Linn Records is thrilled to introduce soprano Rowan Pierce in what promises to be a sensational debut recording. The Cares of Lovers comprises songs from across Purcell's brief career from She loves and she confesses too, one of his very first published pieces (1683), to Sweeter than roses from his final months (1695). Although they all display the same matchless ingenuity and uncanny ability to set English words to music, a highlight includes Tell me, some pitying angel - a triumph of dramatic composition and the equal of any Italian cantata of the period. Since winning the President's Award at the Royal College of Music in 2017, Pierce has won acclaim for her performances at The Barbican, Royal Festival Hall and at the BBC Proms. Her performance in Purcell's The Fairy Queen, with the Academy of Ancient Music, won praise for her 'expressive' (Financial Times) and 'heart-piercing' (The Independent) singing. Richard Egarr and William Carter, two baroque music heavy-weights, join Pierce for this recording, made in Haarlem, Netherlands.

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.
Includes cantata(s) by Johann Sebastian Bach. Ensemble: Bach Collegium Japan. Conductor: Masaaki Suzuki. Soloists: Peter Kooij, Robin Blaze, Yukari Nonoshita, Andreas Weller.

There is a degree of self-effacement and self-absorption in his playing that I find appealing: it's as though we are eavesdropping on an intimate and private dialogue. A fine set, beautifully recorded.

– BBC Music Magazine

With no shortage to choose from, it's easy to imagine why listeners might be overwhelmed when choosing a recording of Bach's Sonatas & Partitas for solo violin. Baroque violinist Pavlo Beznosiuk throws his hat into the ring with this 2011 Linn Records set. His playing does seem very conversational, even drawing listeners into the discourse. His effortless technique shines through in the much more animated, vivacious fast movements.

– All Music Guide

Chamber music by Handel & Stanley played on instruments of the period. A collection of chamber music from Georgian England by the leading composers of the day. The programme includes a chamber version of Handel's 'Water Music' and popular music from London's pleasure gardens.

Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683 - 1764) was born in Dijon two years before the births of Bach, Scarlatti and Handel. He is probably best known for his operas, but also wrote chamber music and over 60 works for harpsichord. These keyboard compositions, which he wrote between 1706 and 1728 and spread over three volumes, differ greatly from the style of his contemporaries. Rameau's intellectualism and technical brilliance of composition, allied with passion and tenderness combine, in his words, to produce 'true music... The language of the heart'. This release features pieces from three of the four suites Rameau wrote for the harpsichord. Virginia Black has selected these to illustrate Rameau's extraordinary talent in descriptive, innovative and often virtuosic writing, and to show how the piano can enhance the works through singing tone and tonal nuance.

The foremost Czech cellist Jirí Bárta brings a complete recording of Bach’s cello suites. With this new album he returns to the same repertoire which he recorded 23 years ago, but enriched with life experience and offering a new interpretation. This time he has recorded all the suites on a baroque cello with gut strings and thus has come closer to the possible original sound; expressivity has been superseded by meditation and peacefulness. Bárta approaches the set of compositions as a six-movement symphony (“I remember the time when I performed the suites for the first time years ago. It felt like an epiphany: the individual suites materialized for me in a definite shape as a symphony in six movements, as a story of life in six chapters, as a perfectly logical and thoroughly structured large composition.”). Bárta spent a long time studying the material and preparing the new interpretation and recording which has the aspiration to become the classical-music event of the season.

This set is in MP3 format at 320 kbps.
These eight discs are equivalent to the 17 volume CD series. You will be able to transfer the files directly to your iPod or MP3 player or play the discs on your computer, most DVD players and the latest generation of in car players. The notes to accompany the original CD release of this series are written by Wilfrid Mellers, Jonathan Baxendale and Kevin Bowyer. These texts are reproduced in their entirety and form an extended essay of 42,000 words which is included on Disc 8. It is formatted as a pdf file ready for printing on standard A4 paper. Also on Disc 8 is an excel spreadsheet listing the pieces in 3 ways: by track number, by title and by BWV number.

----------

Following the success of Nimbus' re-release of their set of Haydn symphonies, conducted by Adam Fischer on MP3 CDs, Nimbus now comes up with another bargain in this format. This 8-CD set of Kevin Bowyer's recordings of Bach's organ works covers nearly 31 hours of music, and is presented in 320 kbps MP3 files. (For those who are interested, the files are encoded with LAME 3.97, using - preset insane). In our review of the Haydn symphonies, reviewer Dominy Clements compared some of the original CDs and the MP3 files, and concluded, "To be entirely honest, I couldn’t really spot any advantages or disadvantages in either in terms of absolute quality." I will echo his comments, having compared the MP3 files of this set to a few of the original Nimbus CDs. Not only do these MP3 files sound excellent, but very few people could reliably spot which files were which in a blind test.

It’s worth noting that Bowyer’s set, at nearly 31 hours, is close to twice as long as most of the other “complete” sets of Bach’s organ works. This is because he plays a number of spurious and mis-attributed works, as well as some works that are generally not played on organ, such as the Toccatas BWV 910-916. So what about the performances? They are generally considered to be one of the finer series of Bach's organ works. I have a number of sets of Bach's organ works, and this one stands out by virtue of the fact that all the music was recorded on a single organ (Sct. Hans Kirke, Odense, Denmark). Many, if not most, other sets are recorded at a variety of locations. Here, the organ itself is beautiful, and the recording is spacious but without too much reverberation. Bowyer's choice of registrations, tempi and phrasing are attractive throughout. You seriously couldn't go wrong with this set, at a price below that of two audio CDs.

-- Kirk McElhearn, MusicWeb International

Foremost among Swedish Baroque composers, Johan Helmich Roman travelled to England then to France, Italy, Austria and Germany, gaining valuable firsthand knowledge of European music. At home in Stockholm he conducted the court orchestra, introduce.