No division between 'absolute' and 'applied' music -- that's the way it has always been for Manuel de Sica. Here we have the chance to explore the oeuvre of this contemporary Italian composer, best known for his contributions to the world of film; Il giardino dei Finzi Contini, the last track on the release, won an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score.

Much of De Sica's work centres around the themes of pain and suffering, where music is invested with the power to help alleviate the indifference that surrounds so much human grief -- thus pieces such as In memoriam and Kojiki, the latter of which was inspired by the bombing of Pearl Harbour -- look to console and redeem. Also included on the set are the Concerto for violin and strings, which pays homage to two of the most important influences on the composer's style -- Berg and Bartók -- and Una breve vacanza, the leitmotif of the like-named film directed by De Sica's father and, by the composer's own admission, one of his most beautiful melodies. Filmusic, a three-part concertino with a Russian-inspired first movement and swirling tarantella-based finale, completes the line-up.

Performing this music is the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini, one of Italy's most important symphony orchestras and which has appeared under conductors of the calibre of Charles Dutoit, Lorin Maazel and Kurt Masur -- to name but a few. The ensemble provides the background to a wonderfully lively instrumental fantasy in which the harp, violin, viola and piano -- here astutely performed Floraleda Sacchi, Maristella Patuzzi, Anna Serova and Michelangelo Carbonara respectively -- becomes the soloists in a fascinating, wide-reaching musical fabric. Flavio Emilio Scogna conducts.

Other information:
- Recorded 27 & 28 May 2013, Centro di Produzione Musicale della Filarmonica Toscanini, Parma.
- Manuel de Sica's music is difficult to categorise, and that in itself is its strength: it seamlessly crosses borders between "serious" and "light" music, touches on tragic events (a memoriam for the victims of the earthquake of Abruzzo and Emilia), and illuminates films. The diversity of De Sica's inspirations (Maderna, Berg, Bartók, Mancini) points at his eclectic and unconventional style. - The works on this CD are concertante works for a variety of solo instruments: violin, viola, harp and piano.
- Music of immediate appeal, a source of beauty and inspiration!
- Excellent performances by the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini, conducted by Flavio Emilio Scogna.
- Liner notes by the composer and orchestra biography.

Elena Sartori’s aim with this new recording is to reinterpret a pair of Jean-Baptiste Lully’s grand motets through the prism of his Italian heritage. As Sartori notes in her booklet essay, the magnificent Te Deum shares little of musical style or text-setting in common with Lully’s operas. The ornamentation and stylised, asymmetric rhythms that are woven through the texture of his dramatic works and those of his successors such as Rameau are notable by their absence; she finds, instead, ‘a deep-rooted, maternal sense of melody, and an enduring, even unwitting memory of Latinate language that leads the work away from factional claims (of national style).’ Anyone who follows Lully’s music and the French Baroque will want to investigate this new recording, which was made in the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna: a Byzantineera building with its own complex history which lends an imposing sense of space to the interpretations.

Albert Lortzing was familiar with the stage from his earliest years, for both his parents were actors, and by the age of 18 he too was engaged as both an actor and singer. His career was anything but stable, however; a competent composer, he divided his time between precarious kapellmeister positions – including a stint at the Theater an der Wien – and having to revert to acting in order to support himself. He died impoverished and unhappy in 1851, a few months after securing his third kapellmeister post.

Today he is best remembered for his Singspiel Der Wildschütz, a masterpiece of writing and whose libretto the composer himself fashioned from Kotzebue’s comedy Der Rehbock, oder Die schuldlosen Schuld bewußten, which had been published earlier in 1816. Kotzebue’s work is a whirlwind of character disguise, a piece whose titillating coquetry touches firmly on frivolity but manages to evade full-scale immorality, and Lortzing also added small touches of his own to the story – including the character of the majordomo Pancratius, whose role has traditionally been performed in Saxon dialect. The enduring appeal of Der Wildschütz, however, clearly rests on the score, with Lortzing’s lightness of touch, his memorable and catchy tunes, and the vivid characterisation of comic situations lending his music a charm that appears as fresh as ever. An ardent admirer of Mozart, it is in Der Wildschütz, more than in any other of his operas, that Lortzing succeeded in writing at least a few numbers that are reminiscent of the great composer. This applies particularly to his carefully wrought ensemble passages, which greatly outweigh the arias in terms of number and of which the much-admired Billiards Scene (Act 2) is surely the greatest.

