Marches and other patriotic music frequently occupied the final place in Liszt's recitals, often emphasising the Hungarian cause, which Liszt supported. They also could have contributed to the previously mentioned mood of Lisztomania. It is therefore unsurprising that marches are to be found in Liszt's compositions and arrangements throughout his lifetime. They are represented here with works from around 1830 to 1879, all arrangements of other composers' music, which, in Liszt's hands, achieve artistic heights only found infrequently elsewhere. Given the common practice of the era for performer-composers to play their own music, Liszt could, through the inclusion of an arrangement of a well-known march, acknowledge others' music, and also pay respect to the culture of wherever the concert was taking place. In an era when recordings were not possible, piano arrangements of orchestral and vocal works were commonplace. Liszt cultivated this medium particularly successfully, creating arrangements of, for example, Beethoven symphonies and paraphrases of stage works by Russian composers such as Glinka. Arrangements heard here of marches by Beethoven, Giuseppe Donizetti, Glinka, Massenet, Meyerbeer, Rossini, Schubert and Szechenyi, indicate the breadth of Liszt's programming for his time.

Schelomo: Rhapsodie Hebra�que is the most celebrated part of Ernest Bloch's Jewish Cycle, and although originally conceived for voice, Bloch determined that only the cello could adequately embody the character of Solomon. The Suite for Viola and Piano was composed between February and May 1919, and the cello version is the work of the pianist and composer Adolph Baller and cellist Gabor Rejto, who recorded their version in 1969. This album sees the World Premiere Recording of the cello version for orchestra, with cellist Parry Karp, who studied with Rejto "getting to record these two masterpieces with conductor Kenneth Woods and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales is a dream come true" - Parry Karp.

Edward Cowie is one of the most notable voices in contemporary music and considered by many to be the "leading contemporary composer of music that is related to the natural world" (Fanfare). A remarkable polymath, Cowie is renowned as a composer, visual artist, and natural scientist. Because They Have Songs is the fourth in Cowie's epic series of duo-works featuring cycles of stunning 'sonic portraits' of birds he has encountered on his travels across the world, exploring the relationships between the bird singers, and where and how they sing. It follows three highly acclaimed releases featuring birds of the UK (Bird Portraits MSV 28619), Australia (Where Song Was Born MSV 28620) and the US (Where the Wood Thrush Forever Sings MEX 77104), each highlighting 24 distinct bird species. This latest release, the fifteenth to feature his music on the Metier label, is devoted to 24 avian wonders of Africa. The title of the album is taken from a traditional African text which says, "Why do birds sing? Because they have songs". Edward Cowie went on safari to remote parts of Botswana, across dense bush and open plains where giraffe, wildebeest, zebra and antelope roam, through vast wetlands, majestic rivers and lakes, and shrub-dotted deserts. On his journey he sketched what he saw (included in the album booklet) and transcribed the natural sounds of insects, the noises of animals in movement, and the magnificent and powerful voices of African birds in all their moods and colours. The result is a vibrant and awe-inspiring interweaving of not only the sounds of singing creatures but also the rich environment in which they sing. The album has revelatory performances from Gerard McChrystal, justly hailed as a "magician" on saxophone, partnered with Richard Shaw's superb craftsmanship on piano, a comprehensive coupling of technique and imagination. Cowie's earlier albums in the bird song sonic portrait series received resounding praise worldwide and are poised to become iconic chamber masterpieces on the global stage: "You may well be thinking 'but Messiaen has already done it'. But Cowie's approach is gentler, almost more loving." -MusicWeb "imaginative, captivating and really very moving" -The Strad "Cowie is an endlessly inventive composer and this is a treat" -BBC Music Magazine

On 1 March 1620, the festa a ballo Delizie di Posillipo was performed at the Royal Palace of Naples to celebrate the recovery of King Philip III. Promoted by the Viceroy Pedro Gir�n, 3rd Duke of Osuna, the spectacle featured splendid stage designs by Bartolomeo Cartaro and music by some of Naples' finest composers: Pietro Antonio Giramo, Giacomo Spiardo, Andrea Ansalone, and especially Francesco Lambardi and Giovanni Maria Trabaci, maestro di cappella and organist of the viceregal chapel. As in the great court intermedii, the performance combined arias, canzonettas, and dances, with alternating instrumental groups. On stage, Pan and Venus, symbols of the terrestrial and marine realms, compete for Posillipo, but the contest ends with a solemn final dance. La Grande Chapelle faithfully revives this sumptuous ballo, framed by the religious ceremonies and music organised by the Spanish court in Naples, a brilliant reflection of it's power, multicultural identity, and Baroque splendour.

