The French composer Florent Schmitt was born in 1870, in Meurthe-et-Moselle, close to the German border. He studied music locally before entering the Paris Conservatoire aged nineteen, where he studied with Gabriel Faure, Jules Massenet, Theodore Dubois, and Albert Lavignac. Winner of the Prix de Rome in 1900, Schmitt saw his post-romantic music regularly performed in France before the second world war, but subsequently his music became neglected and is now very rarely played (or recorded). This recording of his Symphonie concertante, featuring Peter Donohoe as soloist, is only the second commercial recording of the piece. Cancunik, 'Suite in Two Parts', was composed for a competition run by the Compagnie francaise de radiophonie which oversaw Radio-Paris. The suite won first prize, and here receives it's premiere recording. The other pieces on the album (Three Dances and Memorial) are orchestrations by the composer of his own works, originally written for solo piano.

Andris Nelsons and the Wiener Philharmoniker confront the uncompromising power of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 6, the composer's darkest and most enigmatic symphonic statement. With gripping intensity and architectural control, Nelsons traces the work's inexorable march from martial determination to catastrophic collapse. The famous hammer blows in the finale strike with devastating force, while moments of lyrical repose are shaped with haunting restraint. This performance reveals Mahler's Sixth as a tragic drama of fate and resistance, uncompromising in it's emotional impact. Recorded at the Salzburg Festival, the concert forms part of the Wiener Philharmoniker's Mahler cycle with Andris Nelsons. 'Mahler's ?tragedy' as a catharc experience in Salzburg. Standing ovaons for the Wiener Philharmoniker under Andris Nelsons' (Die Presse) Program: Gustav Mahler: Symphony No. 6

Prophecies of Fire' is sublimely moving and exciting percussion music (for bass drums, timpani, tom-toms, snare drums, tam-tams, and orchestral bells) performed by the celebrated Sandbox Percussion ensemble. It's waves of seismically rumbling low drums and shimmering metallophones wondrously wash over the listener. Adams writes:?'Prophecies of Fire is a celebration of the elemental power of sound itself to touch, to move, and perhaps even to transform human consciousness.' Composer John Luther Adams's music has won a Pulitzer Prize and a Grammy Award, and has been performed by such prominent ensembles as the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Seattle Symphony, and the JACK?Quartet. 'John Luther Adams... one of the most original musical thinkers of the new century.' (Alex Ross, The New Yorker) 'His music becomes more than a metaphor for natural forces: it is an elemental experience in it's own right.' (Tom Service, The Guardian) 'His music perfectly echoes the landscape he loves: impersonal, relentless, larger than human scale, yet gorgeous.' (Kyle Gann, Chamber Music magazine) Sandbox Percussion is a highly lauded, award-winning, Grammy-nominated percussion quartet dedicated to championing the work of living composers through it's unwavering dedication to contemporary music. Sandbox Percussion's performances have been hailed as 'exhilarating' (The New York Times) and 'virtuosic... utterly mesmerizing' (The Guardian).

This world premiere recording presents Christoph Graupner's complete surviving cantatas for solo tenor, a remarkable cycle that occupies a unique place within the nearly 1,450 church cantatas of one of the Baroque era's most prolific masters. Performed by Georg Poplutz with L'arpa festante led by Florian Heyerick, these six cantatas reveal a composer whose striking harmonic imagination, expressive intensity and dramatic originality place him firmly alongside his contemporaries Bach, Telemann and Handel.

A glance at the catalogue of works by the composer Otto Nicolai quickly reveals that, although he composed an astonishing amount of music during his short, incredibly eventful life of barely 39 years, he paid rather scant attention to the piano-an instrument he played superbly-when it came to his own compositions. Alongside half a dozen operas and two symphonies, as well as a wealth of sacred and secular vocal music, he wrote a handful of piano works that easily fit on a double album. The result is a veritable bonbonniere. Two starkly contrasting sonatas represent the 'serious' Nicolai. The founder of the Vienna Philharmonic and director of the Vienna Court Opera is represented, amongst other things, by theatrical occasional music and a fantasia on Casta Diva. The trend conscious, playful composer of The Merry Wives of Windsor also composed a number of light pieces such as the Moon Waltz, which has nothing to fear from comparison to anyone named Strauss.

