Aurelio Bonelli's life is shrouded in mystery and today little remains of his creative output. The set features works from the collection Il primo libro de ricercari et canzoni a quattro voci of which only two copies remain. An artist by day it's thought he learnt painting from Agostino Carracci, a key figure of the Bologna School. They worked together on the frescos of Bologna's Olivetan monastery of San Michele in Bosco and in approximately 1611 Bonelli was appointed monastery organist. The set opens with eight four-part Ricercari. This gives a fascinating insight into how the Italian ricercar evolved from simply a vessel for compositional experimentation with few formal structures, to a defined style governed by rules, eventually making it the keyboard equivalent of the liturgical vocal motet. Bonelli's ricercari can be placed in the middle of this transition period. Ricercar del Secondo Tuono and Ricercar del Quinto Tuono for example have identifiable forms but irregularities occur with the introduction of new stylistic and formal elements at the end of the second section which contradict received ideas about the tripartite form. Classical themes are reflected in the eight four-part canzoni where names are drawn from mythology and epics: 'Licori', 'Arete', 'Urania', 'Istrina', 'Nisa', 'Irene', 'Artemisia' and 'Erina'. Again, we hear the conflict between experimentation and modern rules, and the pieces all feature four or five different themes and regularly change metres. This gives the impression there are as many as four or five different parts while only 'Urania' strictly follows the ternary structure. Federico Del Sordo plays the organ of the Abbey of San Magno. Dating from the 1600s, it is the oldest organ with surviving double pedals, allowing works written for two organs to be performed. The artist also plays a harpsichord strung with iron wire rather than brass to replicate the sound of the period. This release is a rare find and offers us a comprehensive overview of Bonelli, and his repertoire provides a detailed snapshot of the era's musical progression.

One of the most well-known musicians of French jazz, Claude Bolling worked with jazz greats like Duke Ellington and Liza Minelli, and composed the music for more than 100 films.; Bolling was one of the first “crossover” composers. In addition to his work in the jazz scene, he also collaborated with classical musicians.; The perfect fusion of classical, jazz, blues, and Latin music, Bolling’s most famous piece is the Concerto for Classical Guitar and Jazz Piano Trio, which is performed on this recording by guitarist Duilio Meucci and the Claude Quartet.; Alongside the Concerto is Bolling’s Sonate pour guitar.

BOHEMIAN SONGS

One of the most emotional liturgical works, the Stabat Mater meditates on the suffering of Mary the mother of Jesus during the crucifixion. The Stabat Mater by Boccherini, featured on this new release, was composed for solo soprano and string ensemble, one of the most intimate settings for this text. A specialist in Baroque repertoire, soprano Francesca Boncompagni performs here alongside the Ensemble Symposium, which performs on original instruments.

As a teacher of theory and composition at the Milan Conservatory in Rome, Bruno Bettinelli (1913-2004) had a decisive influence on the careers of Claudio Abbado, Riccardo Chailly, Riccardo Muti and Maurizio Pollini. At least outside his native Italy, his work as a teacher has overshadowed his own music, which is now being recognised as the output of a distinctive voice in the generation between Luigi Dallapiccola and modernist pioneers such as Luigi Nono. Like his chamber music, however, Bettinelli's piano music also reveals a debt to the instrumental composers at the turn of the last century who worked against the grain in this land of lyric and song: men such as Casella, Malipiero and Ghedini, all of them represented on Brilliant Classics with important revivals of chamber and piano music. Bettinelli deserves his place alongside them, as a first listen to the bold Fantasia will make clear. Composed in 1955, the five sections of the Fantasia make free use of tonality in the context of post- Romantic writing for the piano that presents a challenge to the most accomplished technique; one which Chiara Cipelli overcomes with flying colours. The most ambitious work on the album, the Fantasia is preceded by the more picaresque charms of a three-movement Suite agreste and followed by two contrasting collections of miniatures, the 18 Easy Pieces from 1941 - owing something to neoclassical Hindemith - and the 10 exquisite fragments which make up Sintesi. Written in 1970, Sintesi distils Bettinelli's own adoption of atonal technique to it's most poetic essence. Chiara Cipelli is herself active as a teacher, as a professor of piano in Cremona and Reggio Emilia, but also maintains a busy performing career, with concerts across Europe and the US and a repertoire that places emphasis on the music of our time.

BERIO: CORO

This 6 CD set contains a wealth of chamber music and songs. Bohemian composer Georg Benda achieved great fame in his time but is little remembered today, hence ripe for rediscovery. The booklet contains detailed notes, biographies and a full track list. The song texts are available via the Brilliant Classics website.

This new recording presents two iconic violin sonatas in an arrangement for cello and piano. Beethoven’s Kreutzer Sonata and Franck’s Violin Sonata are two undisputed masterpieces of the violin repertoire. Their power of structure, expression and imagination transcends their mere instrumental restrictions, and their human message stands above the musical matter. The arrangement for cello and piano sheds a new light on the music, enriching and enhancing its dark and dramatic atmosphere, while giving a new dimension to their lyrical and ethereal sections. The Beethoven arrangement is by the famous 19th century cellist Franchomme (also dedicatee of Chopin’s cello sonata), the Franck arrangement is by Jules Delsart, with permission of Franck himself. Roberto Trainini and Cristiano Burato, who have already successfully recorded Martucci’s cello sonatas, provide here beautiful and heartfelt performances.