Gaetano Donizetti was one of the most distinguished Italian composers of the first half of the 19th century. At that time, opera was the preeminent musical genre in Italy, and many top composers based their careers on it. Unlike his contemporary Italian opera composers, though, Gaetano Donizetti also devoted his art to chamber music, producing a good number of excellent works. Between 1814 and 1821, he wrote a number of interesting compositions that included both obligato clarinet or two clarinets in C, as well as demanding parts for basset horn. The voices of soprano and tenor are involved, even in a duet (Aria de Torrente). This album is indebted to Nico Bertelli for his research and publications concerning classical and early romantic arias with clarinet, and to Italian researcher Adriano Amore. � Giuseppe Donizetti�(a.k.a. Donizetti Pasha) was Gaetano Donizetti's older brother. He was a talented child and received lessons from Simon Mayr, the same teacher as his brother. In 1825, he became music master of an Austrian regiment stationed in Italy. In 1831, the Turkish sultan asked him to form the military band of his empire along the Central European lines. He managed to win great esteem and favour from the sultan, transferring the musical style of Italian music to the shores of the Bosporus with great success. He died in Constantinople on 12 February 1856. Giuseppe Donizetti wrote a large amount of music for military bands in many different combinations, but only a few of those works reached his homeland. There are also some vocal works and shorter piano pieces, published in Milan and Florence. - Recorded September 2023 in Cesano Maderno and in Ticino, Italy - Booklet in English contains liner notes by Luigi Magistrelli and profiles of the soloists and the ensemble - A delightful program of works featuring the clarinet in various settings by Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848), one of the greatest opera composers of 19th century Italy, and his brother Giuseppe Donizetti (1788-1856), who was a military music master of an Austrian regiment stationed in Italy. In 1831 the Turkish Sultan asked him to form his empire's military band along central European lines. He was able to gain high esteem and favor from the Sultan, transferring the musical style of Italian music on the shores of the Bosphorus with great success. He died in Constantinople on 10 February 1856. - The program is highly varied and ranges from works for solo clarinet to arias for voices, clarinet and piano, and a wind sextet. Brilliantly performed by Luigi Magistrelli, one of the leading clarinet players of Italy, seconded by a fine selection of Italian soloists. Magistrelli made many recordings for Brilliant Classics with works by C.P.E. Bach (95307), Giuliani (95541), Kummer (94472), Archduke Rudolph (94952), Rebay (94171) and Fuchs (96305). 'Luigi Magistrelli is a skilled artist, with the fingers and the enthusiasm for Weber.' Gramophone.

Alexander Glazunov's seven string quartets extend over the entirety of his composing career and are equal in significance to his symphonies. Fused with nationalist sentiment and Classical discipline the First String Quartet secured the Glinka Prize for the teenage composer in 1884. The advances in expressive range and formal integration in the Second Quartet include a rapturous slow movement considered a highlight of his earlier output, while the Third Quartet has become known as 'The Slavonic' for it's evocative folk-music character.

The enormous popularity enjoyed by the works of Jose de Nebra, the leading Spanish composer in the mid-18th century, is a cause for surprise. His manuscripts are scattered across archives throughout Spain and the Americas. Jose de Nebra rose to be one of the organists of the Spanish Royal Chapel in 1724 and it's vicemaestro from 1751. Following the 1750 prohibition of performing villancicos in the royal institution, Nebra composed a complete series of Christmas Day responsories for the Matins service. From among the different versions, La Grande Chapelle offers the full version from 1752, which is unquestionably one of the indispensable works of Spanish Baroque music. The performance of this collection, following the study and transcription of the musical sources still in existence, represents a premiere of great musicological and artistic interest.

A re-release of Beethoven's Sonatas Nos. 3 & 9 (Kreutzer) from celebrated violinist Viktoria Mullova and her duo partner for this recording, Kristian Bezuidenhout. The pair bring a tension-filled account of these works, displaying their energetic and spontaneous take on what's considered one of Beethoven's most challenging works.

