You may Start in "Soulsville USA", but you'll end in the "Land of 1000 Dances" with this collection from the great, the "Wicked" Wilson Pickett. It includes instantly recognizable hits like "Mustang Sally" and "In The Midnight Hour" alongside covers that Pickett has made all his own like "Engine #9" and The Beatles "Hey Jude." Vinyl LP pressing.

There is terrific atmosphere to this marvelous seasonal celebration of Praetorius works.

The Sony Vivarte box is a marvellous seasonal celebration heard through the works of the too-neglected German composer Michael Praetorius.

His polychoral ‘In dulci jubilo’ is magnificent here, and his astonishing variety takes us from the showy, echoing duets of ‘Ach mein Herre’ to the tender reverence of ‘Verleih uns Frieden’. Just occasionally the singers are overwhelmed by the busy instruments and by the acoustic (as in ‘Gelobt seist du’), but there is a terrific atmosphere to these performances.

-- Anthony Pryer, BBC Music Magazine

Inspired by the fiftieth anniversary of Superman' first appearance in the comics, Metropolis Symphony has been performed by orchestras all over the world. Hailed by the London Times as a "Symphonie Fantastique for our times."

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. The vocal texts are printed in Latin and Japanese.***

Also available on Blu-ray

Adam’s Passion is the moving first collaboration between two “masters of slow motion who harmonize perfectly with each other” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). In the spectacular setting of a former submarine factory, American director and universal artist Robert Wilson creates a poetic visual world in which the mystical musical language of the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt can cast its meditative spell. Three of Pärt’s major works – Adam’s Lament, Tabula rasa, and Miserere, as well as Sequentia, a new work composed especially for this production – are brought together here using light, space, and movement to create a tightly-woven Gesamtkunstwerk in which the artistic visions of these two great artists mirror each other.

Arvo Pärt
ADAM’S PASSION

Lucinda Childs
Michael Theophanous
Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir
Tallinn Chamber Orchestra
Tõnu Kaljuste, conductor

Robert Wilson, stage director, set and lighting designer

Recorded from Noblessner Foundry, Tallinn, 12 May 2015

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / Dolby Digital 5.1 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: Latin, Russian (orig. sung languages), German, English, French, Korean, Japanese
Running time: 94 mins
No. of DVDs: 1 (DVD 9)

Poet Laurence Binyon is known today for one famous verse from "For the Fallen," the complete poem being the most substantial part of Elgar's the Spirit of England and the other two poems being "The Fourth of August" and "To Women." with this important new release SOMM commemorates World War I, and the courage and patriotism of those who fell defending England. The war inspired Elgar to write some of his most moving pages of music, which he dedicated "To the memory of our glorious men." the Philharmonia Orchestra, under the baton of John Wilson, and the London Symphony Chorus, under the direction of Simon Halsey, bring these pages to life in the most inspiring way. Another "plus" is the premiere recording of Elgar's Complete Incidental Music to Binyon's Play Arthur, edited and conducted here by Ben Palmer and his Orchestra of St Paul's.

2015 album from the R&B veteran and former Gap Band member. Wilson has received seven Grammy nominations and multiple awards throughout his career; he was named Billboard magazine's # 1 Adult R&B Artist and has had eight # 1 records that topped the Billboard Urban Adult Contemporary radio chart. Last year, Wilson received a Grammy nomination for the song "If I Believe" in the gospel category; he was also an NAACP Outstanding Album Award winner for the album LOVE, CHARLIE. Plus, BET presented to Wilson a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013.

Cassandra Wilson's stunning third album, now available on vinyl! On Blue Skies, Cassandra moves into the arena of jazz standards with fluid ease, never failing to put her own stamp on these classic tunes. 180-gram vinyl, analogue recording, analogue remastered, folie-cutting. CD release topped Billboard's Jazz Album Chart at #1 back in 1988!

