Gottlieb Muffat’s oeuvre, dedicated almost in its entirety to keyboard instruments and skilfully straddling the stile antico and stile moderno, deserves more detailed attention than it has ever been afforded. The majority of sources containing music by Muffat are unpublished, with only two collections published at the composer’s own behest during his years in the Emperor’s service in Vienna. One of these is the Componimenti Musicali per il Cembalo (Augsburg, 1739).

This collection contains 6 Suites and a Ciacona with 38 variations for solo harpsichord. The composer describes these seven works as capricci or galanterie to be performed in the stile moderno and to suit modern tastes. Although arranged in the conventional order of Allemande–Courante–Sarabande–Gigue, Muffat also added various optional dances, displaying no shortage of innovation. The first movements are introductory in nature, often fugal in form and varying in style and pace: Ouverture (Suites 1 and 5), Prelude (Suite 2) and Fantaisie (Suites 3, 4 and 6). The seventh piece in the collection, the Ciacona con 38 Variazioni, is a special case. As Christopher Hogwood suggests in his introduction to the modern edition (Orpheus, 2009), the Ciacona could be another tribute to the imperial family, as the number of variations matches the age Charles VI’s niece, Maria Amalia, would have been on 22 October 1739.

Muffat’s interest in contemporary harpsichord composition is most clearly evident in his transcription and reinterpretation of works by George Frideric Handel, based on a manuscript copy of the Suites des pièces pour le clavecin he held in his library. Muffat reworked the suites in Handel’s collection, suggesting new ornamentation, distributing the notes differently between the hands, changing the clefs and sometimes note values, and adding slurs and cadenzas. He then applied everything he had observed while rewriting Handel’s suites to his own Componimenti musicali: including a table of ornaments, which the composer asks be played with ‘art and discretion’; he considers the positioning of the player’s hands on the keyboard in his writing and avoids using multiple clefs on one line to prevent confusion; he describes the optimum way to use the thumb for accidentals; and he provides the correct technical interpretation of trills and slurs.

Study of the Componimenti reveals what could be defined as a pedagogical intent, as well as a clear desire to make the score unambiguous and accessible by means of his introductory instructions. The collection contributed greatly to setting a new benchmark for keyboard writing in the lands of the Viennese Empire.

Like his Pulitzer-winning work the little match girl passion, David Lang's 'poor hymnal' tries to get to the core of what a religious experience can be. "What I love about hymnals," the composer writes in his liner notes to the CD, "is that they're a catalog of things a community of worshippers can agree on - a catalog that can be sung. And what the worshippers are singing about matters." 'poor hymnal' is a concert-length work written for the multiple GRAMMY Award-winning chamber choir The Crossing, conducted by Donald Nally. Lang constructed the text by stitching together lines, phrases and poignant utterances from sources as varied as the Old Testament, Mahatma Gandhi and Tolstoy - to name just a few. As Lang explains: "This piece is trying to say: The reason we are coming together is to remember how important we are to each other, and to remember how important it is that we take care of each other."

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.

William Grant Still (1895-1978) from Little Rock was a pioneer in many ways. He was the first African American to successfully depart from the generally acceptable genres of jazz and pop. He lived to see a symphonic work and an opera of his performed, he conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic and directed an important Southern orchestra. The respect that he acquired is reflected in two Guggenheim fellowships and five honorary doctorates, as well as a growing number of top-quality recordings of his works. This album is dedicated to the composer's impressive art songs. Two dozen works, including simple spirituals, expansive, declamatory and captivating scenes, touching miniatures and provocative challenges paint a portrait of a self-assured man asserting his musical authority.

