On the occasion of the bi-centenary of Charles Gounod’s birth, this first complete string quartet (including two unpublished ones) on period instruments reveals an unknown part of his production, dominated by vocal music.Composer of the very end of the 19th century, Gounod and his five quartets are the worthy heir of the Viennese classicism tradition. The lyrical accents of the Quartet in G minor or the airy lightness of the Scherzo of the Petit Quatuor evoke nothing less than the names of Schubert and Mendelssohn.The musicians of the Quatuor Cambini-Paris (Julien Chauvin, Karine Crocquenoy, Pierre-Éric Nimylowycz and Atsushi Sakaï) gracefully reproduce these pages, full of gravity and sweetness.

The most famous tenor celebrates not only his 60th birthday, but also 40 years of an exceptionally rich and varied, and remarkably generous career. A career spent off the beaten track, constantly regenerated, and showing an insatiable curiosity, a temperament, and an extraordinary vocal timbre. Roberto Alagna captivates audiences everywhere. Here he presents a program that is very much in his own image: showing a contagious passion, an insatiable appetite for the exploration of different repertoires and styles, ranging from opera - French, Italian and Neapolitan, German, Polish and Russian - to Italian and French songs, and crossover music with some surprises up his sleeve.

Cage and Dowland: the two Johns, four hundred years apart, share a common taste for sober expression, concise forms and intimate realization - and for the pleasure that comes from words as such. Each cultivates this desire in his own way. Cage, like a tightrope walker, approaches the essence of musical thought with humor, lightness, and depth, and Dowland aims for the expression of feelings in their purest form. Cultivating as always a fertile anachronism, the Th�l�me ensemble brings together the complete works for two voices and lute by Dowland, several compositions by Cage, and world-renowned artist Sting offers a reworking of his hit song, "Shape of My Heart", which in this new arrangement becomes a kind of 21st-century lute song, coming full circle on an album where Renaissance and present meet, mingle, and merge to transcend the boundaries of aesthetics and genres.

Cyrille Dubois is unstoppable: after two albums dedicated to Liszt and the Boulanger sisters, both acclaimed by the critics, and a flamboyant complete set of Faur� songs, the tenor is back to his preferred repertoire, the French art-song. He reunites with his accomplice, pianist Tristan Ra�s, to bring the Bordeaux composer Louis Beydts (1895-1953) out of oblivion, as most of his pieces are recorded here for the first time. From these miniatures, Cyrille Dubois draws the sap of the musician's art. A pure product of French hedonism, it is refined and elegant, with a generous vocality but also daring, for Beydts forbids himself nothing. Echoes of jazz and light music, of Hahn or Faur�, polymodality and polytonality, his melodies traverse everything between fantasy, humor and contemplation with supreme freedom. By transporting us into this singular universe, Cyrille Dubois establishes himself as an invaluable performer of the repertoire and a pioneer of French music, with an uncommon mastery of the combination of word and music.

FALCON