Classical Music

Learning by doing: In the eighties Stefan Winter volunteered for a record company to learn autodidactically the profession as music producer. At the time a demo tape of the young Steve Coleman arrived, nobody showed any interest. During Stefan Winter's first stay in New York City (1984) he jumped at the opportunity and offered Steve Coleman a record deal. This was the hour of birth of the debut recording with the core musicians of the later named "M-Base Collective" and at the same time of the label JMT (Jazz Music Today). Right after the first record Winter started working with Greg Osby, Cassandra Wilson, Robin Eubanks, Gary Thomas, Gery Allen and many others like Kelvin Bell, Kevin Bruce Harris, Marvin "Smitty" Smith and Terri Lyne Carrington. It is historical certainty that these works were recorded mainly in the eighties, but as a listener one can hardly believe it. Each album offers a new inspiring approach to making music which is still characteristic today. Listen to the "M-Base" not to rest on tradition, but to see these artists experience as a sound basis for the future. This compilation is the second release in the Winter & Winter Jubilee Edition, celebrating the labels' 30th anniversary.

MONTEVERDI: SELVA MORALE E SPI

John Wilson and his Sinfonia of London shine in an all-Korngold programme full of wit, romanticism, sensitivity, and virtuosity – an orchestral tour de force! Conductor John Wilson has earned a reputation for his interpretations of British and American repertoire in particular. He is a favourite of many of the UK’s orchestras and festivals including the BBC Proms and Aldeburgh Festival and is currently Associate Guest Conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. John is also in demand across the world at the very highest level, conducting the major orchestras of Sydney, Berlin, Budapest, Amsterdam, Oslo amongst many others, and has a large and growing discography, covering a wide range of repertoire.

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REVIEW:

Wilson's performance of the symphony is one of the most athletic on record. Rhythms are springy and purposeful; the great Adagio really strives, as well as sings, and I’ve rarely heard it probe deeper. Every phrase speaks; textures are translucent and detailed (even at the dizzying speed of the Scherzo), and the string sound glows from within, with portamento very much at the service of expression. Wilson clearly sees Korngold’s Symphony (rightly) as part of the Viennese classical tradition. The result is both gripping and sincerely moving.

– Gramophone

Bennett had a gift for human relationships – family, partners, friends, and fellow artists. Occasionally, his personal loyalty could become an obstacle to his creativity but overwhelmingly, his relationships were an inspiration. Each of the four works recorded here has connections to a significant individual in his life. The composition of his First Symphony coincided with the arrival in his life of Dan Klein, who would become his long-term partner. Zodiac is dedicated to the composer Elisabeth Lutyens, whose music and personality Bennett cherished throughout his life, despite her often caustic manner. A History of the Thé Dansant sets poems by his older sister, the poet Meg Peacocke, and doubles as a perceptive but unsentimental memoir of their long-dead parents. And Reflections on a Sixteenth Century Tune is dedicated to the conductor John Wilson, with whom Bennett shared a musical connection that deepened into a true and lasting friendship.

The recent partnership of John Wilson and BBC SSO on record reaches this second volume in their invigorating exploration of fascinating orchestral works by Sir Richard Rodney Bennett. Less well known than his widely famous film music (Murder on the Orient Express, Four Weddings and a Funeral, etc.), the orchestral works featured here display the versatility with which Bennett contradicted the dogma of musical modernism at the time of their creation (60s-70s), as well as an evolution of his compositional style towards a musical language that spoke to audiences everywhere in the world. From the glittering Symphony No. 2 – generating subtle yet engaging musical contrasts on a large scale – to the jazzy Concerto for Stan Getz – featuring the saxophonist Howard McGill who has established himself as one of the greats of London’s jazz scene – this album features works that break down the false walls between two musical worlds and will appeal to anyone willing to explore, discover, or simply enjoy great music.

