance by the Cincinnati Symphony at Music Hall in 1942. November of 2013 marked the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Those powerful words were delivered here by legendary author, poet, activist and humanitarian Dr. Maya Angelou, a mere seven months before her recent passing at the age of 86; Hallowed Ground is dedicated in her memory. Hallowed Ground also features live recordings of two new works commissioned by the Orchestra for the MusicNOW Festival in March of 2014. Nico Muhly’s Pleasure Ground is a musical portrait of the iconic landscape architect and designer Frederick Law Olmsted and David Lang’s mountain is a musical portrait of composer Aaron Copland, who had a strong connection with the Cincinnati Symphony. Both these pieces and the Orchestra’s overall collaboration with the MusicNOW Festival represent a true spirit of innovation in Cincinnati, and affirm this as a place of experimentation.

Although Marilyn Horne was 58 years old at the time of this concert, no weakness clouded the beauty of her voice. Among the recordings over the course of Horne's career, there are many Rossini operas. This all-Rossini program shows that she could convincingly dominate the smaller forms as well.

REVIEW:

Little needs be said about Marilyn Horne, one of the greatest singers of all time, with a highly distinctive voice, immediately recognizable and colorful, a deep sense of musicality, and a vocal technique that is awe-inspiring. No ornamentation, no roulade, no trill, not the longest phrase, were beyond her phenomenal breath control. Add to this her almost magical personality.

Liederabend does need a word of explanation. The Liederbands (Liederabenden) were an extensive series of vocal recitals (over 60 years) performed at the Schwetzingen South- West Radio (Germany) Festivals. For all its touting as a Liederabend Horne’s program is all-Italian, all-Rossini (a Horne specialty). 19 songs, early and late, familiar and unfamiliar; all musical delights. Among the better known are ‘La pastorella’, ‘Bolero’, ‘La molinara’, the arias ‘Cruda sorte!’ (Italiana in Algeri and ‘Di tanti palpiti’ Tancredi. A few from ‘Sins of my Old Age’ are included.

Here is a great singer at the top of her form with most entertaining music. No texts, but a biography of Horne and a history of the Festival are included.

-- American Record Guide

The tragic death of Alberic Magnard, killed defending his home against German troops in 1914, brought a premature end to the composer’s life but not before he had completed four powerfully expressive symphonies (the Third and Fourth are on 8.574082). Symphony No. 1, with its strangely beautiful chorale, was first performed in 1893 but was then not heard again for a century. Symphony No. 2 caused a scandal at its premiere due to its length and complexity, but in its revised version offers radiant serenity and a dazzling confidence that reveals Magnard’s true compositional voice.

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REVIEW:

The outer movements have a flowing quality with a bit of quiet ecstasy that exemplifies what led people to call Magnard the French Bruckner, even though his music has a very different flavor. Keeping the long line going here is not easy to do, but Bollon excels, and he’s aided by excellent sound. This recording may make many listeners ask themselves how they could have been missing Magnard all these years.

– AllMusic Guide (James Manheim)

This programme portrays the ‘birth’ of the flute in France in the late 17th century and the following 40 years of its life as a new and fashionable instrument. A famous patron of the arts, King Louis XIV gathered elite composers and musicians to create the refinement, elegance and good taste that was demanded at his Paris Court. From the early petites pièces to more virtuoso suites and sonatas with their ornamented lyricism and grand dance rhythms, the mellow, robust and almost husky sounds of flutes from this period blend and weave around each other like the voices of two singers.

This new recording presents two iconic violin sonatas in an arrangement for cello and piano. Beethoven’s Kreutzer Sonata and Franck’s Violin Sonata are two undisputed masterpieces of the violin repertoire. Their power of structure, expression and imagination transcends their mere instrumental restrictions, and their human message stands above the musical matter. The arrangement for cello and piano sheds a new light on the music, enriching and enhancing its dark and dramatic atmosphere, while giving a new dimension to their lyrical and ethereal sections. The Beethoven arrangement is by the famous 19th century cellist Franchomme (also dedicatee of Chopin’s cello sonata), the Franck arrangement is by Jules Delsart, with permission of Franck himself. Roberto Trainini and Cristiano Burato, who have already successfully recorded Martucci’s cello sonatas, provide here beautiful and heartfelt performances.