An audiophile-grade LP transfer of another hit album of contemporary chillout from the master of piano minimalism, Jeroen van Veen. Perhaps the most influential composer of his generation (certainly among the most successful), electro-acoustic polymath Max Richter defies definition: composer, pianist, producer, remixer, and one of the most prolific of contemporary musical artists. Inspired equally by Bach, punk rock and ambient electronica, Richter has built a unique sonic world, which blends the rigour of a formal classical training with the production wizardry of modern technology. Richter came to fame in the classical sphere with his recomposition of Vivaldi's Four Seasons. He has shown an unerring feel for the chillout vibe which many listeners seek in the contemporary classical genre, resulting in commissions for dozens of television and film soundtracks, ballet scores, and a number of long-form original works, including Sleep, an "eight-hour cradle song" influenced by Mahler. In making this survey of Richter's output on and for the piano, Jeroen van Veen has chosen 18 pieces from Richter's earlier work. His selection includes all of Richter's published music for solo piano, plus Waltz with Bashir: an arrangement by Richter of a Schubert sonata movement, further rearranged for solo piano by Van Veen himself. Each of the pieces is illuminated in the sleeve note with commentary from Richter himself. The aesthetic of Richter's soft melodic swirls is complemented by the medium of LP, which gives a gentle, moody vibe to this recording originally made in 2016. When first released, it received enthusiastic critical recommendations: 'Van Veen knows exactly how to play this music, and I am talking about both his fingers and his head.' (Fanfare) - Max Richter (born in 1966) is one of the most influential composers of his generation. Electro-acoustic polymath Max Richter defies definition: composer, pianist, producer, remixer, and collaborator, and beyond argument one of the most prolific of contemporary musical artists. Inspired equally by Bach, punk rock and ambient electronica, Richter's sonic world blends a formal classical training (he graduated from the Royal Academy of Music, and was a pupil of renowned composer Luciano Berio) with modern technology. - This recording presents Richter's solo piano music up to date. - Dutchman Jeroen van Veen is one of the leading pianists of today focusing on Minimalism and championing a new generation of composers, easily crossing borders between musical styles.

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.

Dear to Us, the debut album by violinist sisters Hina & Fiona, captures the rare and radiant bond between two rising stars of the classical music world. Born in New York to French-Vietnamese and Japanese parents, these gifted sisters have already achieved remarkable milestones individually: Hina recently won first prize at the 2023 Elmar Oliveira International Violin Competition, while Fiona debuted with the New York Philharmonic at 16, and respectively embark on illustrious solo careers. Together, their playing reveals a profound connection shaped by lifelong collaboration, honest artistic dialogue, and complementary interpretations. Accompanied by the distinguished pianist Rohan de Silva, they present a thoughtfully curated program that balances beloved classics with lesser-known treasures, showcasing works by Halvorsen, Moszkowski, Ysaye, Rozsa, and contemporary composer Anna Clyne. From the fiery virtuosity of Ravel's Tzigane and Sarasate's Navarra to the tender warmth of Ponce's Estrellita, Dear to Us is a compelling journey through technical brilliance and heartfelt expression. The sisters' extraordinary synchronicity, paired with their distinctive voices, creates a musical experience both intimate and exhilarating. In addition to CD, Dear to Us is also available as a 2LP special vinyl release, offering listeners a rich, analog experience of the duo's vibrant artistry-perfect for collectors and audiophiles alike.

Following on from the critically acclaimed Anthems, Hymns and Gloria (8.574130) released in 2020, Nicholas Childs and the Black Dyke Band return to the music of John Rutter with this album of Christmas carols arranged for brass. The Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus is also featured on O Clap Your Hands, Nativity Carol and Te Deum. Includes twelve world premiere recordings.

Kaija Saariaho (1952-2023), featured in 2017 at Radio France's Festival Presences of contemporary music, was a central figure in a generation of internationally renowned Finnish composers and performers.

Kaija Saariaho developed computer-assisted composition techniques and mastered working with tape and live electronics, but she also encountered French composers of so-called spectral music, whose techniques are based on computer analysis of the sound spectrum of individual notes on different instruments.
In the profusion of works that Saariaho has produced in recent years, two features have marked her entire career. One is the close collaboration with other artists –writers, directors, musicians, etc.– in the creation of new works. The other is the concern to make her music, not the treatment of an abstract process, but an urgent sharing of ideas, images and emotions from the composer to the listener.

This collection is the recording echo of the Festival Presences (created in 1991) and its commissioning and creation activities, supported by Radio France's musical ensembles.

