Composer Tristan Murail is without doubt one of the most significant figures in European contemporary music circles, known best perhaps for his being a close follower of Messiaen (his teacher was Jeanne Loriod) and one of the prime instigators of the field of spectral music. Murail says this: ‘Early on, every young composer is confronted with an already existing musical universe. Should he accept it, play according to established and consensual rules, or instead, try to stretch or even break away from them?” His answer is generally, to develop new soundworlds arising out of the old and to concentrate not on the serialism fashionable when he was young, but the essential musical sound, investigating new playing techniques and creating a genre practically his own. Marilyn Nonken’s recording of his complete piano music, issued in 2005, remains one of the regular best sellers in the Metier catalog. This new album reflects on his encounters with Schumann and culminates in his re-interpretation of Kinderszenen where his restrained arrangement stays close (but not too close) to the original – it is also a first class set of performances by a stunning cellist. Marie Ythier is a remarkably fine cellist for whom this is the 5th album. She plays repertoire form all periods, but is particularly interested in new music. She has collaborated with many leading composers, holds several teaching posts and has received numerous prizes. Her playing is assured and deft, equally at home in the Romantic and the avant-garde.

Many works by Camillo Schumann remained unpublished during his lifetime and today are housed in the Saxon State Archive – a fate very different from that of his elder brother Georg Schumann, whose oeuvre has experienced a selective, though continuous renaissance on the recording market during the past decades (e. g., on cpo). And yet Camillo Schumann’s oeuvre covers almost all the musical genres, and more than three hundred works by him have now been documented. The special qualities of Schumann’s compositional capabilities are present in fine fashion everywhere in his sonatas for clarinet and piano: careful, finely balanced architectonic structures with skillfully elaborated transitions between the individual movement sections, attractive dialogues between the voices, congenial use of the resources of the particular instruments, suspenseful intensifications, and neatly proportioned solutions and conclusions. The compositional tradition of Reinecke and Radecke in which Schumann grew up is continued practically without a break into the twentieth century. Along with his fourth sonata, his playful Serenade in F major in five movements for clarinet and piano was his last composition of more than one movement for these instruments. Here too he proves to be a composer who knows what he is doing and knows how to realize his ideas with the greatest technical expertise.

A Musical Zoo with Ashley Riches and Joseph Middleton is a veritable tour de force, featuring compositions spanning nearly 160 years, from Schubert’s ‘The Trout’ to Shostakovich’s ‘Once there lived a cockroach’ and four languages (German, French, Russian and English). A strong representation of the German Lieder tradition (Schubert, Schumann, Wolf, Brahms and Richard Strauss) is balanced by the French mélodie (Fauré, Ravel) and English lyricism (Ireland, Howells). We humans seem to have an endless fascination with the animal kingdom, and animals have proved an inspiration for artists, composers, and writers alike. This recital demonstrates what a rich seam this has proved for a diverse range of composers. Ashley Riches comments: ‘The text [of a song] may outline to us what we see. But the flutterings of Schubert’s Birds, the flicking antennae of Shostakovich’s Cockroach, the rush of notes with which Ravel’s Peacock spreads its tail – these are movements and energies accessible to music alone.’

Throughout history men have feared madwomen, burning them as witches, confining them in asylums and subjecting them to psychoanalysis – yet, they have also been fascinated, unable to resist fantasizing about them. For their new release, Carolyn Sampson and Joseph Middleton have created a programme that explores the responses of a variety of composers to women whose stories have left them vulnerable and exposed. As a motto they have chosen an aphorism by Nietzsche: ‘There is always some madness in love, but there is also always some reason in madness.’ Brahms’ Ophelia Songs, composed for a stage production of Hamlet, appear next to those by Richard Strauss and Chausson, while Ophelia's death is described by both Schumann (in Herzeleid) and Saint-Saëns. Goethe’s mysterious and traumatized Mignon appears in settings by Hugo Wolf as well as Duparc, while his ill-used Gretchen grieves by her spinning-wheel in Schubert's matchless setting. Sadness and madness tip into witchery and unbridled eroticism with Pierre Louÿs's poems about Bilitis, set by Kœchlin and Debussy. Sampson and Middleton end their recital as it began, with a suicide by drowning: in Poulenc’s monologue La Dame de Monte-Carlo, the elderly female protagonist has been unlucky at the gambling tables and decides to throw herself into the sea.