Lortzing’s operas were the most-performed in Germany for about 150 years, and from listening to Der Wildschütz it is easy to understand why. Recorded in the early ‘80s and bringing together many of Germany’s top singers of the period, this version remains one of the finest to date. ‘Edith Mathis is a delightful Baroness and Doris Soffel nicely characterises the Sophocles-besotted Countess…’, while ‘Georgine Resick sings a charming Gretchen, warm but with a will of her own.’ (Gramophone)

Other information:
- Recorded 1980–1982.
- Reissue of one of the gems of the East Germany archive recordings of Berlin Classics: Der Wildschütz by Albert Lortzing.
- Lortzing’s operas were extremely popular in their time, due to their good humour and wit, the memorable tunes and the general romantic nature feeling.
- A star studded cast of the best German voices of the time: Edith Mathis, Doris Soffel, Peter Schreier, Hans Sotin, Gottfried Hornik, and the magnificent Staatskapelle Berlin conducted by Bernhard Klee. - Contains detailed notes on the music and plot synopsis.
- German Libretto available for download

The Concerto Grosso is a popular Baroque form, in which two instrumental groups complete against each other: a small group of soloists and the tutti of the orchestral group. It is the forerunner of the solo concerto form, which features only one solo instrument. This set present the complete Concerti Grossi by Pietro Antonio Locatelli, modelled on the popular concerti grossi of his teacher Corelli. The writing, as might be expected from Locatelli the devil violinist, is highly virtuosic and brilliant, inventive in harmony and counterpoint, written to impress and entertain. This set is part IV of the Locatelli Edition, the complete works by Locatelli, as performed by Igor Ruhadze and his early music band Violini Capricciosi, playing with great gusto, zest and dazzling virtuosity. Virtuosity, showy improvisation and stratospherically high violin playing are the characteristics of Baroque composer Pietro Antonio Locatelli's theatrical concerti grossi for soloists and ripieno. While concerti grossi from this time could usually be divided into two types, 'da camera' and 'da chiesa' - with the former containing more dance movements - Locatelli went down his own distinct path, creating a new model more like that of Torelli. His ripieno section was larger than the traditional accompanying group, and his slow movements contained drawn-out notes over which the first violinist or harpsichordist was free to improvise. Indeed, one harpsichord passage in Op.7 is so extraordinarily virtuosic that Locatelli labelled it 'ad libitum', presumably to avoid frightening the amateur musician. Only the most consummate and accomplished musicians can perform works of this calibre. Igor Ruhadze and his ensemble Violini Capricciosi have spent years recording Locatelli's works, having previously released his violin concertos and trio sonatas, described by Gramophone magazine as 'brilliantly and at times breathtakingly performed'. They bring their expertise to this release once more, with a tight and supple ripieno section supporting the sumptuous, virtuosic solo playing.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Francesco Corbetta: the JS Bach of the guitar? A bold claim, but one made with passion by the guitarist Izhar Elias in his own booklet essay for this ground-breaking new album. Born in the Italian city of Pavia around 1615, Corbetta worked as a musician in the court of Madrid but he made his career and lasting reputation in France. According to contemporary accounts, Corbetta’s playing epitomized the ornate Baroque guitar solo. The high range, frequent resolution of dissonance, virtuosic techniques, and coloristic effects, such as overlapping tones of campanelas or flashy repicco strumming, converged in his guitar music to make it the most brilliant if challenging of the era. On this album Elias has made his own selection from two of Corbetta’s published volumes which were written for King Charles II (1671) and King Louis XIV (1674) respectively. According to him, Corbetta’s music is rooted in the popular songs and dances of his day, making him more like a modern pop songwriter. Using the genres of chaconne and passacaglia, several of which are included here, he transformed the guitar into a polyphonic instrument and a genuinely soloistic one compared to its previous, humble role as an accompaniment to song and strings. There are also two substantial dance suites, in A minor and G minor. The Dutch-born guitarist Izhar Elias has made several significant contributions to the extensive library of guitar music on Brilliant Classics, including a Spanish Baroque album, ‘La Monarcha’, an exploration of Beethoven’s little-known writing for the instrument; and perhaps most noteworthy, a first complete recording for substantial excerpts from Rossini’s late masterpiece Semiramide, arranged for solo guitar by Giuliani. ‘You’ll rarely hear anyone work so hard,’ remarked the Classics Today reviewer. ‘The playing is magnificent – fluent, tonally as varied as possible, rhythmically true to Rossini.’

