Following on the acclaimed 'Where is Home' and 'Hymns of Bantu', two genre-defying albums, 'Four Spirits' is also drawn from Abel's South African roots and seeks to create a communal experience with the audience through cello concerto, percussion, singing & improvisation. His first solo cello concerto and, formally speaking, a concerto cast in four movements - each movement takes an essential aspect of township life: ancestors, children, faith and community. Selaocoe positions himself as chief storyteller, combining cello improvising with lyrics in the Southern Sotho and Zulu languages.

Alice Sara Ott - "Johann Johannsson: Piano Works" Johann Johannsson: Piano Works, recorded by pianist Alice Sara Ott, is a selection of the late Icelandic composer's most famous works - reimagined for solo piano. These premiere recordings of the piano scores published recently by Faber Music are hauntingly beautiful interpretations, capturing the essence of Johann Johannsson's music. The album includes some of his most iconic works from films such as The Theory of Everything, Personal Effects, and Copenhagen Dreams, as well as from his studio albums including Orphee and Englaborn. CD Mintpack.

Acclaimed pianist Beatrice Rana presents her latest album, a radiant tribute to J.S. Bach's Keyboard Concertos. Featuring BWV 1052, 1053, 1054, and 1056, this recording captures the intimate chemistry of Rana with the Amsterdam Sinfonietta, with Candida Thompson as concertmaster. Recorded in April 2022, following a 10-concert tour together, the album reflects the depth and brilliance born of their shared musical journey. Bach's timeless elegance and energy are reimagined through Rana's expressive artistry and the ensemble's dynamic interpretation.

Recorded with Daniel Harding as conductor and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande. Much of the violin writing in the Sibelius concerto is purely virtuosic, but even the showiest passages alternate with the melodic. This concerto is generally symphonic in scope, departing completely from the often lighter, 'rhythmic' accompaniments of many other concertos. Renaud: "I discovered the concerto by Samuel Barber on a recording made by Isaac Stern, which is very moving for me because Stern played it on the violin that is now mine. I heard it again in Gil Shaham's interpretation. The first two movements are very lilting, very melodic and generate a lot of images. The finale is very virtuoso."

Lang Lang - "Piano Book 2". This new album continues to build the brand Piano Book, following the unprecedented success of the original released in 2019. A collection of the most popular short pieces for piano known, taught and played by players and piano lovers of all ages everywhere. Including iconic classical pieces, works by contemporary composers including soundtracks, gaming and anime, as well as unique arrangements. The album reflects Lang Lang's love of the piano, the joy of music making and his wish to inspire others, which he does through activities including Lang Lang Foundation. SCORE EDITION 2 CD set with digital download featuring sheet music of every piece on the album, plus bonus tutorials with Lang Lang. 2 CD Score Edition.

Beatrice Rana, characterised by Gramophone as a pianist of "fire and poetry, imagination and originality, temperament and charm, all on top of fearless technical address", brings together two monumental sonatas: Beethoven's 'Hammerklavier' op 106 and Chopin's 'Funeral March' op 35. The Chopin has been in Rana's recital repertoire for more than a decade, but it was during the confinement of the pandemic that she first undertook intense study of Beethoven. "I really found a deep connection with this music, especially because of the isolation, being locked away from the rest of the world. Despite the fact that it reflected so much of what was going on at that time, it's a very positive piece. It really helped me through the pandemic. It is a very human sonata, but the Chopin sonata is human in a very different way. The trio in the middle of the funeral march [the famous third movement] is kind of ubermenschlich - how a philosopher might describe surpassing oneself in a transcendental way." Rana also believes that both works show their composers in technically adventurous form: "The last movements of the two sonatas are both experiments at the highest level and in completely different ways... In the Beethoven every line is going everywhere... and in the Chopin the two hands are parallel for the entire movement." She concludes that both works "transcend the human condition in very different ways - but not altogether different... They both have so much to do with the fear of death, with the fear of loneliness. Each finds a solution in different ways."

Lang Lang - "Piano Book 2". This new album continues to build the brand Piano Book, following the unprecedented success of the original released in 2019. A collection of the most popular short pieces for piano known, taught and played by players and piano lovers of all ages everywhere. Including iconic classical pieces, works by contemporary composers including soundtracks, gaming and anime, as well as unique arrangements. The album reflects Lang Lang's love of the piano, the joy of music making and his wish to inspire others, which he does through activities including Lang Lang Foundation. 2 CD Digipak.

Vinyl LP pressing. South African cellist Abel Selaocoe makes his debut on Warner Classics with Where is Home (Hae Ke Kae). It's dual title, in English and Sesotho, reflects the album's diverse program which draws from vibrant European and African influences: pieces inspired by South African and Tanzanian musical tradition share a space with works by J.S. Bach and Giovanni Benedetto Platti, some of which are renewed with instrumental and lyrical improvisations. The title of the album holds multifaceted significance for the Manchester-based musician: "Home is the place that empowers you; it's not only a geographical place but in people as well, where you can live a life of empowerment and not of oppression. I've learned to find my different homes through the cello." Abel Selaocoe represents Africa on the move.