Even great luminaries can make mistakes. For example, as late as 1750, the multi-talented Jean-Jacques Rousseau was firmly convinced in the renowned French Encyclopedie that the sonata was "such an unnatural fashion" that it "would not last". And this despite that quite a few of his fellow musicians paid tribute to this Italian genre, producing many fine pieces. An early example appeared in 1713. It was published under the customary royal privilege as Opus 3 by the 33-year-old Parisian organist and harpsichordist Louis-Antoine Dornel. It is a collection of seven trio sonatas for transverse flutes, violins, oboes, etc. Thanks to it's highly variable instrumentation, it allowed for a wide circle of instrumentalists to perform these tasteful, varied and thoughtfully composed pieces. Today, Dornel's Opus 3 is a veritable rarity, and the Orfeo Blaserensemble has again brought it into the limelight. They would have even convinced Rousseau

In this new production of the Arena di Verona, Giacomo Puccini's masterpiece La Boheme emerges as an intimate drama. Director Alfonso Signorini contrasts the summer setting of the amphitheatre with a snow-covered vision of 19th-century Paris, placing the tragic love story of Mimì and Rodolfo within a striking visual frame. Audience favourite Vittorio Grigòlo gives a charismatic interpretation of Rodolfo, alongside soprano Juliana Grigoryan, who presents Mimì in her Arena d ebut. Luca Micheletti and Eleonora Bellocci complete the central quartet as Marcello and Musetta. Under the musical direction of Daniel Oren, the orchestra and chorus of the Arena di Verona bring Puccini's score to life. 'An evening of great occasions, with a cheering audience well in excess of ten thousand' (L'Adige).

In this new production of the Arena di Verona, Giacomo Puccini's masterpiece La Boheme emerges as an intimate drama. Director Alfonso Signorini contrasts the summer setting of the amphitheatre with a snow-covered vision of 19th-century Paris, placing the tragic love story of Mimì and Rodolfo within a striking visual frame. Audience favourite Vittorio Grigòlo gives a charismatic interpretation of Rodolfo, alongside soprano Juliana Grigoryan, who presents Mimì in her Arena d ebut. Luca Micheletti and Eleonora Bellocci complete the central quartet as Marcello and Musetta. Under the musical direction of Daniel Oren, the orchestra and chorus of the Arena di Verona bring Puccini's score to life. 'An evening of great occasions, with a cheering audience well in excess of ten thousand' (L'Adige).

On the concept album, "l'Experience Franco-Suedoise", the Sweden-based French harpist, Delphine Constantin-Reznik and Swedish soprano, Sabina Bisholt present music by Swedish composers who went to Paris to study around the last turn of the century, as well as music of their French teachers. Guest musicians are violinist Cecilia Zilliacus, clarinettist Dan Larsson, and bassoonist Roman Reznik. World premiere recordings, not least of women composers, mixed with some evergreens such as Camille Saint-Saens's "The Swan", arranged for harp in different settings.

This third and final volume of Magnificat's 'Lassus: The Alchemist' series is devoted to Magnificat's based on secular chansons. Courtly entertainment, popular song and everything in between, the chanson provided composers with an inexhaustible source of melodies and ideas, ready to be recast in new guises. Lassus's genius lay not only in the originality of his own chanson compositions, but also in his transformation of such secular models into music of profound expressive and spiritual power. Some of his choices seem entirely natural: Susanne un jour, Beau le cristal and Mort et fortune all resonate with themes that find echoes in their sacred settings. Others, however, are strikingly unexpected. The worldly wit and erotic innuendo of Si vous estes m'amie, Dessus le marche d'Arras and Si par souhait remind us that Renaissance attitudes to parody and borrowing differed greatly from our own. This recording brings together the chansons and the Magnificat's they inspired to offer a vivid portrait of Lassus. As at the Bavarian court where Lassus enjoyed the finest instrumentalists of his age, Magnificat is joined by the distinguished players of The City Musick.

