During the Baroque era, taking music and art lessons was an integral part of education of children in royal families. Anne, Princess of Orange (1709-1759), the eldest daughter of King George II of Great Britain, was fortunate in having excellent teachers. At the age of five, she moved from her native city of Hanover to London, where for eleven years her musical talent was cultivated by G. F. Handel, a celebrated composer and keyboard virtuoso. Handel dedicated a number of his works to the Princess (among them the wedding serenade Parnasso in festa), while other, highly popular, pieces of his were arranged, including by the virtuoso flautist Michel Blavet. Following her wedding and departure from London, Anne no longer took harpsichord lessons, yet at the court in The Hague, her new home, she remained faithful to the Muses and surrounded herself with excellent artists. For a few years, the court employed the superb violinist and Kapellmeister Jean-Marie Leclair, who dedicated to Anne his fourth book of solo sonatas. In the case of some of them, he mentioned – to the delight of all flautists – the possibility of their being performed by “flûte allemande” as an alternative instrument. As a soloist, the flautist Jana Semeradova has worked with distinguished early music specialists (S. Azzolini, A. Bernardini, E. Onofri, etc.) and has performed at major festivals (Utrecht, Leipzig, Halle, Versailles, Sable, Regensburg, etc.). Erich Traxler is an outstanding soloist and chamber player, who has appeared at the most renowned concert venues worldwide. Princess Anne’s remarkable musical story is the intersection of the stories of the two exceptional musicians.

This album features solo keyboard arrangements of works by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach originally scored for other instruments. In the second half of the eighteenth century the demand for keyboard music increased rapidly, as musical skills became a social requisite for young ladies of the upper classes. To provide compositions for these new keyboard players was financially profitable, but Bach also had another reason for welcoming arrangements: the keyboard instruments were his favorite medium, and he devoted himself to making them into solo instruments as important as the violin and other melody instruments. The eighteen short pieces on this well-filled disc all exist in versions for various small groups of instruments or, in some cases, for mechanical instruments such as the barrel organ. Miklós Spányi has grouped them around three larger-scaled works, of which two are arrangements of symphonies while the Concerto in F major for solo keyboard may in fact be an original composition: a version for keyboard and orchestra exists, but is possibly a later development. In the case of several of the arrangements it is uncertain who made them – some of them only survive in the hand of one of Bach’s admirers. In his liner notes to the disc, Spányi proposes that they could in fact be the original versions, however, as he sees a striking similarity to Bach’s other, indisputably genuine small keyboard pieces.

The rationale of the programme presented by the Labirinto Armonico Ensemble is of a purely geographic nature: it offers a selection of works by three composers who were active in very different contexts between the beginning of the seventeenth century and the end of the eighteenth, but were united by the fact that they were all three natives of Abruzzi. Michele Mascitti, prominent violinist and composer, played a fundamental role in spreading the Italian style in France, making his fortune in Paris where he carried out his musical career; from there his fame extended to England and the Netherlands. Fedele Fenaroli, on the other hand, was a very important teacher and appreciated by Giuseppe Verdi for his treaty on the “Partimenti.” Giacomo Fornaci is the oldest of the three composers, of which only the collection of arias from included in this album have survived.

Celebrated harpsichordist Steven Devine completes his monumental survey for Resonus Classics of the complete solo keyboard works by Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683-1764) with this new collection. These seminal works of the French Baroque era are brought to life vividly by Devine, mainly marking the earlier part of Rameau’s career and charting the development of the future prolific opera and ballet composer. The three books of Pieces de Clavecin are joined by the Cinq Pieces (derived from the Pieces de Clavecin en Concert), and the individual work La Dauphine. Also included is the substantial compendium Les Indes Galantes- keyboard transcriptions that Rameau himself made from his own opera-ballet of the same name composed in 1735/36. “[Devine] is authoritative, suave, technically dazzling and delivers immaculately manicured ornaments that lend brilliance and expressive introspection when required.” (BBC Music Magazine)