John Wilson’s first album in a series of recordings of the orchestral works of Eric Coates, using his own definitive editions of the scores. includes the suites The Jester at the Wedding and London, and the miniature overture The Merrymakers. Infectiously idiomatic playing from the BBC Philharmonic! Eric Coates was born on August 27th, 1886, at Hucknall. Coates showed an interest in music at an early age, studying first the violin and then the viola with George Ellenberger, a pupil of Joachim, and harmony with Dr Ralph Horner in Nottingham. At the age of twenty he arrived in London determined to make a career in music despite some family misgivings. He won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music where he studied viola with Lionel Tertis and composition with Frederick Corder. Eventually, in 1919, when neuritis in his left hand made playing the viola more and more difficult, Eric Coates turned exclusively to composition. Eric Coates' work is in the tradition of polished melodic light music started by Sir Arthur Sullivan and continued by Edward German.

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REVIEWS:

Wilson is relishing every second of the music. The BBC Phil is in great nick, and Stephen Rinker’s engineering brings sound of clarity and fidelity, every detail, dynamic, and subtlety captured perfectly.

– ClassicalSource.com

Volume 1 implies we are to get more like this and they can’t come soon enough. Eric Coates is surprisingly undervalued, even with the resurgence of interest in light music. There are some very familiar pieces here – The Merrymakers, By a Sleepy Lagoon, London Suite – alongside the ballet The Jester at the Wedding and two symphonic rhapsodies. All engaging and here splendidly played by the BBC Phil under one of the real champions of light music, John Wilson.

– Lark Reviews

The exploration by John Wilson of Copland’s major orchestral output with the BBC Philharmonic has now reached Volume 3, with this invigorating programme recorded in surround-sound. It opens with An Outdoor Overture, a cheerful and breezy piece which Copland composed in 1938, intending to spearhead an initiative encouraging ‘American Music for American Youth’. Originally written for organ and orchestra, the First Symphony is presented here in its revised version (1926-28) for large orchestra. The six concise movements of Statements (1932-35) introduce a new style, their gritty soundscapes being stunning examples of what Copland later would refer to as ‘hard-bitten’ pieces. The concluding work is the expressive, fantastical Dance Symphony (1929) which explores different styles of symphonic movements, its dark aura a residue of its origin as a ballet on a grotesque vampire theme, composed 1922-25 and named Grohg. The symphony has remained a highly controversial piece ever since.

Andrew Litton’s recent recording of Copland’s Billy the Kid and Rodeo with the Colorado Symphony (BIS, 1/16) was notable for offering the rarely performed complete versions of the ballets. John Wilson, in the first in a series of Copland’s orchestral music for Chandos, opts for the slightly shorter suites as well as that of Appalachian Spring. In doing so, Wilson comes into direct competition with Tilson Thomas and Bernstein, not to mention the composer himself. However, none of these recordings, not even BIS’s excellent multi-channel production for Litton, matches the spaciousness, transparency, and weight of the sound on the new Chandos disc. It’s the finest-sounding recording to have come my way for some time.

REVIEW:

Wilson’s performances are similarly impressive, and he secures superb playing from the BBC Philharmonic. The three ballets receive strongly characterized interpretations, as piquant and affecting in the slower passages as they are punchy and ebullient in the faster ones. The poignancy and rapture of the quieter episodes of Appalachian Spring are also strongly conveyed. I enjoyed listening to this disc enormously.

– Gramophone

The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and its Associate Guest Conductor John Wilson record for the first time together on Chandos, embarking on a new series devoted to the brilliant orchestral works of Sir Richard Rodney Benentt. While internationally famous for his dances, jazz creations, and film and TV scores, Bennett wrote sumptuous works of ‘concert music’ as he called it. This first volume reveals him as one fo the most brilliant natural talents to emerge in post-war British music. Influenced by both the American Songbook and his teacher Pierre Boulez, he also always strove to place melody- and emotional honesty- at the center of his music. These traits are coupled in the epic Marimba Concerto, an innovative piece for the composer, moving from a colorful and lyrical first movement to highly virtuosic passages and strikingly athletic cadenzas. The demanding solo part is tackled here by the multi-award winning Colin Currie, nowadays seen as the world’s finest and most daring percussionist, as well as a champion of contemporary music.

