Also available on Blu-ray

“Nijinsky“ is the title of this “choreographic approach“ to a dance phenomenon that has been part of Neumeier‘s life ever since the beginning of his career. During his approximately ten years as a dancer, Vaslav Nijinsky (1889-1950) set a new standard both technically and expressively, while in his choreographic work he pointed the way towards modern dance. All three aspects - the dancer, the choreographer and the person Nijinsky - form the starting point for John Neumeier‘s latest creation. Neumeier, who as early as 1979 presented a short ballet, “Vaslav“, is regarded as one of the leading Nijinsky experts worldwide. Nevertheless, it was not without reluctance that he took up the task of honoring through dance a dance legend: “In creating a work about a historical person, what aspect should we concentrate on? Who was he truly: The man? The artist? Which witness, what information can we trust, which theories should one follow? What point of view can we take towards the complex puzzle Nijinsky? An instinctive choice must be made...“ Also included is an interesting interview with John Neumeier about Nijinksy.

Evoke is the Ferio Saxophone Quartet’s third album, following their previous critically acclaimed releases Flux and Revive. For this recording they are joined by pianist Timothy End for a program of original works and arrangements for piano and saxophone quartet. Shostakovich’s Jazz Suite opens the proceedings, followed by Iain Farrington’s extremely descriptive Animal Parade. This is followed by a virtuosic arrangement of Bizet’s Carmen Suite, before the program closes with the quintet Memorias by Spanish composer Pedro Iturralde Ochoa. All of the arrangements are by Iain Farrington, and are all premier recordings.

Lawrence Golan's Fantasia for Solo Violin, written in 1993, was inspired by Ysaye's sonatas of 1924, which, in turn, were inspired by the unaccompanied violin works of J.S. Bach, dated 1720. Hence this recording represents the inspirational lineage of a composition spanning almost three centuries. Acclaimed for his vibrant, inspired performances, imaginative programming and evocative command of different styles and composers, American conductor Lawrence Golan has developed a reputation as a dynamic, charismatic communicator. He has conducted throughout the United States and in Bulgaria, Canada, China, Czech Republic, El Salvador, England, Georgia, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan, and continues to develop relationships with orchestras nationally and abroad.

Schubert moved to Vienna in early 1817, which was the center of musical activities in Europe at that time. Schubert focused strongly upon composing piano sonatas, and the result was these four superb works. Korean-born pianist Sookkyung Cho brings these sonatas truly to life. Noted for her sensitive and imaginative (New York Concert Review) playing, Sookkyung Cho has been captivating worldwide audiences with her personal, thoughtful expressionist style. She has appeared in venues such as Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Chicago Cultural Center, Sarasota Opera House, Baltimore Museum of Art, Montreal Conservatory, Beaux concerts de la releve in Quebec, Château de Fontainebleau in France, and Zijingang Theater at Zhejiang University in China, among others, and was recently heard on Chicagos WFMT.

Classical Music

The solo concerto emerged in Northern Italy in the first quarter of the 18th century and rapidly became popular across Europe. The five works here demonstrate how concertos for the flute differ in Germany, Italy, and France. Outer movements usually retain the virtuosic elements that characterize the concertos of Vivaldi, but the Frenchman Michel Blavet infiltrates an exquisite Gavotte into his work, while Telemanns superb melodies and rich harmonies are characteristic features of his Flute Concerto in D major. All five works exemplify the Baroque ideal of singing lyricism and passionate expression. Barthold Kuijken is an eminent leader in the field of early music. A virtuoso traverse soloist, teacher and conductor, he has shaped the fields of historical flutes and historically informed performance over the last 40 years. His book, The Notation is Not the Music, is an artful summary of his research, ideas, and reflections on music.

In a word I feel myself the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair over this ever makes things worse and worse instead of better... but I have tried my hand at several instrumental things... in fact, I intend to pave the way towards a grand symphony in this manner. These extracts from a letter of 1824 epitomize the paradox of Schubert, the manic-depressive composer. On the one hand his music has that world-weary element of profound grief - 'the most wretched creature in the world' - and on the other a life-affirming exuberance bordering on the manic that characterizes the Wanderer-Fantasie and parts of the D major sonata D.850. In this final volume Llyr Williams plays a selection of Franz Liszt's evocative Schubert song transcriptions, including works from Die sch�ne M�llerin, Wintereise and Schwanengesang.