Following her acclaimed début recital, Marina Staneva returns with a programme of works by the Spanish-Catalan composer Federico Mompou. The programme opens with Paisajes (Landscapes), written in 1942, 1947, and 1960. The first two pieces are dedicated to the Catalan pianist Carmen Bravo, whom Mompou met after his return from Paris to Barcelona in 1942, and subsequently married. Mompou’s Variations on a Theme of Chopin were started in 1938, but completed in 1957 upon a commission from the Royal Ballet in London for a successor to The House of Birds (a 1955 ballet which used piano pieces by Mompou orchestrated by John Lanchbery). The Chopin ballet was never produced, but the piano variations remain. The twelve Cançons i danses (Songs and Dances) were composed between 1921 and 1962, and the form for each is broadly similar: a slow ‘cançó’ (song) followed by a more animated ‘dansa’ (dance), but the pattern sometimes varies, and these pieces are anything but formulaic. Mompou intended to provide ‘a contrast between lyricism and rhythm, to avoid one collection of songs and another of dances’.

REVIEWS:

The Bulgarian pianist Marina Staneva is taking quite a large risk, but certainly not an unwelcome one, by choosing the music of Federico Mompou for her second Chandos solo recording. The programme is well selected: the poetic Paisajes, showing the most Debussyan side of Mompou’s music, are followed by the Variations sur un thème de Chopin, which manages to transform that composer’s brief A major Prelude into 12 imaginative miniatures. Finally the Cançons i danses, written between 1921 and 1962 (Mompou, born in 1893, died as recently as 1987), bring a chance to delve into a wealth of subtly evoked atmospheres and nuanced states of mind.

Mompou has a small but strong cult following among piano fanatics; others who have championed him include such luminaries as Stephen Hough and Arcadi Volodos. Staneva, trained in Sofia and more recently in London, nevertheless holds her own with considerable flair.

She draws a deep, cushioned sound from the piano and seemingly does not see any need to sacrifice thoughtfulness for plain brilliance. She brings out the dance elements that almost always lurk in the background of the Catalonian composer’s writing, whether originating in folk music or jazz, and performs with a sincerity, spaciousness, affection for the music and quiet confidence that make me eager to hear what she will do next. All of this, additionally, makes her a strong advocate for a composer who can sometimes divide his audience with that timeless yet elusive style.

-- BBC Music Magazine (Jessica Duchen)

During the pandemic Marina Staneva was introduced to, and fell in love with, the Variations sur un thème de Chopin and has chosen to record it alongside two other collections; the twelve songs and dances and the three landscapes.

The Variations sur un thème de Chopin...are an extended tribute with jazz influences that Staneva notes in the booklet and delicious harmonies; the first variation with its additional sevenths, ninths and other inner passing notes is very much in the style of his waltz arrangement. Like Godowsky in his arrangements of the études he honours Chopin’s affection for the mazurka and waltz – variations five and nine – and even offers a simple hymn-like version of the central melody of the fantaisie-impromptu as a foil to the intense Evocation, variation ten, which also alludes to his own Cançons i danses no.6.

[In the] Cançons i danses...Staneva captures Mompou’s widely contrasting moods with ease, from the fragility of the third with its Catalan Christmas carol to the vigour of the sixth’s creole dance. If Stephen Hough is a little more rhythmically flexible in the small selection he recorded, there is nonetheless plenty of charm in Staneva’s playing – number seven a case in point with its dance played as a duet between a shy and slightly halting young man and his winsome partner.

I was taken with Staneva’s playing in her début CD Slavic Roots, with piano music by Pancho Vladigerov on Chandos and equally so here. Her tone is rich and even and if her playing is occasionally a just a little forthright she clearly enjoys the subtleties of Mompou’s writing and his sudden harmonic twist and turns; his multi-layered and often quite delicate textures are balanced beautifully.

-- MusicWeb International

Sample the Variations sur une thème de Chopin, whose 12 variations have an unusual structure: the music takes on chromatic accretions and then, in the later ones, resolves to a new tonal clarity independent of the original material (from the Chopin Prelude in A major, Op. 28, No. 7). Staneva holds this dynamic confidently in hand. She is equally effective in the 13 Cançons i Danses pieces in which a tuneful passage is paired with a dance in consistently inventive ways. Staneva catches the faint jazz influences in some of these pieces, and she lets the fundamental simplicity of Mompou's music speak for itself. The album is beautifully and idiomatically recorded at Potton Hall in Suffolk, and it serves notice of a major emerging talent.

