EVERYTHING CHANGED ON JANUARY 7, 2025 I never imagined we would evacuate our home in the Palisades-a place alive with laughter, music, and the joyful chaos of my husband, our two young daughters, and crazy rescue dog-never to return. So many dear friends lost everything: cherished family heirlooms, photographs, instruments, and music libraries that had taken a lifetime to build-all vanished in moments. That evening, from our hotel window, I watched the fires rage through the beautiful Santa Monica Mountains and sobbed, completely helpless. Yet from the ash and destruction, something profoundly beautiful emerged-much like the glowing fairy at the end of Fantasia, rising from Stravinsky's Firebird Suite. I commissioned Eric Whitacre to write a new work for violin and orchestra, and as the world changed, so did his composition. Little did I know that The Pacific Has No Memory would be born from these epic tragedies. This music has become salve for the soul-a warm, healing embrace for my broken heart. Tender and profound, it radiates love, hope, and renewal. I am eternally grateful to Eric Whitacre for creating this musical prayer and to the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra for breathing life into it together. This recording is dedicated to all who were affected by the Los Angeles fires, and to the brave first responders who risked everything to save lives. - Anne Akiko Meyers

Arcadian Dreams: the title conjures pastoral perfection, an idyllic vision rooted in Greek mythology. Equally, it references the Arcadian Academy established in Rome in 1690, a vibrant hub of intellectual and artistic creativity whose influence quickly spread across Europe. Arcadian Dreams assembles an exquisite group of composers-both esteemed and inspired-including the French luminaries Thomas-Louis Bourgeois, Louis Antoine Lefebvre, and Jean-Philippe Rameau; the Neapolitan maestro Domenico Scarlatti, who lived his last 35 years in Spain; and the German-born George Frideric Handel, whose early Italian career left an indelible mark on his masterpieces. The enchanting realm of Arcadian Dreams abounds with gods and goddesses, shepherds and nymphs, and bucolic dreamscapes, creating an aural tapestry of pictorial, secular cantatas intertwined with entrancing instrumental numbers. The fearless young soprano Hannah de Priest, making her recording debut, vividly captures the essence of these beguiling works, alongside the entrepreneurial early music ensemble Les Délices, whose members bring long-forgotten music alive for contemporary audiences. "[De Priest] sings with radiant tonal beauty ... always with compelling expressiveness. Her coloratura is both fluent and effortlessly produced... her colleagues in Les Délices ... help create vocal chamber music of the highest order. Together, their embrace of a variety of colors and subtle flexibility of phrasing add immeasurably to the quality of this recital... A most welcome release.” --Early Music America (Ken Meltzer) "I’m thrilled that more audiences will learn what we already know in Chicago: Hannah De Priest is a star... on an upward trajectory as a leading interpreter of 17th and 18th century repertoire, [she] caps a breakout season... with her debut solo album. Referencing both Greek mythology and the Arcadian Academy in 17th century Rome, Arcadian Dreams features secular Baroque cantatas by Rameau, Handel, Thomas Louis Bourgeois, and Louis Lefebvre with Les Délices, an early music ensemble founded by baroque oboist Debra Nagy. De Priest’s rise as a Baroque specialist is linked with Les Délices and their breakout debut at the 2023 Boston Early Music Festival... The album also includes Albinoni’s Oboe Sonata in C major and a keyboard sonata by Domenico Scarlatti, showcasing Nagy and harpsichordist Mark Edwards." --WFMT Classical (Oliver Camacho)

Giya Kancheli, one of Georgia's most eminent composers, became increasingly famous after the advent of glasnost in the Soviet Union, when his works, not least his seven symphonies, were heard internationally. Around the year 2000 Kancheli shifted away from the opulence of these pieces and moved towards a more restrained, introspective vein, which is exemplified by the three works on this album. Elements of folk and traditional music can be glimpsed in the abstract Ex contrario, while Middelheim is striking for it's overlapping succession of episodes. Tsutisopeli was Kancheli's final score.

With over one billion streams worldwide, Vikingur Olafsson is one of the most listened-to classical artists of our time. Following the global success of his Grammy-winning recording of the Goldberg Variations, the Icelandic pianist now presents his latest album: Opus 109. At it's heart is Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 30 in E major, Op. 109, a masterpiece of the composer's late period, which Vikingur Olafsson places in an illuminating and musically thrilling temporal dialogue, tracing the lineages that converge on this beloved beacon of the piano literature. CD Mintpack.