The sacred-music production of Augustinian friar Ippolito Ghezzi (1655-1725) is collected almost in full in this 4CD box set containing the complete edition of his Oratorios, Psalms and Lamentations for Holy Week. A fresh, inspired writing and a sober, but not austere style are the mainstays of the composer’s approach to the great Biblical episodes. The intention of this music is to reach the listeners’ understanding in a direct (and sometimes also dramatic) way, unfailingly guiding them towards a conversion to faith. Roberto Cascio leads the Cappella Musicale di San Giacomo Maggiore, Bologna.

George Antheil's infamous Ballet Mécanique exists in (basically) three versions, the first of which (for lots of synchronized mechanical pianos and percussion) has only recently been premiered and recorded for the first time by the UMass Lowell Percussion Ensemble. The version that scandalized Paris audiences in 1926 actually was an arrangement for lots of normal pianos and percussion, and this version was recreated on a long out-of-print MusicMasters disc. Daniel Spalding and his intrepid ensemble take on the composer's 1953 revision for the time-honored (via Stravinsky and Orff) ensemble of four pianos and percussion, an arrangement that reduces the score by about half while preserving the most important thematic material. It's a fine work in its own right, more conventionally "listenable" than the early versions, and it's easy to understand Antheil's desire to give the music wider currency. Spalding and his ensemble play very well indeed, and the recording balances the various special effects (airplane propellers and electric bells) in such a way that they register without ever becoming totally obnoxious.


You can't help but feel sorry for Antheil's subsequent career misfortunes. After all, no one today seriously castigates Stravinsky for not writing more Rites of Spring, and we can only view with bemusement the cold shoulder given Antheil's post "Mécanique" production, especially considering the fact that even this notorious work was as ignored in performance as the rest of his music. Antheil clearly recognized that, like Stravinsky's "Rite", the Ballet Mécanique was an artistic dead end, but as this disc proves, he wrote plenty of fine music both before and after it. Take the Serenade for String Orchestra No. 1. Here's a delightful piece, humorous and lyrical, full of rhythmic energy and good tunes. The Symphony for Five Instruments very cleverly balances an unusual ensemble of viola, flute, bassoon, trumpet, and trombone, and will appeal to anyone who enjoys the chamber music of Poulenc. The Concert for Chamber Orchestra (actually a wind octet), also reeks of Stravinsky and Les Six, but you'd be hard pressed to find anything by that septet of composers precisely like it.


In short, Antheil's neglect is completely unjustified, as this and other fine recordings now appearing on Naxos and CPO clearly demonstrate. As with the Ballet, Spalding and the Philadelphia Virtuosi Chamber Orchestra play these diverse other works with affection and relish. Naxos provides them with excellent recorded sound too. A winner in every respect, this disc should go far toward supporting the ongoing rehabilitation of this seminal figure in 20th century music.
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Baby, It's Cold Outside

Conducted by The Sixteen’s Associate Conductor, Eamonn Dougan, this release is the fourth volume in this critically acclaimed series. This installment explores the music of Italian composers who lived and worked within the Polish court during Sigismund III Vasa’s reign. When Sigismund III began to reorganize his music ensembles in 1594, he modeled his new structure after the chapels of Rome, and thus brought in several highly esteemed Italian musicians. Some of these notable musicians included Luca Marenzio, Asprillo Pacelli, and Vincenzo Bertolusi. The arrival of these composers heralded a new age of sacred Polish music. Most notable on this release is Marenzio’s magnificent Missa super Iniquos odio habui. While the Kyria and Gloria movements remained, the other parts of the Mass went missing after World War II, and have only been rediscovered since the fall of the Berlin Wall. This is the world premiere recording of the Mass in its entirety.