William Mathias was one of the most significant and prolific Welsh composers of the 20th century. His flexible and highly approachable style can be heard in the holiday mood of the Suite Parisienne, the brilliance and lyricism of the Capriccio for flute and piano and the wonderfully rhapsodic Sonata for Harp. Mathias’s songs are among the most communicative settings of their kind, including Pan Oeddwn Fachgen (‘A Dream of Youth’), considered by the composer to be ‘one of the finest lyrical poems in modern Welsh.

MOZART, W.A.: Symphonies (Essential), Vols. 1-6 (Norrington)

Cellist Charles-Antoine Duflot (b. 1986) has won numerous prizes since 1999, including first prizes at the U.F.A.M. Competition in Paris, the 2009 Int’l J&A Beare Solo Bach Competition in London, the 2010 Int’l Beethoven Competition in Hradec-nad-Moravici and the 2011 Possehl Music Prize in Lübeck. In May 2013 he won first prize at the violoncello competition “Ton und Erklärung – Werkvermittlung in Musik und Wort” (Tone and Explanation – Work Mediation in Music and Words) in Hanover. This CD, featuring works by Ortiz (d. 1570), Mundry (b. 1963), Bach and Poulenc, is the result of that prize.

Marko Topchii, winner of the 2017 Michele Pittaluga Guitar Competition, has selected a rich and varied repertoire ranging from neo-Romanticism to serialism, each work offering a unique vision of the instrument’s technical and expressive capabilities. Antonio Jose’s Sonata is remarkably inventive, bringing a new language to ancient dance forms, while Frank Martin’s Quatre Pieces breves, written in the same year, offers the flourish and vigor of contemporary harmonic vocabulary. Ronald Dyens’ Libra Sonatine is one of the most virtuosic and brilliant of late 20th-century guitar works. Ukranian-born guitarist Marko Topchii, has been the winner of more than 40 international guitar competitions. He has performed at Carnegie Hall, the Salle Cortot, Yamaha Ginza Hall, and at the Tchaikovsky Hall. He often performs with orchestras, having performed more than ten concertos for guitar and orchestra. He is sponsored by the D’Addario Strings Company and records with a guitar made by Jim Redgate.

The Gürzenich Orchestra of Cologne with its Conductor Laureate Dmitri Kitaienko proudly present magical music illustrating the story of Nutcracker and Mouse King by E. T. A. Hoffmann and Alexandre Dumas. A Nutcracker performance can hardly be more authentic than this – especially since the artists are presenting us here with the entire ballet, not merely the Suite (Op. 71a). The ballet is complemented by the Suite from The Fairy’s Kiss by Stravinsky – composed in 1928 and arranged a number of times. It became world famous through the choreography by George Balanchine for the old New York Metropolitan Opera in 1937, later also for the City Center of Music and Drama as well as Lincoln Center, New York.

Victoria Bond is a distinguished force in contemporary music. She is known for her melodic and dramatic flair, and her orchestral works, chamber pieces and operas have been lauded by The New York Times as “powerful, stylistically varied and technically demanding.” This collection of world premiere recordings by Grammy Award-winning ensemble Chicago Pro Musica provides an essential overview of Bond’s multi-faceted inventiveness- from a musical interpretation of tarot cards in Instruments of Revelation, to descriptive and dramatic images of the tragic city of Pompeii in Frescoes and Ash. Leopold Bloom’s Homecoming expresses in music what is left to our imagination in James Joyce’s Ulysses, and the mathematics of Binary turn the digits 0 and 1 into variations on a Brazilian samba.

Anton Rubinstein was the equal of Liszt as a pianist and a technically gifted composer but, in his own words, he was perceived by his contemporaries as too German to be Russian and too Russian to be German, and his music was frequently disparaged. Although occasionally derivative, the first two sonatas are impressively bravura and passionate works which pianist Han Chen approaches as if reading a 19th-century Russian novel, digging down to the very essence of the human soul. It is perhaps an irony of the history of taste that Rubinstein's very real achievements are beginning to be valued only some 125 years after his death.

