In succession to the Tudors, the flourishing court culture of the Stuart royal dynasty fostered one of the greatest periods in the history of British music. Director and organist Andrew Arthur unites his forces in this compelling program of works by three composers who flourished in the Jacobean period – Orlando Gibbons, Thomas Weelkes and Thomas Tomkins – around the theme of the Word of God. The choral items on this album exemplify a rhetorically-aware sense of what it means to sound the Word enriched with music in order to teach, move and delight.

The decades around 1600 bore witness to the flourishing of a remarkable musical tradition: the art of diminution, in which simple melodies were given exquisitely virtuosic embellishments, effectively creating new works. One such creation, Francesco Rognoni’s ornamentation of Palestrina’s Io son ferito, was captioned ‘con arte e maestria’ – with art and mastery – referring to the consummate craftsmanship displayed in its invention and performance. Giving new life to this tradition was the inspiration for this unique programme: alongside iconic works from the diminution canon, Monteverdi String Band members Oliver Webber and Steven Devine present newly ornamented versions of a selection of sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century works.

Choral music has always played a significant and central role at Belfast Cathedral, since its consecration in 1904. This strong choral tradition continues to this day with the recently formed all-adult, fully professional vocal ensemble. This ‘new’ cathedral choir brings together some of the finest singers in Northern Ireland who lead the liturgy and worship of Belfast Cathedral and are featured here in their debut album for Resonus Classics. Featuring a varied program of seasonal carols from composers including Elizabeth Poston, John Rutter and Philip Ledger, this album celebrates Christmas from Northern Ireland’s national cathedral.

Missouri-based choir Kantorei of Kansas City and their director Chris Munce return to Resonus Classics with a sparkling recording of carols and motets for Christmas. With a compelling programme of Renaissance and contemporary works for the festive season that presents the Christmas story and the journey to Bethlehem, including a number of world premiere recording. Kantorei explores rarely heard works by Renaissance composers such as Giovanni Bassano, Melchior Vulpius, Jakob Reiner and Blasius Amon combined with contemporary composers including Matthew Culloton, Ivo Antognini, R. Douglas Helvering and Kim André Arnesen among others.

The Gentlemen of HM Chapel Royal, Hampton Court Palace and their director Carl Jackson make their Resonus Classics debut with this album of works for lower voices by Thomas Tallis – himself a Gentleman of the Tudor Chapel Royal serving under four monarchs. Recorded in the impressive surroundings of the Chapel Royal where the choir are resident, this first release with the ensemble presents works for four and seven voices including a reconstruction of Tallis’s Missa Puer natus est nobis based on chant for Christmas Day, and the sumptuous Suscipe quaeso Domine. The Gentlemen of HM Chapel Royal, Hampton Court Palace sing services throughout the year in the palace’s splendid Chapel Royal, whose ceiling was installed by Henry VIII in the 1530s. There they are joined by up to eighteen boy choristers, who are drawn from schools nearby and led by Carl Jackson, Director of Music. Just as in the sixteenth century, the choir’s personnel is adapted dynamically to the occasion and the demands of the repertory. In ordinary times, there are six Gentlemen and for special occasions the ensemble can expand to as many as fourteen singers.

Recorded in the inspirational surroundings of The Cobbe Collection of early keyboard instruments in England’s Hatchlands Park, the celebrated early keyboardist Menno van Delft makes his Resonus solo debut with J.S. Bach’s six keyboard Partitas – the first part of Bach’s Clavier-Übung series of keyboard works. Using an original 1784 instrument by Christian Gotthelf Hoffmann (one of only two remaining clavichords from this maker), van Delft makes the case for performing these works on Bach’s most favored keyboard instrument. Born in 1963 in Amsterdam, Menno van Delft studied harpsichord, organ, and musicology at the Sweelinck Conservatory in The Hague and the University of Utrecht. Amongst his professors were Anneke Uittenbosch and Gustav Leonhardt. In 1988 Menno van Delft won the clavichord prize at the C. Ph. E. Bach Competition in Hamburg and subsequently made his debut at the Holland Festival Early Music Utrecht. He teaches harpsichord, clavichord and basso continuo at the Conservatory of Amsterdam and the Hochschule fur Musik und Theater in Hamburg.

The cembalo-obbligato sonata reached its zenith in the middle decades of the eighteenth century; thought to date from the last fifteen years of J.S. Bach’s life, the composer was a pioneer of this compelling form, and for the soloistic role of the harpsichord in ensemble music. Critically acclaimed Amsterdam-based viola da gamba player Robert Smith joins with the celebrated Italian harpsichordist Francesco Corti to present a new recording of four prime examples of this genre, Bach’s three Sonatas for viola da gamba and harpsichord along with a sonata by his close contemporary Christopher Schaffrath. Completing the album is a new work by Robert Smith – based on Henry Purcell’s Dido’s Lament this innovative new work for the instrument absorbs broad influences from both the eighteenth century and the heavy-metal band Metallica.

For over 100 years the only opera by a woman to have been performed at the Metropolitan Opera, Der Wald is a taut, brooding drama where the simplicity of village life comes under threat from the uncontrollable desires unleashed by the darkness of the forest. Richly orchestrated, harmonically daring, and demanding a huge expressive range from the cast, the narrative drives relentlessly forward from wedding to tragedy in a single act, observed pitilessly by the eternal spirits of the forest. John Andrews conducts the BBC Singers, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and an international cast in the first ever recording of this work, using Smyth’s English version of the libretto.

The harpsichord concertos of J.S. Bach form the origins of the keyboard concerto genre that was to continue to flourish through the music of his sons, C.P.E. Bach and J.C. Bach, and onwards. Here, celebrated keyboardist Steven Devine is joined by members of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in this recording that features the Concerto in D minor, BWV 1052, Concerto in A major BWV 1055, and the Concerto in D major BWV1054, together with a new reconstruction by Steven Devine of the Concerto in D minor BWV 1059.

In their debut album, the Sakuntala Trio presents the world premiere recording of Franz Schubert’s String Trio in B-flat major, D.471, in this innovative and compelling completion by Professor Brian Newbould. Of this first trio, only the first movement and the beginning of the slow movement, were penned by Schubert, before he abandoned the work, leaving a gem of a fragment. The album also features the second version of Schubert’s String Trio in B-flat major, D.581, together with a selection of Peter Warlock’s transcriptions of Henry Purcell’s Three-Part Fantasias.