With Improvised Bach, cellist Víctor García García invites listeners into the living, breathing world of Johann Sebastian Bach, where composition, performance and improvisation were once inseparable arts. Centred around Bach's Partita No. 1 for Solo Violin-performed here in a rare historical cello transcription-the album reimagines the composer's music through newly improvised preludes, doubles and ornamented repeats, all rooted in Bach's original harmonic language while revealing fresh expressive possibilities. In 2024 Victor was awarded First Prize at the Bach International Competition in Leipzig. He is a Professor of Historical Cello at the HKU Utrecht Conservatorium and also in Scotland's St. Andrews University. Research is an important part of his work besides his musicianship. Rather than treating Bach's masterpieces as untouchable monuments, Victor García García approaches them as a vibrant musical language that continues to evolve in performance.. Drawing inspiration from eighteenth-century improvisational practice, each improvised piece becomes a musical dialogue across three centuries, capturing the spontaneity of the moment while remaining deeply faithful to Bach's style. The result is a compelling recording gives listeners the opportunity to hear familiar works with renewed curiosity, imagination and wonder.

Ephemer takes it's title from the Greek word for something that lasts only a short time: fleeting, transient and impermanent. It is a fitting image for the music of bassist, composer and bandleader Vroni Frisch, whose quartet thrives on the tension between carefully shaped compositions and moments that can exist only once. With Gregor Schor on reeds, Manuel Seng on piano and Rhodes, Tobias Frohnhofer on drums and Frisch on six-string electric bass, the VRONI FRISCH BAND moves freely between contemporary jazz, lyrical chamber-like passages, cinematic colours and powerful grooves. Frisch's writing leaves room for contrast: music can be smooth and delicate one moment, rough and untamed the next. At the centre are strong melodies, rich harmonies and intricate rhythms, while improvisation gives each piece the freedom to take an unexpected turn. Across nine original compositions, Ephemer captures that balance of structure and openness. Tracks such as 'Why,' 'Stream,' 'Lugano,' 'Drab' and the expansive 'Megalodon' reveal a band equally comfortable with subtle interplay and grand gestures. The result is music that feels composed without becoming fixed: constantly shifting, developing and responding in the moment. For Frisch, whose work spans jazz, improvised music, art-pop and large ensemble composition, the quartet has become a focused space in which to bring together these different musical experiences.

Greatest ever Danish pianist in rare releases. With this eighth volume, Danacord's series The Great Danish Pianist Victor Schioler is brought to it's conclusion. The series contains the greater part of Schioler's studio recordings, supplemented by a selection of live performances and productions made for Danish Radio, and it encompasses, with a single exception, all the works he recorded in the studio. Where he recorded the same work on more than one occasion, one version has sometimes been included and in other cases two or three. Volume 8 presents Schioler in three capacities: as solo pianist, chamber musician and concerto soloist. CD 1 opens with Beethoven's Cello Sonata Op. 69 and Brahms's Cello Sonata in F major, both featuring Schioler in inspired and sympathetic partnership with the 22-year-old Erling Blo¨ndal Bengtsson, who had by 1954, when these recordings were made, already established a considerable reputation. The two cello sonatas are followed by solo piano music, again by Beethoven and Brahms. First comes the Moonlight Sonata, which Schioler recorded no fewer than three times: in 1929, 1942 and 1951. The first and last of these recordings-both outstanding performances-are interpretatively quite close to one another: a slow and dreamlike first movement, a restrained and delicately played middle movement taken at a moderate tempo, and finally a dramatic and stormy yet perfectly controlled finale. The 1942 recording presented here is no less masterly, but differs markedly from the 1929 and 1951 versions in it's more classical approach, with a considerably faster and far less inflected first movement. Fu¨r Elise, which follows immediately afterwards, is not generally counted among Beethoven's major works, popular though it is. Yet Schioler's delicate touch and poetic phrasing elevate this modest work into a little masterpiece. Victor Schioler Volume 1 DACOCD 491-492 Victor Schioler Volume 2 DACOCD 782-783 Victor Schioler Volume 3 DACOCD 832-833 Victor Schioler Volume 4 DACOCD 867-868 Victor Schioler Volume 5 DACOCD 872-873 Victor Schioler Volume 6 DACOCD 962-963 Victor Schioler Volume 7 DACOCD 987-988