Classical Music

Louis Spohr's reputation as one of Germany's leading violinists was at it's height when he composed his Duets for Two Violins, Op. 39, and while it appears his intention was to finance an Italian concert tour with marketable duets, the publishers complained of their technical difficulty. Spohr defended this aspect by stating his 'desire to give my duets more inner value, more richness of harmony' than is usual in this genre. Indeed, a contemporary critic exclaimed that 'it is no exaggeration to say that the ideas and artistry required for these works would be sufficient... to create three concertos.'

Vojin Kocic, winner of the 2017 Heinsberg International Guitar Competition, presents a recital that not only covers a wide historical range but also includes some of the most challenging works in the guitar repertoire, of which Ponce's La Folia variations is considered a veritable Everest to be conquered. Following a long and distinguished tradition, Kocic's own arrangement of Bach's Second Violin Partita is crowned by the greatest of Baroque instrumental masterpieces, the monumental Ciaccona, Regondi's prodigious talent is reflected in his scintillating Introduction et Caprice, while Pasieczny's Phosphenes was composed as a test piece for a guitar competition. Born in Serbia in 1990, Vojin Kocic began playing guitar at the age of eight, studying with Jovica Milsevic and Darko Karajic. He went on to study with Anders Miolin at the University of Arts in Zurich, Switzerland, and was awarded a Bachelor of Arts, Master of Specialized Music Performance and Master of Pedagogy Diploma.

There are no finer period-instrument Haydn symphony performances available than these. Using a nearly 50-piece orchestra (thank God!), McGegan captures the music's full grandeur as well as its intimacy. These players sound like a real orchestra, a group with a corporate identity, an attractive ensemble sonority, superb wind soloists, and, miracle of miracles, period strings that don't sound like a den of dying cats. McGegan's phrasing of the "clock" theme in the eponymous symphony's second movement is a model of stylishness and wit--listen and I dare you not to smile.

His pacing throughout is ideal; allegros are swift but not so much as to blur characterful detail. The minuets are perfect; trumpets and drums cut through the texture without turning crude; tuttis really fill the acoustic space, and the dynamic range is aptly wide. No performance of these works follows Haydn's dynamic markings literally, but McGegan's adjustments flow with the music and invariably come across as natural--check out the finale of the "London" Symphony for some particularly telling examples.

The live sonics are generally very good, particularly given the fact that the recordings were made over a three-year period (2007-9). In Symphony No. 88 close miking makes the sound a touch rough in places, and I could do without the applause at the end of each work, but the audience otherwise is extremely well-behaved and extraneous performance noises are happily quite minimal. We need Haydn recordings like this: warm, humorous, affecting, yet fully cognizant of period scholarship and style. They are far too rare.

– David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com



HAYDN Symphonies: No. 104, “London”; No. 88; No. 101, “Clock” • Nicholas McGegan, cond; Philharmonia Baroque O • PHILHARMONIA BAROQUE PBP-02 (75:16) Live: Berkeley, CA 2/10–11/2007, 11/15–16/2008; 9/12–13/2009


Nicholas McGegan and his San Francisco period-instrument ensemble are renowned for their many Handel recordings, but they play music of all eras. This is the first Haydn I’ve heard from them. This 2007 performance of the “London” Symphony is marvelous: The opening Adagio-Allegro brims over with high spirits, highlighted by blazing brass and pounding timpani; the Menuet has grace as well as bounce (McGegan does not play da capo repeats), and the Trio has a delicious lilt, with the merest hint of a luftpause in measure three. The finale is somewhat rough and ready, but its Spiritoso direction is fully realized. Comparisons with other performances do reveal a few shortcomings. As used to be the case in period ensembles, violins are rather dull; those in Richard Hickox’s Collegium Musicum 90 are clean and bright. Hickox’s forces are also better balanced and recorded (by Chandos); McGegan’s woodwinds are often drowned out by screaming trumpets. However, the Hickox has nowhere near the drive and élan of this performance. Nor can McGegan’s strings match the crisp attacks and phenomenal execution of either Colin Davis’s Concertgebouw or Leonard Bernstein’s New York Philharmonic.