A documentary by Günter Atteln

with
Sofia Gubaidulina
Paul Hillier
Gidon Kremer

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / Dolby Digital 5.1 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: German, English, French, Korean, Japanese
Running time: 56 mins
No. of DVDs: 1 (DVD 9)

"The Woman without a Shadow" by Richard Strauss was just the ticket for Music Director Sebastian Weigle at the Frankfurt Opera, so it is quite appropriate to make available this opera on CD. Strauss specialist Weigle has brought together excellent singers and musicians for the stage debut, including Terje Stensvold in this 2014 Frankfurt Opera series. - Oehmas, (Translated from German text.)

FROSTY THE SNOWMAN - Winter Songs for the Christmas Season

CORELLI Violin Sonatas, op. 5: No. 7 in d; No. 8 in e; No. 9 in A; No. 10 in F; No. 11 in E; No. 12 in d, “La follia” • François Fernandez (vn); Glen Wilson (hpd) (period instruments) • NAXOS 8.557799 (62:53)


François Fernandez and Glen Wilson’s readings of the last six sonatas of Corelli’s op. 5 make up the second of a two-disc set (the first issued by Naxos as 8.557165). Harpsichordist Glen Wilson has provided the notes, in which he discusses the style of ornamentation, the use of harpsichord alone in realizing the figured bass, and the choice of A=400 (at which pitch Fernandez’s 1690 Andrea Guarneri violin, hardly so viola-like as might be expected, retains a surprising edge—of course, Corelli, like many of his contemporaries, avoided more than occasional use of the G string, supposedly because the bulkier string responded more sluggishly, so the higher tessitura doesn’t focus so intently on the instrument’s lower registers). Corelli’s sonatas influenced not only his contemporaries and immediate followers, but generations to come, and Fernandez and Wilson’s performances should make them equally impressive to modern listeners as well—not because of modern instruments or reliance on astringent timbres, but simply because they make these works breathe with a similar vital force as they must have exhibited in their own time. Even in these sonatas da camera the bass counterpoint should hold the most hidebound polyphonist’s attention, yet the melodies flow liquidly in the slow movements and they leap with sprightly, though controlled, energy in the fast ones. In the Ninth Sonata, Fernandez plays, on repeats, the ornaments provided by Corelli’s student, Geminiani, available in Hawkins’s History of Music (elsewhere, they try to remain true to the spirit of models that Roger claimed Corelli himself provided. Geminiani’s “ornaments,” as Wilson notes, amount almost to recomposition—heavy handed ones, in fact, some might think, in the spirit of Geminiani’s reworkings of Corelli’s solo sonatas as concerti grossi). Throughout, Wilson and Fernandez tease the textures of these works—which could alternatively be played with a noble (deadly?) restraint as inviolable masterpieces—with textural highlights, strong underscoring of the signature sequential passages, and zesty tempos. In Fernandez and Wilson’s performance, the famous “Follia” blends a somewhat melancholy dignity with the noted technical brilliance that made it a model for virtuosic showpieces through the generations. In this joie de vivre the duo seems to be having a thumpingly good time, as did Andrew Manze in so many pieces. Yet, with Corelli’s sonatas, Manze (Harmonia Mundi 907298, 26:5), with period instruments, wove sensitive, seductive fantasies. In 20:3, I reviewed John Holloway’s more abruptly rhetorical set, on period instruments (Novalis 150-128). And I also like Elizabeth Wallfisch’s set with the Locatelli Trio on Hyperion 66391, which Nils Anderson reviewed in 14:4.


Although Fernandez draws a somewhat reedy, acerbic sound from his violin, sound never seems an end in itself, nor does he rely upon it as a means to any other kind of end than a purely musical one. The engineers have balanced the harpsichord and violin almost perfectly; the ambiance remains clear and light. These performances constitute both an irrefutable argument for Corelli’s predominance and an irresistible introduction to his œuvre . In the last analysis, the choice between Manze, Holloway, and Fernandez depends more on the listener’s aesthetic predilections rather than on any superior merit. They are all authoritative in their very different ways. Fernandez belongs in this august company. Urgently recommended.


FANFARE: Robert Maxham

Includes work(s) for hpsch by Louis Couperin. Soloist: Glen Wilson.

Classical Music

Classical Music