-- AllMusic

The is the fourth volume of orchestral works by Toshio Hosokawa, Japan's leading living composer. These world premiere recordings were recorded in the presence of the composer. Featuring soloists violinist Paul Huang and Belgian trumpeter Jeroen Berwaerts, with the Residentie Orkest The Hague conducted by Jun Markl.

Valentin Silvestrov was forced to leave his native Ukraine after the Russian invasion of 2022. His music has a prescient quality that unerringly seems to express the fate of his homeland. The intimate Violin Concerto and the heartfelt, single-span Eighth Symphony are notable for their economy of expression and emphasis on beauty, depth and harmony. This is music that hovers on the edge of silence in an uplifting homage to love and humanity, hope and renewal.

This production is dedicated to the works of two American composers, of whom Morten Lauridsen is certainly the better known in Germany. His choral work O magnum mysterium (1994) in particular has become one of the hits of contemporary choral literature in recent years. Lauridsen (born 1943) grew up in Portland, Oregon, the son of Danish immigrants. The songs of Jerome Kern, Cole Porter and Richard Rodgers were very present in his home. He initially studied English and history and worked as a fireman. He then turned his attention entirely to music and moved to the University of Southern California, where, after graduating, he taught music theory and later became a professor of composition. As a creator of primarily vocal music he received many awards, including the National Medal of Arts in 2007. From 1994 to 2001, he was composer in residence with the Los Angeles Master Chorale, one of the leading professional choirs in the USA, which also premiered his Lux aeterna. All five movements of this cycle refer to the "Eternal Light". While Lauridsen was setting the underlying liturgical texts to music, his mother was dying - but the words about light as a universal symbol of all-encompassing enlightenment gave him consolation. Jake Runestad is one of the latest additions to the list of great American composers and is in the process of securing his place in US music history. Born in 1986 in Rockford, Illinois, he grew up in a family that sang a lot. There was also a piano, and during his primary school years he began to play little melodies on it - also teaching himself Scott Joplin's The Entertainer. From 2009 to 2011, he studied at the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University, after which he quickly gained recognition, especially in the field of choral music. However, his catalogue of works also includes operas, orchestral pieces and chamber music. He has received commissions from the Washington National Opera, the vocal ensemble VOCES8 and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, among others. His first album, The Hope of Loving, was immediately nominated for a Grammy Award. A keen mountaineer and camper, Runestad finds nature a great source of inspiration. In his Earth Symphony, Mother Earth herself is given a voice; the five interrelated sections deal with her destruction, her sorrow, her healing, and also her hope for humanity.

Delos is thrilled to announce a new collaboration with GRAMMY® Award-winning vocal ensemble Chanticleer. Famed for it's "accuracy of intonation, purity of blend, of color and swagger of style" (Boston Globe), the group makes it's label debut with Joy to the World. This new Christmas collection blends tradition with innovation, combining Renaissance motets and fresh arrangements of classic carols with contemporary compositions, including two new commissions from Joanna Marsh. Showcasing the ensemble's extraordinary ability to move seamlessly and expertly between styles, Chanticleer's first Delos release conjures a wintertime world of magic, light, and wonder.

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.

Vikingur Olafsson / FROM AFAR - From Afar is a new album full of beautiful arrangements recorded on two pianos with the repertoire mirrored on both grand piano & upright piano. Inspired by a meeting with the iconic Hungarian composer Gyorgy Kurt g, this album is a musical response with music from: Kurt g, J. S. Bach, Brahms, W. A. Mozart, AdSs*, Schumann, Birgisson, Kaldal¢ns. With beautifully evocative titles & forgotten melodies, V¡kingur creates a thread of stories within a bigger structure: nature, home, childhood, family.

Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Vol.7 The latest installment of Angela Hewitt's much-lauded Beethoven cycle is bookended by the great 'Tempest' and Op.109 sonatas. The performances are as usual complemented by Angela's own booklet notes which provide real insight into how she approaches these masterworks.