Georges Onslow's reputation as the 'French Beethoven' was earned in the field of chamber music. His 34 string quintets build on a form perfected by Mozart, and are enhanced through Onslow's suggested use of a double bass instead of a second cello, as heard in this recording. The String Quintet No. 14 in F major has an attractively genial quality, with distinctive themes contrasting with warmly emotive lyricism; String Quintet No. 24 in D major shows the influence of Beethoven in it's theatrically dramatic moods.

Avant-jazz pianist and composer Matthew Shipp has been referred to as the "elder statesman" of the art form by DownBeat magazine, but the reach and scope of his music extends much further than mere genre. The Cosmic Piano delivers on that promise - a solo recording that taps into the deeper exploratory potential of the instrument, with Shipp channeling a lifetime of knowledge and a daunting array of influences into nearly an hour of spontaneous, enlightened and joyfully rendered music.

SOMM Recordings' new series, "Elgar from the Archives," explores Edward Elgar's music with rare archival recordings, not only from well-known British interpreters but also from lesser-known, yet equally laudable, international conductors and soloists. Volume 2 in the series features historic live performances of Sir Edward Elgar's Violin Concerto in B minor, Op. 61, with Tibor Varga, and the Cello Concerto in E minor, Op. 85, with Andr� Navarra. Lani Spahr-whose work as a master recording engineer of historic reissues has been honoured by Gramophone Magazine-has once again expertly realised the audio restoration of these performances. The Royal Philharmonic Society of London commissioned the Violin Concerto from Elgar in 1909. Composed within a year of his First Symphony, it is one of his longest orchestral compositions and has the reputation of being one of the most difficult in the violin repertoire. He dedicated it to the noted violin master of his day, Fritz Kreisler, who gave the premiere performance in 1910 with Elgar conducting. The Hungarian violinist Tibor Varga (1921-2003) was six years old when he made his first public appearance, becoming one of the most prominent soloists of his generation. The Franz Liszt Academy appointed him an honorary professor-a rare distinction also awarded to Elgar, Emil Gilels, Richard Strauss, and Arturo Toscanini, amongst others. Varga moved to London in 1947, became a citizen, and lived in Britain for nine years. That experience is reflected in his fine, committed performance of Elgar's concerto. This recording, from 1957, is with the Dutch composer and conductor Jan Koetsier and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra. Following the Great War, Lady Elgar noted that her husband's compositions were different in style and character. His four-movement Cello Concerto, completed in 1919, is barely longer than the first movement of his Violin Concerto, and it is a contemplative, elegiac work with a heartfelt third-movement adagio that is a masterful example of controlled emotion. Yet the concerto ends on a positive note, as the declamatory opening returns in a valedictory form at the end of the finale. The renowned cellist Andr� Navarra (1911-1988) graduated from the Paris Conservatoire at the age of fifteen, and he was later mentored by Pablo Casals. He toured extensively in the United States, Europe, Asia, and the Soviet Union, playing with the great conductors of the era, and he was one of a number of distinguished French cellists who embraced the Elgar concerto. He chose it for his first public performance in Britain at the 1950 Cheltenham Festival with John Barbirolli-with whom he recorded the concerto in 1957. His recording here with German conductor Fritz Rieger and the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra comes from 1956.

When composer Jeffrey Brooks premiered The Memory Palace at Bang on a Can's summer festival at MASS MoCA in July 2023, he'd perfected the presentation of what we now know as the Stein-o-caster - a new form of prepared piano, fitted with pickups, that he conceived and designed the previous year with electronics engineer Greg Lee. As a featured instrument on two pieces from this new recording, the Stein-o-caster sets the tone for the aural atmospherics and soundscapes that transport the music into fresh dimensions of space and time. An artist of wide-ranging musical tastes, Brooks has also held a lifelong affinity for the electric guitar (Jimi Hendrix is a personal hero), so in the context of The Memory Palace, it made sense to approach longtime collaborator Mark Stewart - in-house guitarist for the Bang on a Can All-Stars, and musical director for Paul Simon's touring band - for a specially commissioned piece. This became "Santuario," scored for double-neck electric guitar, and a mini-epic of sonic exploration in it's own right.