“Schumann soaked into my life not too fast. It might have been the over intertwining of inner voices…it might have been the broad spectrum of his emotions that needed time to mature and grow within myself….. I did not fall in love with him at first sight as I did with Chopin. Processing his music at times felt heavy. It was like a map in which I had to discover the evolvement of my own searching. The inner struggles, the layers of his wandering spirit embedded in his music either subtle or obvious way (with his own marking) brought me deeper into the cave of my own inner world. To understand him and to ultimately empathize with him required integrity and effort. Nevertheless, contrary to this weight, the duality of Florestan and Eusebius and many between them lift off the certain seriousness in my approach to his music. His music evokes the lightness of the existence. Perhaps the distance which enabled him to observe the alter egos within himself is the humor to his music. I learned to love him in time more than any other composers, most firmly, closely and freely to my heart.“ (Klara Min)

Played on historical instruments, alongside Schumann's "Adagio and Allegro", there are first recordings by unknown romantic composers from a collection of A. E. Fischer Verlag, Bremen, which was lost in World War II. The varied program transports the audience to the German salons of the late 19th century. With short preludes, the piano creates smooth transitions to the valve and natural horn repertoire. The beautifully designed, informative booklet with many illustrations provides insights into the flourishing music world of Bremen at the time, researched in terms of music history.

Wife of Robert Schumann, Clara Wieck Schumann was a great piano virtuoso. She also was a wonderful composer of piano works. Korean-born pianist Junghwa Lee brings these works to life with vital performances. Junghwa Lee performs actively in solo recitals, chamber concerts and lecture recitals, and has frequently appeared in concerto performances as a soloist including those with the Korean Symphony Orchestra, Salina Symphony Orchestra, Hutchinson Symphony Orchestra and Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra among others. Lee has presented solo performances in Korea, Holland, France, Hungary, Romania, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Chile, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, China, the United Kingdom and the United States, including appearances at the Arts Center Concert Series at National Chiao Tung University in Taiwan, Shenyang Music Cultural Exchange Exhibition Between China and Foreign Countries Festival in China, Beethoven 32 Sonatas Recital Series in Singapore, the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series at the Chicago Cultural Center and her New York debut recital at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall as a winner of Artists International’s Special Presentation Award.

All of the works gathered on this album have - as different as they may be - one thing in common: they can be heard in the popular and idealized folk tone popular in the Romantic period. Whether Schumann's Fantasiestücke or Schubert's Arpeggione Sonata, all of these pieces catch the ear quickly, stir deep emotions and yet are complexly composed works that place the highest demands on cello and piano. Born in Freiburg, Germany, into a musical family, Tatjana Uhde took her first cello lessons at the age of 6, with her mother Sanja Uhde Mitrovic. She later went on to study with Martin Ostertag (Hochschule für Musik, Karlsruhe), Philippe Muller (Conservatoire national supérieur de Paris), and Antonio Meneses (Hochschule der Künste Bern). Since 2008 Uhde has been Associate Principal Cellist at the Paris National Opera. She is also a member of the Festspielorchestra in Bayreuth. A sense of sound, virtuosity, stage presence and a special feeling for an interesting selection of programs characterize the pianist Lisa Wellisch. Her particular concern is to facilitate access to classical music for a diverse audience through exciting music education - without compromising on the always demanding selection of works. She especially likes to give lecture recitals and in 2009 founded the concert series “Klassik im Sigma Zentrum” Bad Säckingen, which makes an important cultural contribution to the region with 10 top-class concerts a year, moderated by the artists.

“It has been almost 50 years since I met Yo-Yo in the cafeteria at the Juilliard School… We became friends very quickly and a couple of years later played a benefit concert for a children’s orchestra... I believe that in the life and career of a musician, luck plays an enormous role. The great piece of luck in my musical life has been my partnership with Yo-Yo. I learned most of the standard cello repertoire with him, but through our work together I also learned an enormous amount about all the other music that I was playing – and about sharing my love of music with audiences. Our approaches to learning a new work together started at opposite ends quite often. Yo-Yo always saw the big picture, he thought first about the emotional impact. I often started by asking why the third eighth note in bar 2 had a dot, and the fourth one didn’t. Gradually, we met in the middle. For me, it was revelatory to work in his way, and I hope I did not annoy him too much with my persnickety questions!

"Our first recordings were the Beethoven Sonatas. We had played them in concert a number of times and thought that we could do a creditable performance on disc. I remember so well the thrill of seeing those LP covers; the pianist is now a white-haired old gentleman, and the cellist looks as young as ever! I am a great lover of Russian music, but never felt that I could play it properly. The albums of Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff and Prokofiev are very special to me as they represent my attempts at music that I adore… When I look at the list of recordings that Yo-Yo and I have done together I feel enormously privileged to have shared in the journey of this unique artist. It was happenstance and great good fortune that gave me this gift, and I am grateful beyond measure for the time we have had together. I hope there are still some years left for me to keep learning from him, and that we continue to have fun exploring together.” (Emanuel Ax)