Finnish Kaija Saariaho and Estonian Helena Tulve, two composers with highly individual voices, both explore instrumental color as a core element of their work. Saariaho's vocal works particularly reveal the full expressive richness of her music. Early pieces like Suomenkielinen sekakuorokappale and Nej och inte established her unique grammar of disintegrating sonic and semantic units; later works such as Lumen valosta and Kesapaiva further develop this approach with extended vocal techniques. Tulve's music "grows out from simple primary impulses, being influenced by natural patterns, organics and synchronicity." I Am a River, based on verses by the 13th-century Persian scholar, poet and mystic Rumi, explores the connection between choral music in resonant church acoustics and sensorial mysticism. Nachtliche Gesange, based on texts by exiled German-speaking Jewish poets, draws it's sonic material from the phonetic properties of the German language. These works of unusual beauty are entrusted to the expert voices of the Helsinki Chamber Choir under Nils Schweckendiek. This GRAMMY-awarded collaboration, previously heralded for their Saariaho album Renaissance (BIS-2662), promises a profound interpretation of these contemporary works for choir.

Two multi-choir Masses from mid-17th-century Rome (one for Easter, the other based on Palestrina's motet for Pentecost) complete I Fagiolini's dazzling series exploring the 'Colossal Baroque' and paying tribute to the 'lost' music of Orazio Benevoli. Maestro of the Cappella Giulia at St Peter's, Rome, Benevoli's mastery of surround-sound is clear in these very different works. The sheer quality of his music shines through and, sung by a group at the height of it's powers, changes our view of 17th-century multi-choir music. All the Masses in I Fagiolini's Benevoli series are premiere recordings.

Spain's Siglo de Oro, the Age of Gold, gave rise to some of the greatest sacred choral music of the Renaissance. Lead, Kindly Light is devoted to the music of two outstanding Spanish composers, exploring majestic works by Cristóbal de Morales, famed throughout Europe and in the New World, and the exquisite polyphony of Sebastián de Vivanco, whose intricately crafted counterpoint adorned services at the cathedrals of Ávila and Salamanca during the late 1500s. Contrasting and complementing these 16th-century masterpieces are spellbinding settings of words by Saint John Henry Newman: Sir James MacMillan's Nothing in Vain for soloists and double choir, and the world premiere of Kerensa Briggs' Lead, kindly light, specially commissioned for this album.

The troubled life of English composer Ernest John Moeran (1894 - 1950) ended 75 years ago, when he fell into the water at Kenmare in Ireland, and his death was officially recorded as a cerebral haemorrhage. To honour the life of E J Moeran, SOMM Recordings is releasing broadcasts that were privately recorded by Lionel Hill, author of Lonely Waters - the diary of a friendship with E J Moeran. This commemorative release, with outstanding audio restoration by Lani Spahr, includes Moeran's Symphony in G minor conducted by Sir Adrian Boult and his Violin Concerto with the incomparable Albert Sammons as soloist. Additionally, Moeran's Cello Concerto, written for his wife Peers Coetmore, is available as a download. E J Moeran was born to an Irish Protestant priest and a Norfolk-born mother, and the duality of his nationality finds expression in his music. He wrote of his Symphony in G minor that it "may be said to owe it's inspiration to the natural surroundings in which it was planned and written. The greater part of the work was carried out among the mountains and seaboard of Co. Kerry, but the material of the second movement was conceived around the sand-dunes and marshes of East Norfolk." On 9 February, 1949, Moeran and his friend Lionel Hill attended a performance of the symphony at the Royal Albert Hall, with Adrian Boult conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra. That is the performance heard on this CD. The first movement of Moeran's Violin Concerto, written in Co. Kerry, was similarly inspired by the calm of Kenmare Bay in fine weather, while the Lento last movement reflected a period of seasonal colour and beauty along the Kenmare River. The second movement Rondo is unmistakably imbued with the spirit of Kerry fairs and Irish fiddlers. Moeran wrote that "Albert Sammons is the only living violinist I would like to have interpret it." This recording, a BBC Home Service broadcast from Norfolk on 28 April 1946, is Sammons' last public concerto performance. One cannot overemphasise the importance of this recording; it is, as far as we know, Sammons' only known live recording. In December 1943, eighteen months before their marriage, Moeran wrote to the Irish cellist Peers Coetmore, "Please write and tell me you would like me to write a concerto especially for you, and I give you my promise that I will put my whole heart into it." The result is a work of considerable beauty, especially memorable for the typically Irish tune that introduces the slow movement. Following the premiere in Dublin, Coetmore gave it's first London performance in April 1946-available here as a download-with Adrian Boult conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