Pitiful indeed-most pitiful-was the fate of the satyr Marsyas. (Ovid, "Metamorphoses") Apollo versus Marsyas-a musical contest pushed to it's ultimate limits. On it's new GENUIN album, the German-Spanish ensemble Marsyas Baroque transforms this ancient myth into a compelling musical narrative: an instrumental pasticcio that follows the unfolding story, interwoven with brief spoken texts that illuminate key moments along the way. Performed on historical instruments, works by Vivaldi, Telemann, Gesualdo, Reichenauer, and others enter into dialogue with a newly commissioned composition by Alessandra Bellino. Who decides the outcome of a contest over music itself? The answer is as unsettling as it is unforgettable.

The third and final volume in an enlightening series of Liszt's music for two pianos: new recordings masterminded by the great Lisztian of our time, Leslie Howard, and featuring several world-premiere recordings. Leslie Howard's complete survey of the piano music of Liszt has been widely acknowledged as a monument in the history of sound recording. Since that vast project reached completion, however, he has continued to mine the Lisztian archives for buried treasure. In partnership with Mattia Ometto, he has recorded the complete symphonic poems and the Faust and Dante symphonies, in versions for two pianos made by Liszt himself. Issued by Brilliant Classics, these collections have met with enthusiasm from dedicated Lisztians, who will be even more eager to acquire the final volume of the series. This features several works better known in their solo-piano versions, such as the Reminiscences de Don Juan de Mozart and the Fantasia and Fugue on B-A-C-H. The Concerto pathetique may be slightly more familiar in this, it's original version for two pianos, but the Groes Konzertstück based on three of Mendelssohn's Songs without Words is a genuine rarity. There are two versions of the multi-authored Hexameron based on a theme from Bellini's I Puritani, the second of which has never been recorded, along with a transcription of the Festklange tone-poem which again differs in detail from the one recorded by Howard and Ometto in their earlier survey. The finer points of the editions are engagingly discussed by Howard in his booklet note. The performances themselves lack nothing for drama as well as authenticity, and open a window on to the generosity of Liszt's artistic relationship with earlier masters and notable contemporaries. If we view Liszt these days as a pivotal figure in 19th-century music, it is not least thanks to Howard's dauntless dedication to the cause.

