A New York Times 25 Best Classical Track Selection for 2019

Susan Narucki has worked closely with Kurtág on the interpretation of these songs, and her readings may be regarded as definitive.

American soprano and Latin Grammy-nominee Susan Narucki, one of today’s most committed advocates of the music of our time, has a deep and lasting working relationship with Hungarian composer Gyorgy Kurtag which dates back to 1986. Susan’s luminous tone and distinctive artistry and Kurtag’s idiosyncratic fusion of poetry and music come together in this quintessential recorded collection of some of the composer’s most iconoclastic vocal works. In Susan’s words, “I have spent much of my life immersed in this repertoire, and it has become essential to the way I understand music; it is the heart of my practice as a musician.” Equally appreciative, Kurtag acknowledges Susan, “who sang so warmly, purely, so ‘integer’ these songs- with thanks and love.”

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REVIEWS:

Susan Narucki has worked closely with Kurtág, in Hungary, on the interpretation of these songs, and her readings may be regarded as definitive. She puts across how Kurtág's songs, more than embodying a relationship between text and music, constitute a heroic attempt to weld the two, through the use of extremely detailed instructions in the score, into a single unit. Small though they are, they may be regarded as virtuoso works. Recommended, although not to everyone's taste.

– All Music Guide (James Mannheim)

These seven songs, a highlight in this album of Kurtag’s vocal works, pass in just over nine minutes: dark little pools of fervor, articulated by Ms. Narucki with precision and tenderness and accompanied by just the percussive cimbalom, played here with richly pianistic resonance by Nicholas Tolle.

– New York Times (Zachary Woolfe)

The singer-songwriter tradition of any country reflects the hearts and thoughts of the people, and in Russia this is no different. In quiet, often acoustic settings, the artist performs his music, making the song and it's words the focus above all else. Through vivid lyrics, metaphorical language, and soulful melody, the singer-songwriter can mask controversial and difficult topics to bring his message home, or simply convey his most personal thoughts through music. During the days of the Soviet Union, artists like Vysotsky, Vertinsky, and Okudjava pioneered the Russian singer-songwriter style. All wrote on themes central to Russian life, sang with heartfelt passion, popularized a genre for the people and about the people, and, through their individual and unique styles of performances, ensured the lasting popularity of the singer-songwriter.

Classical Music

Following its successful run of unabridged Dickens titles, Naxos AudioBooks has turned its attention to Henry James. Further titles are planned for 2018. In the second novel of James’s celebrated late period, American Lambert Strether is sent to Paris on behalf of Mrs. Newsome, his fiance, to collect her son, Chad. When Strether finds Chad, he discovers an altered man and becomes introduced to a free and unconventional style of life that soon intoxicates him. His views begin to change; the morality of Woollett, his hometown, becomes foreign, and the ‘ambassador’ loses sight of his mission… Part tragedy, part comedy, The Ambassadors is a rewarding portrait about one man’s late awakening. John Chancer is an award-winning narrator of many audiobooks. His soft American accent lends an authenticity to James’s intercontinental tale.

Note: This Blu-ray Disc is playable only on Blu-ray Disc players, and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

Recorded live from the Teatro Regio di Parma, 8 October 2011

Bonus:
- Verdi’s Backyard – A documentary by Sergej Grguric

Picture format: 1080i High Definition
Sound format: PCM 2.0 / DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: Italian, English, German, French, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese (concert) / English, Italian (documentary)
Running time: 95 mins (concert) + 52 mins (documentary)
No. of Discs: 1 (BD 50)

Classical Music

Listen to the Naxos Podcast to learn more about this release

Through Puccini represents the late-Romantic apex of the Italian operatic tradition, his songs are much less well known and, in their pared simplicity and emotional restraint, could hardly be more different from his stage works. The nineteen complete songs for soprano (two in duet with a mezzo) and piano cover themes typical of lyric poetry including life, death, personal resolution, love, nature, home and religious faith. There are also rare salon pieces and examples of Puccini's secular juvenilia, written between 1875 and 1880.