Abel Selaocoe, the innovative South African cellist, composer and vocalist, announces the release of his second album, Hymns of Bantu on Warner Classics on 21st February 2025. Abel follows the acclaimed release of his 2022 debut Where Is Home (Hae ke Kae) with a remarkable new body of work celebrating his South African heritage, and tracing his ancestral path that leads into his vast influences including Western classical repertoire.

Fatma Said's third album, Lieder, is a very personal tribute to the art of German Song. Singing lieder has a central place in Fatma's musical life, it is a world of unique expression for her, listen to e.g. der Zwerg and it becomes crystal clear. Lieder is also a great collaborative project. Fatma recorded with the outstanding clarinettist Sabine Meyer, Anneleen Lenaerts on the harp, with our recently signed and critically acclaimed baritone Huw Montague Rendall, and many, many more

Fatma Said's third album, Lieder, is a very personal tribute to the art of German Song. Singing lieder has a central place in Fatma's musical life, it is a world of unique expression for her, listen to e.g. der Zwerg and it becomes crystal clear. Lieder is also a great collaborative project. Fatma recorded with the outstanding clarinettist Sabine Meyer, Anneleen Lenaerts on the harp, with our recently signed and critically acclaimed baritone Huw Montague Rendall, and many, many more

Renaud Capucon expands his wide-ranging concerto discography with Bartok's two violin concertos. Composed almost three decades apart, they are highly contrasted, inhabiting very different emotional and musical worlds. Partnering Capucon is the London Symphony Orchestra under it's Principal Guest Conductor, Francois-Xavier Roth. - Firmly established as one of the world's greatest violinists, Renaud Capucon's career both on the stage and as a recording artist has spanned a wide gamut of concerto repetoire, chamber music and recitals. He has a reputation for impeccable performances and fine interpretations of classics and lesser-known repetoire, from his most recent albums with critically-acclaimed readings of the Bach Violin Concertos and the Vasks Violin Concerto, and a recital disc with Khatia Buniatishvili, to the Beethoven / Korngold and Brahms/Berg concerots, Renaud has become known for the breadth of his repetoire, his world-class chamber music partners, and the quality of is playing.

Cellist Edgar Moreau, with the WDR Sinfonieorchester and conductor Andris Poga, performs two concertante works from the mid-20th century: Mieczyslaw Weinberg's Concerto in C minor (1956), and Henri Dutilleux's Tout un monde lointain... (1970). Both were premiered by the great Mstislav Rostropovich, which creates a special link with Moreau: in 2014 in Paris, he won the Young Soloist Prize in the Rostropovich Cello Competition. In recent years, interest has grown in the music of the Polish-born Jewish composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg, who was mentored by Shostakovich. The title Tout un monde lointain... evokes a distant world, and Dutilleux's five-movement work does indeed take us to a very different place from Weinberg's, drawing inspiration from the sensuous poems of Charles Baudelaire. Praising Edgar Moreau's last Erato album, Transmission, Gramophone wrote: "His tone is beautiful, his phrasing rapt, and the intensity of his delivery is magnified in the immediacy of his presence in the sound picture."

The King's Singers celebrate the hundredth anniversary of Disney with When you wish upon a star, a joyful album of twenty-five hit songs drawn from the soundtrack of the past century. They are joined by mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato and a host of guest artists in a programme comprising virtuoso close-harmony arrangements freshly commissioned from an international line-up of composers, including John Rutter, Nico Muhly, Alexander L'Estrange, Toby Young, Jim Clements and Jamey Ray. The tracklist embraces songs from nine decades of Disney animation, spanning everything from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) to Coco (2017) to evoke memories of childhood for listeners of all ages.

This cello prodigy belongs in the family of the greatest artists of all time, states La Provence. Recorded with the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester and conductor Michael Sanderling, this album from Edgar Moreau features works from composers who have been inspired by different aspects of Jewish life, religion, and culture. It includes Bruch's Kol Nidrei, Ernst Bloch's Schelomo & From Jewish Life, Korngold's Cello Concerto, and Ravel's Deux Melodies Hebraiques. Moreau loves this repertoire and gives it a prominent place in concerts: it is essential for him to "transmit" this.

2 LP, Limited Edition. Luxurious 180 g heavyweight vinyl pressings from OPTIMAL. This release includes a voucher with a unique code to download the digital audio files (MP3) of the full album for free. Works by Chopin, Tan Dun, Haydn, Liszt, Schubert, Schumann. "An awesome new recording of the most spectacular recital I've ever seen" (Gregory Krischling, Entertainment Weekly)