In these two string trios may be heard the voice of the young Beethoven at its most personal and polished. They were composed just before and just after his critical move from Bonn to Vienna, where he proceeded to establish himself in the wake of Haydn and Mozart. Both composers cast their own contrarian shadows over Beethoven’s trios. Beethoven adopted both the form and tonality of Mozart’s sublime E flat Trio-Divertimento for his first essay in the genre, and yet otherwise went out of his way to distance his own work from its apparent exemplar. The accentuation of weak beats in the first Minuet is typical of Beethoven’s headstrong manner, even if the second is more Mozartian. Elsewhere the young man reveals himself quite capable of inhabiting an idiom of Viennese grace and courtly charm, but equally likely to subvert and rebel against it. From a couple of years later, the Serenade also opens in bold and striking fashion, with a Spanish-accented march, but the peaceful Andante and solemn, French-style Adagio follow older models deriving from Baroque-era trio sonatas. Most unusual – at least in 1795 – is the fifth-movement Polonaise, linking the very different languages of Rameau and Chopin. The Serenade concludes with an expansive variation movement where Beethoven does at last acknowledge some debt to Mozart – yet the overall impression left by both works is of a skilled craftsmanship that owes most to the teaching he received from Haydn and Salieri.

Comprising Alessandro Milani (violin), Luca Ranieri (viola) and Pierpaolo Toso (cello), this trio was founded in 2004, reviving the name of the classic ensemble led by Franco Gulli, with Bruno Giuranna and Giacinto Caramia, who performed and recorded the landmark works of the string trio repertoire in the 60s and 70s.

The start of an exciting ane prestigious series: the complete Beethoven piano sonatas played by Giovanni Bellucci. Bellucci is one of the most interesting and extraordinary pianists of today. Described by Piero Rattalino as ''a force of nature, vast and palpitating'', his playing is highly original, striving to recreate the original impact of the work she is playing: ''het akes us back to the Golden Age of the Piano'' wrote Le Monde. His recordings, notably with works by Liszt, were showered with prizes such as Diapson d'Or, Choc, Editor's Choice, CD Maestro, etc. Giovanni Bellucci embarks on this epic musical journey of recording the complete Beethoven Sonatas, a challenge that every pianist of world stature will face. His Beethoven is free, with a strong sense of rhetoric and improvisation, adhering nevertheless strictly to the score and its intentions. The result is fresh, exhilarating and illuminating, letting us marvel at the originality and genius of the music.

At the heart of Trio Origo's repertoire are the earliest trios composed for clarinet, cello and piano. The origins of the repertoire lie in the 'Gassenhauer' Trio composed by Beethoven in 1797 for a clarinetist, probably Joseph B�hr, who also suggested to the composer that he use a hit tune - known as a 'Gassenhauer' - from a recent opera by Joseph Weigl. Beethoven (uncharacteristically, but with perhaps an eye on the work's future commercial success) duly obliged, and made Weigl's tune the basis for his theme-and-variations finale - but he also produced a version of the trio substituting the clarinet for the violin to ensure it's popularity. An adroit piece of reverse compositional engineering produced the Op.38 Trio from the Septet Op.20. The Septet was one of Beethoven's most popular early works, and resulted in a string of arrangements for smaller forces, most of them made by other hands, but the composer himself produced this arrangement for clarinet trio, which happily amplifies the solo instrument's prominence in the Septet. He never wrote a more joyous melody than the main subject of the first movement, and the work as a whole finds the composer at his most relaxed. While Beethoven's clarinet writing has never received the attention accorded to Mozart's, he wrote for it with no less warmth and affection, and this pair of trios displays a winning, sunny side of the composer that is often overshadowed by the cantankerous instrumental dramatist of popular myth and legend. The Finnish members of Trio Origo all pursue successful careers with chamber and period-instrument ensembles such as the Tapiola Sinfonietta, the Finnish Baroque Orchestra and the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, but they have been performing Classical-era clarinet trios together since 2004, ranging beyond Beethoven to explore little-known gems by his contemporaries.

The combination of cello and piano has long been a favored choice among composers. Detailing a selection of works by two of the world's greatest; this release celebrates one of music's most enduring partnerships through showcasing some of the duo's best literature. From the intensity of Beethoven's sonatas to the affecting expression of Schumann's creations, Quirine Viersen and Silke Avenues offer passionate readings of beloved literature with an enviable unity of musical thought and direction.

Domenico Bartolucci was in some ways a 20th-century descendant of the liturgical musicians who composed for the church during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries. Born in 1917, he was appointed Master of Music at the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, but he also taught at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. Most of his considerable output was, naturally, sacred in form and purpose: not only motets and mass settings but symphonic oratorios and even a sacred opera based on the life of the painter Brunelleschi. He was appointed a cardinal in 2010 and died in 2013. Very little of his music has been recorded. Here, however, is a new studio recording of his chamber music, made in the Pontifical Institute for Sacred Music in Rome. The genre of Prelude, Intermezzo and Fugue implies a keyboard work of the type written by Bach or Franck; here, however, are two examples scored for violin/cello duet and for string trio, both demonstrating Bartolucci’s considerable mastery of counterpoint. They are joined by a Piano Trio with a lovely second-movement Canzone, and a Violin Sonata of engaging richness: there are moments of great passion in the first movement, of elegiac delicacy in the slow movement, grotesque elements in the third movement, and a luminous fluidity reminiscent of Mozart in the finale.

The disc features Antal Zalai, praised by Igor Oistrakh as 'an exceptional violinist who has a perfect technique, beautiful large tone, real musical finesse and maturity as well as a noble personality'. Joining him is Jozsef Balog, one of the most celebrated pianists of his generation and winner of the 2005 Annie Fischer Award.

The second installment of Antal Zalai's complete Bartok violin edition centers on the monumental Sonata for Solo Violin. The work is a landmark of the 20th century where contrapuntal and fugal writing, folkloristic elements, and the unique harmonic and rhythmic language of Bartok fuse into a work of intense expression. The 44 Duos for Two Violins serve as a foil for the Sonata, performed with wit, irony, and folksy color by Zalai and Valery Oistrakh.