The songs of Alice Tegner and Gustaf Nordqvist have been sung and loved by generations of Swedish people, particularly children. Tegner’s songs for children were published into a series which made its way into many schools and homes across Sweden. A lesser-known genre of the two composers is focused on in this new release: music for mixed choir. Both composers held important choral positions, Tegner composing for and leading a chapel choir, and Nordqvist enjoying a respected position in the capitol. Danderyds Vokalensemble was founded in 2008 with the purpose of attracting some of the best singers, and performing music from all eras. The ensemble has recorded several major works, ranging from early Renaissance music to contemporary composers.

With his Arctic Philharmonic Orchestra, Lindberg records Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony—one of the composer’s best-loved works.

Peter Tchaikovsky composed one of the most popular piano concertos in the repertory, but in solo recital programmes his name is rarely seen. Although little known, his solo piano music can nevertheless be surprisingly rewarding. It includes two large-scale sonatas, a youthful work in C-Sharp Minor, and the Grand Sonata in G major recorded here and a large number of mainly short pieces published either singly or as collections throughout the composer's life. This type of work was profitable for composer and publishers, and an indication of the relative commercial value comes from a letter in which Tchaikovsky offers his publisher the Grand Sonata for only 50 roubles, but asks 240 roubles for the twenty-four little pieces of his Children’s Album, Op. 39. A work of big, public gestures, the sonata is anything but childish and to a large extent Tchaikovsky keeps the lyrical ideas that came so naturally to him firmly under control.

In contrast, lyricism was given free rein two years earlier, in the twelve pieces that make up The Seasons. They were the result of a commission for a series of piano pieces to appear in a monthly St Petersburg journal. Some ten years after the serial publication in the journal the pieces appeared in print as a collection which has become Tchaikovsky’s best-known solo piano music. As with much of his work in this genre, the ultimate model is Schumann: January, for example, combines hints of Schumannesque Innigkeit with Tatiana’s music in Eugene Onegin. With the present recording Freddy Kempf, who made his acclaimed début recording with Schumann's Carnaval and has gone on to demonstrate his versatility in programmes taking in Bach as well as Liszt and Stravinsky, now adds Tchaikovsky to his discography.

In Ástor Piazzolla’s tango nuevo are all the ingredients of his life – his love from adolescence for Classical music, his fascination with jazz and improvisation and – naturally – the ever-present tango, instilled in him by his father, whom he would immortalize in one of his best-loved works, Adiós NoniNo. + Piazzolla’s life-long quest to rejuvenate the tango caused animosity and even threats from traditionalists in Argentina, and even among his sympathizers there were those who sometimes wondered if what they heard really was a tango. + Piazzolla himself never doubted, and musicians of all backgrounds and genres, from jazz (Gerry Mulligan, Gary Burton, Al Di Meola) and pop (Grace Jones) to classical (Gidon Kremer, Yo-Yo Ma) have agreed with him. + On the present recording, the trombonist Christian Lindberg has joined up with his long-time chamber music partner Roland Pöntinen and the young bandoneon player Jens Lundberg in a program that takes in their own arrangements of Piazzolla highlights. + Trio Tangophoria also selected some tango standards which featured in Piazzolla’s repertoire, as well as Christian Lindberg’s own homage to Piazzolla: Midvinter (‘Midwinter’), written for a concert project as a bridge between two of the master’s Four Seasons.

In the course of this highly original programme, Terje Tønnesen and his Camerata Nordica tell us tales of madness and love, of battles and delusions. Building on imaginative scores by Biber, Telemann and Purcell, Tønnesen himself and Mikhel Kerem has fashioned even more colorful arrangements that bring human follies and passions to the fore. In the course of the disc we are treated to rousing drum solos, a trio of Hungarian folk musicians makes a guest appearance in Biber's "joking sonata" and a Swedish nyckelharpa adds color to the plaintive Aria in Battalia, before the listener is telescoped into the famous battle scene itself. Featured soloist soprano Karin Dahlberg gives us memorable portraits of madness in three English "Mad Songs", and throughout the programme the members ofthe ensemble with equal conviction play their instruments, bay as a pack of hounds and groan as wounded musketeers. The result is a pageant fit for a street performance during a carnival - at turns absurd, burlesque, frightening and moving.