A veritable musical fresco inspired by the cyclical course of the sun, Circa Diem - "almost a day" - invites the listener on a sonic journey following the rhythm of light. From the peaceful darkness of the deep night to the gentle dawn, from the intense brightness of the zenith to the enveloping warmth of the golden hour, to the shifting shadows of dusk, each stage of the day finds it's musical resonance here. The trio Les Heures Bleues weaves it's common thread around Tomaso Albinoni's Opus 1. A first opus for a first project: the idea of a beginning, where all the musical trajectories to come are already hinted at. The cycle of a day thus mirrors the great cycles of life: gestation, birth, maturity, tranquillity, then evanescence. Four sonatas by Albinoni have been chosen and set in dialogue with different moments in the solar cycle, revealing the expressive richness of this Baroque music in the light of passing time. To anchor this one-day journey in our present, contemporary composers were invited to create works based on the light/sonata correspondence that inspired them most: Virginie Tasset, Max Charue, Patrick Leterme, Jimmy Bonesso, and Muhiddin Dürrüoglu. Their contemporary perspectives extend and renew Albinoni's legacy, inscribing this timeless cycle in a resolutely modern sensibility.

Clarinettist Peter Cigleris is adding another gem to the SOMM catalogue less than a year after the release of his Clarinet Concertos (with symphonic band) [SOMMCD 0705, October 2025], which featured two world-premiere recordings and was roundly praised by Gramophone's Guy Rickards: "Cigleris is possessed of a beautifully mellifluous tone. A hugely varied, enjoyable programme, then, superbly played and recorded; enjoy!" For this release, Cigleris again offers concertante works, and again two first-ever recordings, but here the tutti forces, rather than winds, are the luminous strings of the London Mozart Players led by John Andrews. The trio of composers is British, and along with Gerald Finzi, whose Clarinet Concerto is justly beloved, come two others keenly deserving of the light this recording sheds on their music. The three works, all composed in the late 40s, are bound together by the common thread of the eminent English clarinettist Frederick Thurston (1901-1953). Denis ApIvor (1916-2004), born in Ireland to Welsh parents, was a chorister at Christ Church, Oxford and then at Hereford Cathedral, where he also studied clarinet, piano and organ. As a teenaged medical student he heard the English premiere of Wozzeck under Sir Adrian Boult and his musical inspiration was renewed, leading to private composition lessons with Patrick Hadley and Alan Rawsthorne. While there is a later version of his Concertante for clarinet orchestrated for an ensemble featuring full strings, harp and celesta, Peter Cigleris opens this album with ApIvor's original chamber version for piano and two percussionists (one on timpani). This early work was conceived during the composer's wartime posting to India, and the premiere (with Frederick Thurston) was given in London after two years of peace, a repeat performance going out live on the BBC Third Programme on 27 January 1948. This recording, the work's first, shows an already impressive thread of musical argument and masterly writing from a 30-year old ApIvor, who would reach the peak of his success some eight years later with his score for the Royal Ballet's Lorca-inspired Blood Wedding. Many who know the name Freda Swain (1902-1985) will think of pedagogical piano solos and be surprised to learn of the Portsmouth native's catalogue of 450 or so serious works including large-scale operatic, orchestral and concertante music as well as varied chamber pieces, all regrettably neglected for too long. Presented here in it's premiere recording, Swain's "Lumine naturi" Concertino for Clarinet is an expressive work in language that draws on tonality yet is highly individual and sweepingly melodic. The genre-title's Italian diminutive belies concerto-worthy length (24 mins) and thematic substance. Each movement bears an epigraph by Algernon Blackwood evoking an ultra-vivid natural scene, hence the Latin epithet: "By the Light of Nature". Though Swain never published the work, it is likely that the tutti of string orchestra anchored by a lone horn accompanies a clarinet part intended for Frederick Thurston, a frequent collaborator and the dedicatee of her Rhapsody for clarinet and piano. Thurston did play the premiere of Gerald Finzi's (1901-1956) Concerto for Clarinet and Strings at the Hereford Three Choirs Festival on 9 September 1949, and the masterpiece has deservedly become the composer's most frequently heard concert work.