After completing his Goyescas, the pianist and composer Enrique Granados wrote that he had happily succeeded in "writing something significant". And who would want to contradict him? The six scenes, some of them very extensive, are based on drawings by the great Spanish artist Francisco Jose de Goya. They form a cycle that is glowing with inspiration from the first to the last bar, and whose technical difficulties achieve the kind of transcendence that Franz Liszt in particular had achieved in the 19th century. His technical prowess is entirely devoted to picturesque and highly emotional expression, from humorous whimsy to the most grave of tragedies. The young Dina Stojilkovic has recorded Goyescas for cpo on a Steinway B built in 1895, an instrument that Granados might well have had under his virtuoso fingers at the time.

In March 2026, M�tier presents a stunning album of choral music from Northumberland-based composer John Casken, inspired by the region's magnificent landscape and coastline, it's changing colours, history, and poetry. The recording features Joyful Company of Singers under the direction of Peter Broadbent and reflects two years of working alongside the composer. The album features evocative and powerful settings of poems by writers from 7th-century Northumbrian cowherder Caedmon to George Herbert, John Donne, Robert Burns, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Northumbrian poet Katrina Porteous, and John Casken himself. The album contains many Northumbrian connections, especially in the works written for choirs in Durham and Northumberland, including the Choir of Durham Cathedral and Newcastle Cathedral, Northern Sinfonia Chorus, and the choir John Casken himself started - Coquetdale Chamber Choir. The works are grouped around timeless and deeply resonant themes, the headings drawn from within their texts: Northumberland's seascape and dialect are central to Uncertain Sea, the single work in 'Far from Land'. The focus of 'Sacred Shaper' is Christianity in early times, followed by an Easter sequence Stone and Thorn, and finally music of farewell, Fare thee weel. Stones also play a part, whether rolling on the seabed, in memorials of stone, "the stone rolled away from Christ's tomb," or as an allegory for virtues symbolised in the stone floor of a church. The choir takes up various roles - sometimes as the voice of a community, or as voices coming together to offer reflection, or simply to tell a story through the music. John Casken's painting for the cover of this recording includes the stones of Dunstanburgh Castle bordering the seas; in Katrina Porteous's words, "Black Dunstanburgh withstands / The waves, the years."

Leo Weiner was one of the most important of all Hungarian pedagogues as well as being a distinguished composer. The success of his Serenade, written when he was 21, was immediate - it's light, intimate and richly melodic qualities, some of which derive from stylised Hungarian dances, are still captivating today. The Divertimento No. 3 and Variations on a Hungarian Folksong mine joyful music from a collection in Budapest's Museum of Ethnography. The Violin Concerto No. 1 is a masterly orchestration of his Violin Sonata, Op. 9, alternating between the playful and the dramatic. The performance heard here restores 115 bars that were cut from the fourth movement, making this the first complete recording.

January 2026 marks the 75th anniversary of The Elgar Society, which has, since the late 1990s, offered it's invaluable support to SOMM Recordings for new and archival releases of Elgar's works. In celebration, SOMM is releasing this month Vol. 1 of Edward Elgar from the Archives. The release offers "acoustic" recordings of Elgar's Enigma Variations conducted by the composer in 1920 and by Sir Henry Wood in 1924. Also included-abridged, in order to fit onto the original disc sides-is a 1919 recording of Elgar's Violin Sonata featuring the virtuoso, Marjorie Hayward, a fellow of the Royal Academy of Music, and the Australian pianist, Una Mabel Bourne. The London String Quartet, founded in 1908, is featured in an abridged version of Elgar's String Quartet, which they recorded in 1921. Elgar's recording of the Enigma Variations, the Violin Sonata, and the String Quartet are all remastered premiere recordings. Before the microphone made it's appearance in 1926, and revolutionized the technicalities of the recording industry through "electrical" recordings, musical performances were captured by "acoustic" recordings. Jutting from the wall in front of the players was a recording horn that was wound in tape to attenuate the "tinny" sound and reduce vibration. On the other side of the wall was a diaphragm, which transmitted the vibrations captured by the horn to a stylus positioned via a gimbal mechanism over the wax disc to be cut. The recordings on this release demonstrate the skill of the forgotten engineers from that era and show how they learnt by experience. Their skill has been realized for modern ears by the musician and master recording engineer of historic reissues, Lani Spahr,�whose Elgar Remastered [SOMMCD 261-4] was described as a "vivid new transfer" by Gramophone�Magazine when it was named their Historical Choice for Elgar's Symphony No. 1. Elgar and Richard Strauss were the first major composers to take the recording of their music seriously, and the Enigma Variations was Elgar's most substantial piece in his ten years of making recordings. This present performance with the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra was recorded at the HMV Studio, London, in three sessions: February and November 1920 and May 1921. Four years later, Sir Henry Wood conducted the New Queen's Hall Orchestra for Columbia. These two "acoustic" recordings, which bookend the Violin Sonata and the String Quartet on this release, offer a fascinating comparison. Wood's interpretation is marginally quicker overall and, as Lani Spahr points out, "the two orchestras sound to be about the same size but the balances are different and more forward in the Wood. Recording techniques had improved greatly in the four years between the Elgar sessions and when Wood recorded his Elgar set."

