The Brodsky Quartet is joined by soprano Susana Cordón in the premiere recording of the chamber oratorio A Mortuis Resurgere by the contemporary Spanish composer Jorge Grundman (b. 1961). Featuring Mr. Grundman’s trademark contemplative harmonies and expressive writing, this work of remarkable accessibility tells the story of the Resurrection of Christ. This multi-faceted artist and humanitarian is also a professor of acoustics, a writer and co-founder of the Non Profit Music Chamber Orchestra.

Norwegian soprano Mari Eriksmoen is undoubtedly a rising star at the moment, following successful appearances at the Opéra-Comique in Paris, Grand Théâtre de Genève, Oper Frankfurt, Komische Oper Berlin, and Teatro alla Scala in Milan. On the concert stage she has made recent important appearances with the Orchestre de Paris, Berliner Philharmoniker, Oslo Philharmonic, and Münchner Philharmoniker among others. Here she joins the Bergen Philharmonic and Edward Gardner for a powerful album of orchestral songs, coupling Britten’s Les Illuminations and Four French Songs with a selection of Cantaloube’s inimitable Songs of the Auvergne. Eriksmoen spent a year studying in Paris, and proves an effective and natural singer of the French language. As she mentions in her program note: ‘It is highly demanding to sing in French when it is not one’s native tongue, but I have always felt at home when singing in French and nurture an emotional attachment to the French language.’

REVIEWS:

One cannot can’t praise Eriksmoen enough for the accuracy of her singing, its tonal beauty, and her absorption in the text. There are running passages, exposed intervals, and those chromatic steps to contend with. She faces every challenge with ease.

-- Fanfare

In Britten’s Les illuminations, the generally belllike accuracy of Norwegian soprano Mari Eriksmoen’s singing is more than matched by the expressive truth of her interpretations. She is most beguiling when floating her voice weightlessly and with a serene joie de vivre in ‘Antique’, perfectly partnered by the lovely violin playing of the Bergen Philharmonic leader Melina Mandozzi.

-- BBC Music Magazine

“Cooper asserts her stylistic credentials right at the start of the disc in Robert’s Humoreske, playing with a warm, golden tone and fluidly finding that distinction between the extrovert and introvert traits that were key to Schumann’s musical personality.” – The Telegraph (UK)

This is the penultimate release in the Chandos series of Brahms works for solo piano, performed by Barry Douglas. | Brahms is often considered both a traditionalist and an innovator with his music being rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of Baroque and Classical eras. | These recordings are being performed in the finest international venues including the Wigmore Hall and Concertgebouw. | This fifth volume is the most virtuosic of the series, including the Scherzo in E flat minor, technically demanding variations, several intermezzi, and three Hungarian Dances. | Barry Douglas is gainging a reputation of one the few world-class piano virtuosi of the romantic repertoire. | Barry Douglas won the 1986 Tchaikovksy Competition in Russia.

After four volumes exploring 20th century British works for cello and piano, the Watkins brothers come together again turning their attention across the Atlantic ocean and the American contribution to this repertoire spanning four decades of seminal compositional activity in the United States. The inspired performances of the Welsh sibling duo, both highly acclaimed in their musical endeavors further illustrate the confluence of the unique American influences with the development of early 20th century classical repertoire.

Although most widely remembered for his operettas in partnership with W.S. Gilbert, Sir Arthur Sullivan was the most famous of all British composers of the nineteenth century. He was revered as a composer of oratorios, and was urged by Queen Victoria to compose a grand opera. The result, Ivanhoe, achieved 155 consecutive performances (in an opera house especially built for it). Achieving equal success in his lifetime, his substantial legacy of songs fell into neglect in the twentieth century, but as this album demonstrates Sullivan's endlessly fertile melodic gifts withstand comparison with those of any other song composer. David Owen Norris and his quartet of outstanding young British singers deliver this fascinating programme with terrific style and panache.

This is the premiere recording of Vaughan Williams's opera The Poisoned Kiss. This romantic extravaganza contains some of the composer's finest music, and a sense of fun runs through the delightful score. Vaughan Williams began writing The Poisoned Kiss, his fourth opera, in 1927. He was also working on Sir John in Love and had begun sketching the first scenes of Job. he was at the height of his musical powers, yet The Poisoned Kiss has remained unperformed, unrecorded and unknown. The reason for this neglect lies mainly in the rather dated text and the lengthy sections of spoken dialogue (some of which is omitted in this recording). It did not help that the composer and the librettist were uncertain about the balance between comedy and drama in the opera, a dilema that led to major revisions of the work by Vaughan Williams in 1936 and again in 1956-57. In the final version the composer's lyricism dominates the humour and we are treated to an extraordinary wealth of expressive and heart-felt music whcih does not deserve to be ignored. Recorded in: Brangwyn Hall, Swansea 3-6 January 2003 Producer(s) Brian Couzens Sound Engineer(s) Ralph Couzens Matthew Walker (Assistant)

Gypsy Strings is a collection of arrangements of traditional gypsy music together with a selection of original compositions. The disc was conceived to display the talents of London Concertante’s leader, Adam Summerhayes, and the Bulgarian fiddle player Emil Chakalov. The music becomes a jousting match between the two, backed by London Concertante’s twelve-player string section. The ensemble enjoys an ever growing reputation for exciting and memorable performances, thanks to exceptional players and inspired programming.