The opening Allegro of No. 88 goes beautifully; the movement has no trumpets or timpani. Violins are brighter in 2008, as is the recorded sound. The Largo, however, is a disaster. Bassoons are weak; even when the pair shares the solo line, they are nearly inaudible. Taken even faster (5:30) than the impatient George Szell (5:53), this performance totally misses the movement’s calm beauty. Largos are always difficult; holding the line at a very slow tempo takes enormous concentration and ensemble discipline. Hermann Scherchen almost manages, at a lumbering 10:04; Bernstein’s 7:04 is ideal, in a uniquely lovely rendering. McGegan’s Menuet is back on track; his slow Allegretto works well. The Allegro con spirito finale, again reasonably paced, is also a success—until the coda. In this live performance, McGegan (adrenaline kicking in?) ups the tempo at the last minute, and the final three chords are smudged. Bernstein opts for a ludicrously fast tempo; his virtuoso ensemble pulls it off.


The “Clock” gets a fine performance at mostly consensus tempos; the 2009 sound (they were all at the same site, the First Congregational Church in Berkeley) is more reverberant than before but very well balanced. The Andante is too fast; is McGegan, like Szell, allergic to slow music? The bassoons revive here, but oboe and flute are a bit sour together. Menuet and Finale are magnificent; the wrong-note trumpet joke sounds cleanly, the clarinet-brightened score resounds, and this time the final three chords are crisp.


Good period performances of late Haydn symphonies have been hard to come by. This disc ranks among the best.


FANFARE: James H. North
"...Nicholas McGegan has been honing the San Francisco-based period-instrument Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra for some 25 years. Nor are performances of Haydn’s music in period style anything new. But seldom have his elemental dynamic contrasts sounded so properly in proportion or so mercurial, with the 50 or so players able to play out lustily in fortes and pull back quickly to quieter modes, whether playful, subtle or mysterious...The recordings, made at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley, Calif., from 2007 to 2009, were beautifully produced and engineered by David v. R. Bowles...The release of cumulative excitement at the end of each [symphony] is of a kind that tends to happen only in live circumstances."

- James R. Oestreich, The New York Times [June 24, 2011]

Inspired by the image of a violin melody ‘flying off’, Chinese-American composer Bright Sheng’s virtuosic three-movement concerto Let Fly interweaves Chinese and Western classical elements. Vivid legends of astrological animals inform Zodiac Tales, a tour de force concerto for orchestra. Reflecting the city of Suzhou’s ancient, continuous cultural heritage, traditional nostalgia fuses with contemporary rhythms in the exciting Suzhou Overture. These works are featured here in their world premiere recordings.

Shortlisted for the Gramophone Awards!

Following the success of their last album, Timelapse, this new album from Orchestra of the Swan is a collection of extraordinary works connected by ideas of pilgrimage, contemplation, exploration and enlightenment through the works of composers such as Richter, Respighi, Britten, Piazzolla, Brian Eno, Nico Muhly, Joy Division and more. As with Timelapse, the joy is to be found in discovering the surprising and delightful connections between culturally disparate and musically contrasting time periods. Labyrinths have been an important part of humanity’s cultural landscape for thousands of years; from the Ancient Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur to the intriguing stories of Jorge Luis Borges and Umberto Eco. Our overwhelming desire to find patterns and ‘the hidden truth’ is perhaps nowhere more evident than in the subversive and complex vistas of music. Formed in 1995, Orchestra of the Swan is a British chamber orchestra which, under the artistic direction of David Le Page, is passionate about audience inclusivity and blurring the lines between genres, through its adventurous and accessible programming.

Philip Glass has become an iconic figure in American music. His works are often inspired by collaborations with other leading musicians, and the proposal of an “American Four Seasons” by the violinist Robert McDuffie to reflect Vivaldi’s famous masterpiece resulted in a concerto which evokes the Baroque spirit of early 18th-century violin tradition. With the Concerto’s range of moods, listeners are invited to decide for themselves which season the music evokes. The Violin Sonata sees Glass’s melodic and harmonic language haunted by the ghosts of Brahms, Faure and Franck, “the meditative-ness of this piece bringing a unique energy” for award-winning violinist Piotr Plawner.