Until thirty years ago, the Russian performing school largely overlooked the principles of playing historical instruments. However, with the fall of the "Iron Curtain" of traditional approaches, a newfound freedom emerged - not only in daily life but also in the interpretation of early music. Today, as we strive to preserve this cultural openness, we look back to the 18th century - an era when Russia made an extraordinary leap into the world of instrumental art in a remarkably short period of time. Ivan Khandoshkin, a brilliant violinist and composer, became the pivotal figure of this breakthrough. Born in 1747, Khandoshkin was an elder contemporary of W.A. Mozart and a younger contemporary of J. Haydn. Young Ivan's extraordinary talent led him, at the age of thirteen, to join the court orchestra of Emperor Peter III, a passionate music lover and amateur violinist himself. Under the tutelage of the Italian court violinist Titto Porto, Khandoshkin's progress was so remarkable that in 1762 he was appointed to the Court Orchestra. A significant milestone was the 1781 publication of two editions of his work in Amsterdam. After returning to St Petersburg in 1788, he remained a central figure in concert life, performing his own works and serving as a first violinist in various orchestras. In 1804, Khandoshkin died following a stroke and was buried at the Volkovo Cemetery in St Petersburg. Khandoshkin's sonatas for solo violin were published posthumously as Op.3 around 1806 by the St Petersburg publisher Friedrich Dittmar, but stylistic features indicate that they were composed in the 1790s. The use of the solo violin served both a practical purpose-allowing performance in the absence of a continuo player-and an artistic one: it was an opportunity to demonstrate the highest level of virtuosity. Any composer undertaking such works entered into an "intellectual duel" with works of great masters of these genres, such as the sonatas and partitas of J.S. Bach, the fantasies of G.P. Telemann, the fugues of J. Stamitz and W. Pichl, the sonatas of J.F. Reichardt and F.W. Rust. Khandoshkin holds a distinguished place in this lineage, his pieces pose exceptional technical demands while reflecting profound artistic intentions, embodying three distinct aesthetic currents: the fury of Sturm und Drang, the expressive nobility of the pathetish-galant style, and the refined hedonism of the Rococo. Anna Dmitrieva (b. 1987) graduated from the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, where she studied under T. Liberova, P. Popov, and I. Dzektzer. She continued her studies in chamber music and Baroque violin at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Koln with A. Spiri, H. Schoneweg, R. Gwilt, and K. Junghanel. With her ensemble Ludus Instrumentalis, she completed postgraduate studies at the Mozarteum Salzburg under R. Goebel. Highlights of recent seasons include her work as concertmaster of Concerto Koln in Romantic repertoire under Kent Nagano and Jacob Lehmann, as well as appearances as leader and soloist in a wide range of Baroque programmes. She has also served as leader for Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Ensemble Boulevard Baroque, and Ensemble 1700. Her performing and recording collaborations include Cordevento, La Chapelle Harmonique, Compagna di Punto, Altera Pars, Il Pomo d'Oro, B'Rock Orchestra, Musica Gloria, Collegium Musicum '23, and the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, among others.

Published in Salzburg in 1715, Artificiosus Concentus pro Camera is the only surviving collection for solo violin by Johann Joseph Vilsmayr, who served as a court violinist in Salzburg from 1689 until his death in 1722. We cannot be certain that he studied with Heinrich Biber, the greatest violinist of his age who became a leading musician at the Salzburg court, but the relationship between the two figures can be inferred from the style and the sophistication of Vilsmayr's writing for his instrument. Four of the partitas notably use scordatura, where the violin is retuned away from the conventional G-D-A-E intonation in order to explore new and striking expressive colours on the instrument. In works such as the cycle of Mystery Sonatas, Biber shows himself the master of this technique, but (as his putative student) Vilsmayr demonstrates a deep understanding of scordatura. For example, in the B flat major Partita, the highest string is lowered to D, creating a natural resonance that emphasizes a fundamental tone for that key. In the D major Partita, the scordatura (A-E-A-D) enriches the harmonic resonance by reinforcing the overtones of the key centre. Despite it's high musical and technical value, Vilsmayr's collection remains little known, especially when compared to contemporary masterpieces for solo violin such as the Mystery Sonatas, the Sonatas and Partitas of Bach or the Fantasias by Telemann. In his booklet essay for this new recording, the violinist Davide Facchini explains how he was initially drawn to the world of Biber, before discovering these fascinating works of Vilsmayr. He discovered for himself that they represent a landmark moment in the Austrian violin school, 'demonstrating a refined balance between technical invention, timbral exploration, stylistic sensitivity, and a profound preference for scordatura.' Born in Rome in 2000, Davide Facchini studied with luminaries of the Baroque-violin tradition such as Enrico Onofri, Lorenzo Ghielmi, and Enrico Casazza. This album marks his international debut on record.