Choral Concert: United States Air Force Singing Sergeants -

Metier’s top line release for 2015 is this program which may be the first ‘music DVD’ devoted to contemporary percussion works. More than that, it has been produced with stunning graphics and visual enhancements as well as ‘straight’ video of the performances thanks to the work of top Danish movie director Christian Holten Bonke. The program includes the most iconic of modern percussion classics, ‘Psappha’ by Iannis Xenakis, together with his much more recent ‘Rebonds’. Works by Henze, Donatoni and Ferneyhough utilize wide ranges of tuned and unturned instruments, while the pieces by Jodlowski and Globokar use different materials altogether. Even for the non-percussion fan, the film is one to watch again and again. Mathias Reumert is one of Europe’s foremost percussionists, having been awarded the DanishMusic Critics’ Prize for 2015.

Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schumann & Ravel: Piano Concertos

Also available on Blu-ray

Haydn’s oratorio ‘The Creation’ is one of the greatest masterpieces in the repertoire. Its libretto was constructed by Gottfried von Swieten who took texts from the Book of Genesis, the Psalms, and who employed his own original poetry. In this radical and compelling staging by the ground-breaking Catalan theatre collective, La Fura dels Baus, and internationally acclaimed stage director Carlus Padrissa, the oratorio is seen through the prism of a stream of refugees expelled from Paradise. Stunning light projections encapsulate the stage space and incorporated philosophical and scientific perspectives make this truly an oratorio for our time.

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REVIEW:

Many productions these days use video as part of the design but this is the first I can recall which is so wonderfully—often breathtakingly—effective.

– Lark Reviews

Described as “evocative” and “kaleidoscopic” (NY Times), composer Scott Wollschleger’s music is at times deconstructive, disembodied, and dystopic, but always infused with awe and wonder. Wollschleger probes timbre, instrumental relationships, and aesthetic implications to find transcendent moments in unique textures in this remarkable recording featuring performances by soprano Corrine Byrne, trumpeter Andy Kozar, violist Anne Lanzilotti, cellist John Popham, pianist Karl Larsen, Mivos Quartet, and Longleash trio. Scott Wollschleger is a Brooklyn-based composer of solo, chamber, and dramatic music. His distinct musical language explores themes of art in dystopia, the conceptualization of silence, synesthesia, and creative repetition in form. Wollschleger’s concert works have been performed across the United States and the world, including the International Music Institute at Darnstadt, the Festival of New American Music in Sacramento, the Bang on a Can Festival at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, and the MATA Festival Interval Series. His music is published by Project Schott New York.

The genesis of Heitor Villa-Lobos’s Études goes back to his first meeting with the Andrés Segovia, at which the legendary guitarist asked for one étude and the composer ended up writing twelve. Andrea Bissoli returns to the original 1928 manuscript, restoring elements lost in later publication and reliving the magic of those times on an instrument almost identical to Segovia’s. The Tarantela was probably also written guitar in hand. For his ‘folk ensemble’ instrumentation of the brightly colored songs of the Guia prático, Bissoli has sought out traces of the guitar in the original and chosen a selection of pieces tailor-made for his instrument. The exciting story of O papagaio do moleque (The Little Boy’s Kite) concludes this third and final volume of the series.

Shortly after taking up the position of Thomaskantor in Leipzig in 1723, Bach wrote a Magnificat in E flat major for performance at Christmas. Around a decade later he revised the work, transposing it down to D major and making it more concise. Utilizing a Biblical text, the piece is suffused with a series of memorable arias and choruses and orchestrated with spectacular grandeur. Lumen is a contemporary musical dialogue that urges empathy between the three Abrahamic religions. Translating the oratorio form into a 'unity of diversity,' Robert M. Helmschrott has converted the poetry of the Old and New Testaments, the Torah and Qur'an into an interfaith 'language of sounds and singing.'

Classical Music

Footprint Records is proud to present a very special Christmas gift: the album 'A Christmas Wish,' performed by the Gothenburg Youth Choir under the choral direction of Anne Johansson. The Gothenburg Youth Choir, one of Sweden's most acclaimed, consists of boys and girls between the ages of 16 and 25. Anne Johansson, who has dedicated her professional life to teaching secondary-school children to sing, is an authority on young voices. The album contains arrangements of traditional Christmas songs from Sweden and France, as well as compositions by Benjamin Britten, Max Reger, and others- it is the perfect accompaniment to the Yuletide season. The Gothenburg Youth Choir wishes you and your family a very Merry Christmas!