Naxos Spring Sale 2026
864 products
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Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Shakespeare Overtures, Vol. 2 / Penny, West Australian Symphony
Naxos · Oct 2010CD$19.99 -
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SalePhilips: Cantiones Sacrae Quinis et Octonibus Vocibus / Sarum Consort
Naxos · Dec 2011CD$19.99$13.99 -
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SaleCyril Scott: Violin Sonatas Nos. 1 & 3, Sonata Melodica / Howick, Rahman
Naxos · Jul 2010CD$19.99$13.99 -
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Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Shakespeare Overtures, Vol. 2 / Penny, West Australian Symphony
The art of Shakespeare was a recurring fascination for Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco. In addition to two operas and numerous settings of songs and sonnets, he wrote 11 Shakespeare Overtures which here receive their first ever complete recording. Deploying all the resources of the symphony orchestra, these are some of the twentieth century’s most dramatic and tuneful orchestral works, spectacular evocations of Shakespeare’s greatest plays.
Hindemith: Music for Cello
Philips: Cantiones Sacrae Quinis et Octonibus Vocibus / Sarum Consort
Peter Philips was the most famous English composer of his time, and only Byrd, a generation older, had more compositions published. Much of Philips’s life was spent on the Continent, where he wrote music of intricate, text-conscious colour, both deeply expressive and architecturally powerful. His motets and anthems, whether celebratory, meditative or dramatic, embrace the widest range of feeling and texture. The much-admired Sarum Consort’s disc All the Queen’s Men (8.572582) was praised for its ‘energy and aplomb’. (American Record Guide)
Rozsa: String Quartets No 1 & 2, String Trio / Tippett Quartet
Though Miklós Rózsa became one of the most admired of film composers, he had always written music in other forms and his two published string quartets reveal important facets of his musical background. String Quartet No 1 was written in 1950 when he was under contract with M-G-M and, with its nocturnal and folk-dance imagery, is redolent of his Hungarian youth. String Quartet No 2 is prophetic of his later sparer style, though it too is infused with great energy and high drama. The String Trio, Op 1, recorded for the first time in its original 1929 published version, abounds with youthful vitality.
Balada: Sinfonía en Negro, Double Concerto & Columbus
Maxwell Davies: Symphonies Nos. 4 & 5
Chopin: Piano Concerto No 1... / Nebolsin, Wit
Chopin’s youthful Piano Concerto No. 1 is dominated by the brilliant piano part that the teenage performer-composer wrote to showcase his extraordinary virtuosity. Its ravishing Romanza (‘reviving in one’s soul beautiful memories’, as the composer described it) is framed by an opening movement rich in dramatic lyricism and a vivacious Rondo. The Fantasia on Polish Airs, Op. 13 and Krakowiak are similarly vehicles for Romantic reverie and bravura which pay tribute to the music of Chopin’s homeland. Eldar Nebolsin’s recording of Liszt’s piano concertos was ranked ‘among the finest’ by Gramophone.
Rachmaninov: Complete Preludes / Eldar Nebolsin
RACHMANINOFF Preludes (complete) • Eldar Nebolsin (pn) • NAXOS 8.570327 (77: 44)
The technical and musical demands of the Rachmaninoff preludes are legion. A partial catalog might include: the ability to negotiate massive chords, sensitively voiced and often in quick succession; seamless arpeggios; perfect thirds, sixths, and other double-note figurations; a wide variety of attack and release strategies; the most delicate, leggierissimo fioratura; infinitely calibrated effects of crescendo, diminuendo, accelerando , and meno mosso ; intelligent rubato; and perhaps above all, the ability to launch and sustain a singing line. To these requirements might be added some suggestion of that special attribute (of which Rachmaninoff himself was the unexcelled exemplar) namely, the ability to suggest aural planes—a vivid foreground, mid-distance, and background—capable of revealing the most complex textures to the listener. Happily, this new recording reveals Eldar Nebolsin as a pianist equal to these demands.
After encountering Ashkenazy’s recording of these pieces from the mid 1970s (Decca 475 8238), I find Nebolsin’s interpretations are a breath of fresh air. Each piece unfolds as a miniature drama with its own unique character, lending the entire set great variety of mood—from serene tranquility, to ebullient joy, to the most crushing sadness. Nothing in these interpretations suggests the routine. Nebolsin is hypersensitive to each of Rachmaninoff’s articulation indications, pedal markings, and dynamic subtleties. And while the performances are thoughtful, they never sound fussy. In every instance, one has the feeling that this bouquet of late-Romantic expression emanates directly from the pianist’s heart.