Featuring 13 premiere recordings, With Eys Lift Up is a new collection of works written by American composer Nico Muhly for - and the majority commissioned by - the Choir of Magdalen College, Oxford. Comprising settings of the mass and canticles alongside anthems for Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Easter, Ascensiontide, Trinity Sunday and Remembrance, the collection sets a number of little-known texts, casting new light on familiar seasons of the church year.

The guitar output of a landmark figure in Argentinean classical music, fusing national melodies and dances with European forms in a fusion of perennial appeal. Carlos Guastavino (1912-2000) became internationally renowned, after the Second World War, for song-cycles and works for his own instrument, the piano, which refracted his Argentinean identity, and the culture of his home nation, through European classical idioms. Without plugging himself in to the current of modernism which coursed through the work of American contemporaries, from Copland and Carter in the US to Chavez and Revueltas in Mexico, and down to Brazilian composers such as Claudio Santoro, Guastavino nonetheless belonged to their age, and spoke of his time through his music. Composed between 1967 and 1973, his three sonatas for the guitar embody sonata form in both the progress of their individual movements and their larger, three-movement structures. The First Sonata is dedicated to his brother, Jose Amadeo, who played the guitar as an amateur, and inspired Carlos to write for the instrument. Jose Amadeo died by his own hand while Carlos was at work on the sonata, and it's central movement is an elegy to his memory. The Second, more Romantic in tone, deploys native rhythms such as the Zampa as well as jazzy harmonies. The Third returns to the Zampa but in a more intricately worked style. Here, the central movement is a smoky Milonga, evoking a mood more familiar from the tangos of Astor Piazzolla. Leonardo Palacios sets the sonatas in their context with transcriptions of five short pieces originally conceived for piano: Apegado a mi, Vidala del Secadal, Santa Fe para llorar, the seventh of Guastavino's Cantos Populares and finally the Bailecito (Little Dance) which established his fame worldwide. As a Uruguayan guitarist with decades of experience as a performer and teacher, Palacios brings both technical refinement and idiomatic sensitivity to Guastavino's music: he also contributes the booklet note to this album, giving the listener an invaluable sense of the composer's place in his world.

The six duos for violin and viola on this recording were composed between July and October 1783. A biographical sketch by Michael Haydn, published in 1808, two years after his death, recounts this in detail. "Michael Haydn was ordered by superiors to write duets for violin and alto. However, he was unable to deliver them by the appointed time because he was struck by a severe illness, which subsequently rendered him incapable of any work for longer than anyone expected; for the great man was incapable of giving a quid pro quo. He was threatened with the withdrawal of his salary if he delayed, because the master was presumably too little informed about Haydn's circumstances, or perhaps even deceived by false reports. Mozart, who visited him daily, learned of this, sat down, and wrote for his afflicted friend with such unceasing restlessness that the duets were completed in a few days and submitted under Michael Haydn's name. We often delighted ourselves later on with this excellently executed work of love, which our master also preserved in the original as a sanctuary, always honoring Mozart's immortal memory. Holy genius of friendship!"

This CD features works whose first editions or manuscripts are preserved in libraries north of the Alps, particularly in present-day Germany. Of particular interest is that these are primarily works for wind instruments, especially oboes, but also trumpets. Another important aspect is the transcription and arrangement of Albinoni's works and themes from the pen of two famous German composers, Johann Sebastian Bach and Johann Gottfried Walther. Albinoni was already very famous during his lifetime and admired by princes and fellow musicians, even north of the Alps!

Spanning 500 years from the exquisite simplicity of Thomas Tallis' perfect miniature O nata lux through Britten's jubilant Festival Te Deum to Cheryl Frances-Hoad's majestic O come let us sing unto the Lord, this album celebrates the hope and anticipation that comes with the beginning of a new day. Arise my love perfectly complements Magdalen's first album on CORO, Peace I leave with you, which celebrates music written for the end of the day.