Pianist and composer Marina Baranova released her album Hypersuites on Berlin Classics in August 2016. "My Hypersuites are acoustic remixes of baroque masters," says the artist. For her project, she selected compositions by four Baroque composers - Couperin, J. S. Bach, Rameau and Handel - and combined individual pieces by these composers to create four suites of her own. The result of this exploration is a new Gesamtkunstwerk, a modern "mixed tape": Hypersuites. Baroque music of the 21st century. For Hypersuites, recorded on a modern Steinway grand piano in the Berlin Teldex studio, Marina Baranova has invited a special guest: Composer and pianist Hauschka created a remix of Rameau's La Poule. The result is a piece that mirrors baroque and electronic music. What if this idea is taken a step further? Marina Baranova is a classical concert pianist who has her musical roots not only in classical music but also in jazz. However, her interests go much further. The idea for Hypersuites came to her during a DJ session. She thought that scratches are basically the modern form of baroque musical embellishments. So nothing could be more obvious than to give the Hypersuites another musical color: Electronic arrangements of Baranova's version for solo instrument. How do DJs, contemporary composers and musicians interpret baroque music? How modern is baroque music, and how can it be transferred into the present day? Not just remixes, but an independent piece of music should be created, with an individual signature without any specifications or restrictions. Who takes part? Hauschka created a 6-minute version of Rameau's La Poule for Hypersuites Reloaded. The musician is known for his "prepared piano" and film scores, but new projects are also leading him more towards classical music with orchestras and chamber ensembles. The composers, producers and musicians John Kameel Farah, Damian Marhulets, Humboldt, Kostia Rapoport, Jannis Block, Anton Berman and Raz Ohara can also be heard with their own remixes. Marina has also created her own remix, which is not just a remix, but offers yet another unique approach to Bach's Siciliano.

His 17th album with Signum Classics, the Welsh pianist, Llyr Williams, brings a profound musical intelligence to his work as soloist, accompanist and chamber musician. His second album of Robert Schumann works explores a selection of works that span a substantial part of Schumann's life. Llyr Williams' long and successful collaboration with Signum Records includes the 8-disc box-set 'A Schubert Journey' (2020), the 12-volume 'Beethoven Unbound' (2018), a 'Wagner Without Words' double album (2014) and highlights from Liszt's 'Annees de pelerinage' (2012).

Anton Rubinstein stood at the heart of Russian musical life for nearly half a century and had a profound influence on generations of Russian musicians, including Tchaikovsky. His piano sonatas reveal a composer intent on uniting intellect and passion within a symphonic conception of the keyboard. With it's heroic, noble themes, the Third Piano Sonata was Rubinstein's own favourite of the set. The final Piano Sonata No. 4 represents the composer at the height of his creative command, pouring a lifetime of emotions into a single piece and distilling the paradoxical tensions between intellect and impulse, Germanic structure and Russian ardour. Sonatas Nos. 1 and 2, played by Han Chen, can be heard on 8.573989.

ART DECADE is a wide-ranging collaboration that unites composer, producer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist Evan Ziporyn with Toronto's renowned ContaQt ensemble, led by arranger and percussionist Jerry Pergolesi. Featuring all-new interpretations of 'art rock' and ambient classics from the early '70s psych-prog output of King Crimson, David Bowie's "Berlin trilogy," and Brian Eno's Ambient 1-4 series, ART DECADE is more than just a tribute album. "Our goal is not to 'elevate' or legitimize this music," Ziporyn and Pergolesi reveal in the album's liner notes. "It's towering artistic achievement and profound influence on an entire generation is self-evident. Instead, by revisiting and inhabiting these groundbreaking works, we hope to ensure they remain a vibrant, celebrated part of the musical repertoire, retaining their punkish sense of gleeful adventure as they continue to subvert expectations and venture into uncharted territory."