PIAZZOFORTE

Massenet: Werther

The decades around 1600 bore witness to the flourishing of a remarkable musical tradition: the art of diminution, in which simple melodies were given exquisitely virtuosic embellishments, effectively creating new works. One such creation, Francesco Rognoni’s ornamentation of Palestrina’s Io son ferito, was captioned ‘con arte e maestria’ – with art and mastery – referring to the consummate craftsmanship displayed in its invention and performance. Giving new life to this tradition was the inspiration for this unique programme: alongside iconic works from the diminution canon, Monteverdi String Band members Oliver Webber and Steven Devine present newly ornamented versions of a selection of sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century works.

Chisholm: Music for Piano, Vol. 7

In 1832 German-born Friedrich Burgmuller settled in Paris where he became internationally admired for his salon pieces and studies. At a time when demand for new teaching material had reached unprecedented heights, he supplied a sequence of works that appealed to the amateur market by virtue of their musical interest and appropriate technical demands. Written for the burgeoning market for piano teaching material, the set of 25 Easy and Progressive Studies, Op. 100 was soon followed by the 18 Characteristic Studies, Op. 109, a continuation of the earlier set, each piece bearing a charming title. They continue to provide a basis for teaching to this day. These works are performed by Swedish pianist Carl Petersson, whose previous albums for Grand Piano have won critical acclaim.

• Lutenist Axel Wolf's fourth Oehms release

Time Flies is an album of sixteen contemporary solo harpsichord works. All of these works have been composed within the last twenty years. Harpsichordist Elaine Funaro is “regarded as one of the leading performers of new music for harpsichord” (Classical Music: The Essential Listening Companion). She is a popular presence at contemporary and early music festivals around the world, and was the first, now past, president of the newly merged Historical Keyboard Society of North America, and is currently the Artistic Director of Aliénor, the American-based international competition for new harpsichord music. Elaine Funaro performs on a custom-made contemporary harpsichord, the Kingston Opus #333, which is decorated throughout by original artwork from North Carolina artist Lisa Creed.

This double album dedicated to Psalms and Dialogues (released after the 4-album release titled Oratori, Mottetti e Lamentazioni) is completing the opera omnia of sacred works hitherto known by the Augustinian friar Ippolito Ghezzi. Within these recordings, the Cappella Musicale di San Giacomo Maggiore in Bologna led by Roberto Cascio is revealing to us a prolific and talented composer, endowed with technique, inventiveness, and happy melodic vein. The Cappella Musicale San Giacomo Maggiore was founded in 2006 with the aim of reviving the unpublished scores of the many composers who belonged to the order of the Augustinian fathers between the 16th and 18th centuries. Among the ensemble’s performers are renowned theorists such as Lodovico Zacconi and composers like Ippolito Ghezzi, Guglielmo Lipparini and Tiburzio Massaini. The Cappella Musica, with its research and restoration work, intends to contribute to the rediscovery of the Italian historical and musical heritage.

In the days before sound recording, orchestral music was often arranged in versions for piano duet as a way for the public to hear, play and enjoy music by the great composers of the day. As a result, the number of arrangements made available soon exceeded that of original piano duet compositions. Robert Schumann, who loved to play duets together with his wife Clara, often supervised and occasionally created many of his own arrangements in the form. This is the penultimate album in this seven-volume series containing all of Schumann’s orchestral works arranged for piano duet. Mariko and Volker Eckerle founded the Eckerle Piano Duo in 2006. The cleverly conceived concert programs of the German-Japanese duo are very popular with critics and audiences alike. Along with central works of the piano duet repertoire, the Eckerle Piano Duo regularly plays rarely heard pieces and works together with other musicians, actors and ballet companies.

The violin-accordion Duo ViA! (Sinn Yang and Harald Oeler) made their debut in 2009 with the program Seasons at the Heidelberg Spring Festival. + At that time, it required a great deal of courage to present to the public, in a sold-out hall, one of the most popular and most frequently played classical works, Vivaldi’s I quattro stagioni in combination with Astor Piazzolla’s Las cuatro portenas. + For the Duo, the program Seasons was and still is both an experiment and a daring feat.

Classical Music

The Naxos Deutsche Schubert-Lied-Edition: Schubert set the poetry of over 115 writers to music. He selected poems from classical Greece, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, from eighteenth-century German authors, early Romantics, Biedermeier poets.

On her debut album with the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra and Roberto Paternostro, Selina Ott presents an exciting selection from the opulent range of 20th century trumpet concertos that have been written in close temporal proximity to one another.