John W. Duarte (1919-2004) was educated at the Manchester University Faculty of Technology. He worked as a professional chemist until 1969, then abandoned chemistry in favor of full-time dedication to music, after having been persuaded by Len Williams, father of John Williams. His only formal musical education consisted in jazz guitar lessons with Terence "Terry" Usher, the rest he learned by self-instruction. He also worked professionally as a player of the trumpet and double bass, and regularly worked as a jazz musician, among others with Coleman Hawkins and Django Reinhardt. Duartes work shows an exceptionally wide range of styles. Some works reflect the Renaissance style of court lutenists such as John Dowland, other works alternate in style between aleatory, atonal and graphic, contained within a conventionally notated framework and allowing spontaneous reaction between the performers. In many other works he employs a tonal language, often coloured by the folk music traditions of various nations, and romantic in mood. John Duarte was a great admirer of America's musical styles. Three types of music are characteristically American: the folk music of the settlers from the British Isles, jazz, with it's African American origins and the music of the American musical theatre. All of these are exemplified in the musical programme of this recording: folk music in Variations on an American Folk Song (Colorado Trail) and Appalachian Dreams, jazz and blues in Sua Cosa and Simply Blues, and music of the theatre in the arrangements of songs by George Gershwin. Americana includes examples of each of these types of music. Included are the suite Americana, Simply Blues and Appalachian Dreams, as well as 12 arrangements of Gershwin songs. Played by Italian master guitarist Francesco Cipriani.

Son of the better-known Georg Muffat, Gottlieb was also hawked around the courts of Europe by his father as a boy wonder of music, anticipating the course of Mozart's early years under the self-interested care of Leopold. However, when at home, Gottlieb Muffat grew up in Vienna under the careful tutelage of Johann Joseph Fux, master of music at the Hofkapelle, a relationship which deepened once Georg died in 1704, when Gottlieb was just 14 years old. In due course Fux pulled strings to get his talented pupil an official post, and this album of keyboard partitas offers ample proof that his faith in Gottlieb Muffat was justified. Their date is uncertain: during his lifetime, only two collections of his music were published, and after 1739 he seems to have broken off composition, focusing his energies on performing and teaching at the Hofkapelle. Listeners familiar with the keyboard partitas by JS Bach will find a certain degree of common ground in the elegant sequence of French-style dances which are headed by a more exploratory Prelude. Muffat's counterpoint may not be so rigorous, but his ear for a well-turned melody offers satisfying reward in it's own right. The use of French, English and even Spanish titles to individual movements underlines the imaginative and fanciful qualities of the collection: see for example Postillon in the Suite in F major; Coquette in the Suite in A major; a Hornpipe in the Suite in D minor and the Intrada to the Suite in F. As well as enthusiastically received albums of Pasquini, Gabrieli, Vivaldi and above all Frescobaldi, Roberto Loreggian has previously recorded the 1739 collection of Componimenti Musicali to which this new recording forms a sequel. Of his collection of Partitas by Telemann, Fanfare commented: 'Without seeming driven, his playing is lively and well-articulated, and he is always sensitive to Telemann's stylistic variety, whether it is tending, at any given moment, to the courtly or to the common.'

With this album, Trio Fibonacci takes us on a journey through the meditative and deeply human universe of Ludovico Einaudi, a master of contemporary minimalism. His works, built around repetitive motifs and subtle harmonic variations, open up a space for contemplation and pure emotion. Many of the pieces presented here have been specially adapted by Trio Fibonacci for duo or trio, bringing new vibrancy and emotional depth to the music while remaining true to the spirit of the composer. With a total runtime of 71 minutes, Timeless Horizons guides listeners through Einaudi's most iconic pieces, including: "I Giorni" - a poignant elegy inspired by Malian folklore "Experience" - a powerful meditation on time and memory "Nuvole Bianche" - a serene and soothing classic "Una Mattina" - made famous by The Intouchables "Petricor" - evoking the scent of the earth after rain But there is much more: 13 pieces in total. The album blends Einaudi's signature repetitive motifs and subtle harmonic shifts with the Trio's expressive and fluid playing style. These arrangements offer a rare intimacy, drawing the listener into a world of silence, longing, and awakening. Trio Fibonacci made it's debut in 1998, with the press reporting that "to hear them is to enter into the world of miracles" (Le Devoir, Montreal).

Italia Mia by Ensemble Micrologus is not merely a collection of pieces but a musical journey that invites listeners to explore the vivid and diverse soundscape of Italy's past. Through their dedicated performance, Micrologus offers a window into the past, allowing modern audiences to experience the beauty and complexity of early Italian music. This live-recording stands as a testament to the enduring appeal of these works and the ensemble's commitment to preserving and celebrating the rich tapestry of Italy's musical heritage.