The highest compliment that may be paid Nebolsin’s technique is that, in its complete subordination to the music, one is simply never aware of it. His sound is always beautiful, whether in the transparency of the most massive fortissimos or in the rainbow of subtly contrasted pianissimos. If the soaring op. 23/2 takes flight effortlessly, its fierce left-hand figurations never obtrude on the ebb and flow of exultant musical substance. The exquisite op. 23/10 breathes all the freshness of dew on delicate blossoms opening to the morning sun; the voice leading is simply gorgeous. The great B-Minor Prelude (op. 32/10) begins with a heart-rending sadness, so immobilized and still that the subsequent chordal section assumes an awesome grandeur of uncanny power and eloquence.
The recording was made in Westleton, Suffok, U.K., this past January and is, in all technical aspects, commendable. One hopes that, despite the inevitable vicissitudes of career-building, this 33-year-old pianist will continue to exhibit this degree of instrumental prowess in the service of a sensitive and deeply artistic musicality. Highly recommended.
FANFARE: Patrick Rucker
Handel, G.: Semele [Oratorio]
Davies: Strathclyde Concertos Nos. 7 & 8
Cyril Scott: Violin Sonatas Nos. 1 & 3, Sonata Melodica / Howick, Rahman
Works for violin and piano are an important part of Cyril Scott’s chamber music. This disc presents three sonatas which span his output. The capricious and ruminative First Violin Sonata ranks among the most convincing and successful of his earlier large-scale compositions. Sonata Melodica is a more relaxed yet equally quixotic work, while the Third Violin Sonata is one of the most inventive from his later years.
Sweelinck: Music For Harpsichord / Glen Wilson
Scarlatti: Complete Keyboard Sonatas, Vol. 12 / Gerda Struhal
--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com
Tan Dun: Concerto For Orchestra, Symphonic Poem On Three Notes
The multifaceted and multi-award winner Tan Dun has made an indelible mark on the world music scene with a creative repertoire that spans the boundaries of classical music. The Symphonic Poem on Three Notes describes an evolutionary arc from nature through industry and back to nature, the traditional orchestra augmented with a range of unorthodox sound sources such as wind, stones and car brake drums. The drama of Orchestral Theatre centres on memories of ritual from the composer’s childhood, linking folk music styles to Western atonality, while the Concerto for Orchestra describes the exoticism of Marco Polo’s geographical, musical and spiritual journeys.
Haydn: Keyboard Concertos / Müller-brühl, Hoeren, Haugsand
HAYDN Organ Concertos: in C, Hob XVIII:1,8,10. Harpsichord Concertos: in C, Hob XVIII:5; in F, Hob XVIII:7 • Helmut Müller-Brühl, cond; Harald Hoeren (org); Ketil Gaugsand (hpd); Cologne CO • NAXOS 8.570486 (72:46)
These early concertos—from the 1750s, although some were revised in the 1760s—were written to be played by either organ or harpsichord, which is why this disc is entitled “Keyboard Concertos.” In Brilliant Classics’s recent 150-CD “Haydn Edition,” all five of these works were played on an organ. The music is conventional, having elements both Baroque and rococo, but it is still Haydn, which means spirit and quality as well as competence. The only lack is individuality; I would hate to face a blind audition of each movement—especially if you switched solo instruments. These performances are also conventional, too much so. The modern-instrument band produces very little color, and less variety of it. Bland, tubby recorded sound reinforces that feeling; trumpets in the C-Major pieces are barely noticeable, and drumbeats are little more than extra reverberances. By contrast, Brilliant’s period-instrument Ensemble Dolce Risonanza produces vibrant colors and violent explosions. The tables are turned with the soloists, however; Brilliant’s Anton Holzapfel can hardly get a note in edgewise among all those dolce risonanzas, whereas both Hoeren and Gaugsand take the lead when called upon and give imaginative, well-rounded performances. The best things here are the Allegro finales, which are taken at spirited, upbeat tempos.
This disc is in no way necessary, but you’re sure to enjoy it.
FANFARE: James H. North
The A-Z of Opera [2nd Expanded Edition]
The A–Z of Opera 2nd edition has been expanded to include even more composers, operas, and 130 bonus tracks. The 1,096-page book details the lives of hundreds of opera composers, and like the range of Naxos recordings itself, this set highlights the extraordinary breadth of opera and its composers across the centuries in a rich and inspiring resource.