Very little is known about Matteo da Perugia. His life is poorly documented, and even the dates of his birth and death remain unknown. He served as principal singer at Milan Cathedral during two distinct periods (1402-1407 and 1414-1416), at a time when the previous church had collapsed (1386) and reconstruction was still in progress. Of great importance is the fact that Matteo was part of the entourage of Pietro Filargo da Candia, Archbishop of Milan from 1402, who was later elected pope under the name of Alexander V (1409). An examination of Matteo's musical output reveals a striking degree of structural coherence, expressive and linguistic tension, and an exceptional boldness in melodic and rhythmic innovation. These characteristics clearly anticipate the emergence of a new polyphonic language, commonly associated with the figure of Guillaume Dufay, which would profoundly transform the history of music in the early decades of the fifteenth century. An important aspect is how he perceives the relationship between text and music, in an intimate and direct way, The source of the music recorded on this album is the Modena Codex. From a corpus of more than forty sacred and secular works, twelve compositions have been selected (four ballades, three virelais, three rondeaux, one Italian ballata, and the sole surviving canon). This selection aims to present a composer whose output demonstrates a remarkable capacity for invention, capable of conveying beauty and eliciting pleasure, admiration, and respect. Founded in 1991, the MiniM Ensemble initially aimed to explore a specific area of contemporary musical language. Beginning in 2019, the ensemble began exploring medieval repertoire, focusing on "complex" music, particularly that of the so-called "Ars subtilior". Seminars held by Kees Boeke at the Palermo Conservatory - focused on some of the most important musical sources of the period - such as the Chantilly and Modena manuscripts, were crucial in developing the ensemble's expertise in medieval repertoire. In 2024, the ensemble created it's own version, with instruments and male and female voices, of Guillaume de Machaut's Messe de Nostre Dame.

Sergei Rachmaninoff's Vespers (All-Night Vigil), composed in 1915 for a charity concert held in Moscow in aid of the victims of the First World War, draws on the traditions of Russian Orthodox liturgical chant. It's fascinating beauty captivates listeners in both East and West alike. The new CD from BR Klassik presents a complete recording of the Vespers (All-Night Vigil) for soloists and mixed choir a cappella. Sung in the original language, it was performed in Munich in November 2025 by the outstanding Bavarian Radio Chorus under the direction of Peter Dijkstra. Opus 37 is regarded as the quintessential sacred masterpiece by the Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninoff. Correctly translated, this vocal work, composed in 1915 and titled 'Vsenoscnoe bdenie', means 'all-night vigil': a form of worship common in the Orthodox Church, divided into evening and morning prayers. It is called 'all-night' because this service, which began as vespers in the evening, originally lasted all night and seamlessly transitioned into morning prayers. Rachmaninoff set the fifteen fixed parts of the liturgy to music. The solo part, supported by the choir with long sustained notes, adheres to the requirements of the liturgical sequence and the strict regulations of the Byzantine order of worship. Ten of the chants are based on ancient monophonic Greek and Russian church chants; five have been set to Rachmaninoff's own melodies. Throughout his life, Rachmaninoff himself regarded his Vespers as his most significant musical creation. Yet he was interested 'less in God and religious ceremony than in the incomparably beautiful singing'. The composer's memories of his carefree childhood and the 'religious soul' of his homeland are also evident in his music. Just two years later, in the winter of 1917, Rachmaninoff was forced to leave that very homeland for good.

Two remarkable yet rarely heard masterpieces of the late Romantic piano concerto repertoire come together in this compelling recording by acclaimed pianist Severin von Eckardstein, the Poznan Philharmonic Orchestra, and conductor Lukasz Borowicz. Franz Xaver Scharwenka's dazzling Third Piano Concerto radiates brilliance, lyrical warmth and virtuoso flair, while Nicolai Medtner's deeply personal Third Piano Concerto unfolds as an epic musical journey, rich in mystery, melancholy and spiritual depth. Together, these works reveal two strikingly different visions of Romantic expression - one outwardly brilliant, the other profoundly introspective. For von Eckardstein, Medtner's Third Concerto represents the summit of the composer's creative life: a work that rewards every new listening with fresh discoveries and emotional depth. Paired with Scharwenka's exuberant, richly coloured concerto, this recording offers a fascinating dialogue between two overlooked masters of the Romantic tradition. Performed by one of Poland's finest orchestras under one of today's leading advocates of Central European repertoire, this album shines new light on two extraordinary concertos that deserve a place alongside the great classics.