Francesco Corti and il pomo d’oro continue their acclaimed series of Bach harpsichord concertos with a recording of the concertos BWV 1044, 1054, 1056 and 1057. This completes the cycle of seven “official” harpsichord concertos that Bach composed. Many of them are masterful reworkings of existing material, either own compositions or works by contemporaries, showing Bach’s exceptional skill to present musical ideas in a different light. For their second Bach recording, Corti and il pomo d’oro have chosen to work with a relatively small ensemble, in order to bring out the individuality of each melodic line. Corti shares the centre stage with recorder players Andres Locatelli and Alessandro Nasello in BWV 1057, while joining forces with violinist Evgenii Sviridov and traverso player Marcello Gatti in the concluding “triple” concerto BWV 1044. Francesco Corti belongs to the most established harpsichordists of his generation, and releases his second PENTATONE Bach harpsichord concertos album, after his debut on the label in 2020. He works together with the multi-award-winning ensemble il pomo d’oro, who also recorded two vocal recital albums with PENTATONE: Carnevale 1729 with Ann Hallenberg (2017), as well as Prologue with Francesca Aspromonte (2018).

The Antegnatis were a family of organ builders who produced some of the best-known instruments of the 16th century, many of which can be found in churches across northern Italy. In total, they constructed an estimated 400 organs. Costanzo Antegnati was perhaps the most influential member of the family, and his set of 12 ricercars – the centrepiece of this recording – was published alongside his treatise on organ tuning and registration. The compositions were of such high quality and popularity that they were subsequently included in the Intavolatura d’organo tedesca, the most extensive manuscript source of keyboard works known today, containing a good 1,770 pieces by composers from Italy and Northern Europe. Interwoven between Antegnati's pieces are works by other composers of the same period. Notable among these is Anton Holzer's three canzoni, of which this is the first complete recording, and Agostino Soderini's Canzon La Ducalina, a fascinating short piece in which the keyboard writing closely follows the pronunciation of a virtual text and at times sounds like poetry being recited. Federico Del Sordo is a renowned continuo player who has devoted himself for more than 15 years to the study of the alternatim repertoire. For this recording, he performs primarily on a 17th-century organ installed in a Brescia church by Graziadio Antegnati III; variety is added to the set by the inclusion of harpsichord and clavichord performances.

This programme portrays the ‘birth’ of the flute in France in the late 17th century and the following 40 years of its life as a new and fashionable instrument. A famous patron of the arts, King Louis XIV gathered elite composers and musicians to create the refinement, elegance and good taste that was demanded at his Paris Court. From the early petites pièces to more virtuoso suites and sonatas with their ornamented lyricism and grand dance rhythms, the mellow, robust and almost husky sounds of flutes from this period blend and weave around each other like the voices of two singers.

Shortlisted for the Gramophone Awards!

Following the success of their last album, Timelapse, this new album from Orchestra of the Swan is a collection of extraordinary works connected by ideas of pilgrimage, contemplation, exploration and enlightenment through the works of composers such as Richter, Respighi, Britten, Piazzolla, Brian Eno, Nico Muhly, Joy Division and more. As with Timelapse, the joy is to be found in discovering the surprising and delightful connections between culturally disparate and musically contrasting time periods. Labyrinths have been an important part of humanity’s cultural landscape for thousands of years; from the Ancient Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur to the intriguing stories of Jorge Luis Borges and Umberto Eco. Our overwhelming desire to find patterns and ‘the hidden truth’ is perhaps nowhere more evident than in the subversive and complex vistas of music. Formed in 1995, Orchestra of the Swan is a British chamber orchestra which, under the artistic direction of David Le Page, is passionate about audience inclusivity and blurring the lines between genres, through its adventurous and accessible programming.

The composer of the Stabat Mater presented in this sound recording was musically educated in Malaga Cathedral at the end of the first third of the 19th century. The musical chapel of the citys first tempo had already suffered the onslaught of the yellow fever of 1803 and the French invasion during the Napoleonic invasion (1808\-1814), and had yet to receive the lethal blows of the successive disentailment measures of Mendizábal (1836), Espartero (1841) and Madoz (1854). However, what seemed to put an end to the stable ensemble to solemnise cathedral liturgies was paradoxically giving way to a paradigm shift. The everyday music of the cathedrals would be reduced to a minimum thanks to the resources established in the Concordat of 1851 signed between Pope Pius IX and Queen Elizabeth II. Hence, the drastic mutilation of the stable staffs in the cathedrals favoured what would quickly become a common and frequent practice, i.e. the ex profeso hiring of instrumental and vocal troops for certain solemnities and festivities, among which those related to Holy Week and its natural period of spiritual preparation, namely Lent, were particularly noteworthy.