Monteverdi’s sacred vocal compositions introduced the expression of powerful and personal emotions to the world of church music. While it took him a number of years to find fulfillment in his work, Monteverdi was a revered composer within his lifetime and his music is regarded as revolutionary, marking the change from the Renaissance style to that of the Baroque. This album includes some of the finest works from Monteverdi’s years as director of music at St Mark’s in Venice, published posthumously in 1650 as the ‘Messa a quattro voci et salmi.’ “Pure- and vintage- Monteverdi, starting with a Dixit Dominus and ending, grandly with a version of Beatus Vir, using material we know from the familiar one. Ideal consort singing.” (The Sunday Times) “As always with The Sixteen, we get superb tuning, balanced ensemble work and a lively pace.” (BBC Music Magazine)

'Sit back and relish this treasure trove which has clearly been prepared with passion.' Gramophone Choice 'a delightful performance.' BBC Music Magazine 'This is sound you could listen to all day, the kind that no matter how loud you play it, it never appears anything but natural. This is a first-rate job all the way around.' Classical Candor, USA The Sixteen and Associate Conductor, Eamonn Dougan, follow up the success of the first disc in their new Polish series with a new recording devoted to music from the court of Sigismund III Vasa. The second disc in the series explores a selection of fascinating music composed by the Italian maestri at the Polish Court of the 16th and early 17th centuries including works by Asprilio Pacelli (1570-1623), Vincenzo Bertolusi (c.1550-1608), and Giovanni Francesco Anerio (c.1567-1630) .

This new album release by the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Hannu Lintu presents a new contemporary voice within Finland’s contemporary music scene: Antti Auvinen. This album includes three recent orchestral works by the composer marked by highly pressurised and explosive rhythms and sounds.

The premieres of Antti Auvinen’s (b. 1974) Junker Twist (2015) and Himmel Punk (2016) in the mid-2010s electrified the scene of Finland’s contemporary music: music critics felt that a new major voice in the country’s music scene had been born. Auvinen’s works are often thematically connected to events in the surrounding society. Junker Twist (2015) deals with the topic of rising neo-Nazist ideologies, while Himmel Punk (2016) takes a stand against religious discrimination. The most extensive work of this album, Turbo Aria (2017/2018), is partially based on arias sung by Finnish sopranos a century ago. These ‘arias’ sung by Alma Fohström, Aino Ackté and Järnefelt and the sounds of the accompanying instruments are augmented by the crackles, pops, hisses and other mechanical noises made by the original discs. Yet the work also has a second underlying theme: the refugee crisis. Is this program music? Perhaps – but it does not matter, because the music is equally impressive with the narrative or without it. In 2016, Auvinen was awarded with the Teosto award, one of the biggest music awards in the Nordic countries.

REVIEW:

This release...offers an excellent musical programming concept, with all three works captured live in performances that are absolutely stunning and fully competitive with the best available. Both the Bartók and Martinů pieces were composed during their respective composers’ exile in America, while Gideon Klein’s Partita (an arrangement for string orchestra of his String Trio), is the result of “internal exile” in the Terezín concentration camp. All three men found ways to continue making music despite displacement, personal misfortune, and against the background of the rise of Nazism and the onset of war. More to the point, the program works because it offers plenty of purely musical contrast and variety.

Martinů’s Memorial to Lidice, a town wiped out by the Nazis as an act of retaliation for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, is a harrowing but ultimately hopeful orchestral elegy that receives the most gut-wrenching performance yet recorded. Eschenbach is about 50 percent slower than Ancerl (or anyone else), but he uses the extra time to excellent effect, revealing every luminous detail of Martinů’s orchestration and building the music to a shattering climax, with Beethoven’s Fifth balefully intoned by the horns. Klein’s Partita has much in common with Bartók’s Divertimento, with its folk-inflected thematic material. Its central movement is a very attractive set of variations on a Moravian theme, and it’s clear from this performance that the Philadelphia tradition of great string playing is very much alive and well. Eschenbach leads a performance both warm and incisive, revealing a major work in the process.

The Philadelphia Orchestra already has at least two recordings of Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra to its credit, both with Eugene Ormandy--a fine early stereo version on Sony, and a mediocre early digital remake on RCA. This newcomer clearly is finer than either of those, as exciting a rendition as any available. Eschenbach thankfully eschews the excessive slowness that has marred his recent Mahler performances and lets the various sections of the orchestra display their considerable prowess in what remains one of the repertoire’s great showpieces. Listen to the rush of excitement in the transition to the first-movement allegro, or to the beautiful balance between woodwinds and harps in the second subject; notice the brilliant brass fugato that initiates the recapitulation, and the driving coda. It’s the real deal, from the very first note.

The sonics are markedly superior to what Sony, RCA, and EMI used to get in any of the various venues that they used, at least in stereo. The microphones are close to the players, the better to reduce the occasional noise from the audience (the occasional light cough isn’t at all bothersome), but the orchestra can take the exposure, and the sonic impact is pretty thrilling. I’m pleased (and honestly relieved) to be able to recommend it to you in the strongest possible terms.

-- ClassicsToday.com (David Hurwitz)