English Suites is the title traditionally given to Bach's splendid collection of dances, assembled by tonality and preceded by a Prelude, probably dating form the second decade of the 1700's, perhaps before 1717. Forkel states that the suites were composed for an English nobleman, but adds nothing more. Recently, scholars have made various suggestions: some think that the word English, for thes epieces which Bach defined Preludes avec les Suites, BWV 806-811 have always been considered the worthy counterpart of the French Suites BWV, 821-827. Alessandra Artifoni, who already recorded for Dynamic the latter, two years later proposes their twin collection, using an instrument built by Tony Chinnery after Mietke, and Neidhardt temperament.

This is Volume 8 in Centaur's recording of the complete Pieces de Clavecin of Francois Couperin, performed on harpsichord by Mark Kroll. This cycle, gradually nearing its completion, will be a landmark in recordings of works by Couperin, one of the greatest French composers of the Baroque period. Mark Kroll has performed on four continents as a harpsichordist and fortepianist, in both solo recital and as a collaborative chamber musician. Highlights include an appearance as the official guest of the city of Barcelona; featured soloist in Germany’s Regensburg Early Music Festival, France’s Festival Ambronay and the Bordeaux Hummel Festival; performances and lectures in Beijing and Shanghai; two concerts for the Czech Republic’s Prague Spring Festival; and recitals at Lisbon’s Gulbenkian Foundation, Rome’s Conservatorio Santa Caecilia and Associazione Musicale Romana, Poland’s Dni Bachowski, and Slovenija’s Radovljica Festival.

Two-time Grammy Award-nominated harpsichordist Jory Vinikour plays historically groundbreaking works by François Couperin (1668–1733) on an album comprising three inventive Couperin suites — the composer called them “Ordres” — combining traditional French Baroque dance movements with witty and atmospheric character pieces — miniature tone poems for solo harpsichord. Couperin’s suites “are elegantly composed, concealing a complex, allusive and varied emotional world behind their highly wrought surface” (Norton Grove Concise Encyclopedia of Music). Chicago-born, French-trained harpsichordist Vinikour is especially enamored of Couperin’s Ordres Nos. 6, 7, and 8, calling them “remarkable” for their harmonically driven melodic invention and atmospheric unity within each suite. Highlights include the celebrated Les Baricades Mistérieuses from Ordre No. 6, which England’s The Guardian calls “shimmering, kaleidoscopic and seductive, a sonic trompe l’oeil.” The compelling Les Amusemens from Ordre No. 7 is irresistibly sweet and melancholic. Order No. 8 offers masterful examples of established forms, culminating with a dramatic Passacaille.

REVIEWS:

L’Unique presents all the wit and melancholy of Vinikour’s distinctive interpretations of the sixth, seventh, and eighth suites.

– BBC Radio 3 Record Review Extra

Playfully and decorously brought music to life by American harpsichordist Jory Vinikour. The recording places the instrument in a really lifelike perspective.

– BBC Record Review

A busy schedule as music director of the Bach Collegium Japan and sought-after guest conductor doesn’t stop Masaaki Suzuki from returning to his first loves, the organ and the harpsichord. With the present release he adds yet another chapter to his series of Bach’s works for solo harpsichord. After acclaimed recordings of the Well-tempered Clavier, the Goldberg variations, the French Suites and other works the turn has come to the English Suites. Composed while Bach was in his thirties it precedes other sets such as the French Suites and the Toccatas, and in his liner notes, Bach scholar Yo Tomita draws attention to 'the stylistic traits of a youthful and ambitious composer wanting to make his mark through the use of counterpoint and virtuosity'. Despite its title, the collection has very little to do with England, at least musically: the six suites are instead rooted in the French tradition, and show certain striking similarities to the composer Charles Dieupart’s Six Suites pour le Clavessin from 1701. (Bach made a copy of Dieupart's set sometime between 1709 and 1716.) It was only in the 19th century that the suites became known as the 'English', based on a never substantiated claim that the set was commissioned by an English nobleman.