Caspar Kummer is a composer of unjustly little renown. Held in high esteem by his contemporaries, relatively little information can be found on his life in the leading music dictionaries of today, a fact that stands in stark contrast to his compositional excellence as well as his virtuosity as a flautist. Though Kummer rose to the position of Kapellmeister in the castle chapel of an important German duke in his later years, his creative output failed to reach a similar level of renown after his death in 1870.

The music on this collection, constructed around his favourite instrument, goes some way towards doing the composer some justice. There are a number of noticeable highlights here. Von Dir! is a fascinating attempt -- on the performers' part -- at 'making an instrument speak': the original vocal part is interpreted by a lyrical and otherworldly clarinet, which is in constant dialogue with the complementary flute. The challenging Adagio and Variations, meanwhile, requires a mastery of the basset horn (an instrument that, interestingly, was rather out of fashion for much of Kummer's life), pushing the instrument to the upper edge of its range. The final Trio leaves us with a suggestion of the greater stylistic variety within Kummer's work, leaning towards the Romantic rather than the dominant Classical style of the rest of the collection.

This exploration of a relatively unknown composer is undertaken by an ensemble who are appearing here for the first time on Brilliant Classics: the Italian Classical Consort, led by multi-instrumentalist Luigi Magistrelli. Even more fittingly, they specialise in performances of the much-neglected Classical and Romantic repertoire, and they are known for their concerts and masterclasses the world over.

Other information:.
- A World premiere, recorded July 2012, Gallarate and Santo Stefano Ticino, Italy
- Caspar Kummer, in his time a virtuoso on several wind instruments (flute, clarinet, basset horn) left an oeuvre of surprisingly high quality and originality, in the romantic tradition of Mendelssohn, Schumann and Spohr: a discovery well worth exploring.
- Played with dedicated affection by the "discoverers" of these hidden gems: the Italian Classical Consort, led by virtuoso Luigi Magistrelli.
- Booklet contains extensive liner notes on the composer, his music and an artist biographies.

Known to his contemporaries as "the Beethoven of the flute", Friedrich Kuhlau took much inspiration from the master of Bonn, who was a major influence on his work. The two even met in Vienna in 1825, an encounter which was a resounding success and during which they improvised canons. Kuhlau's output for the flute comprises over 60 works -- an impressive total for a composer who was not a flautist himself. His friend and colleague Bruun was a great help in this respect, being the essential first pair of eyes on all of Kuhlau's compositions for the instrument.

The unusual scoring of the flute quintets -- using flute, violin, two violas and a cello -- gives a great richness to the sound, due to the presence of the three lower-register instruments. The flute essentially takes the role of first violin rather than soloist, becoming an integral part of the structure and development of each of these elegant works. Flautist Ginevra Petrucci joins the internationally acclaimed Kodály Quartet for the recording.

Other information:
Recorded 27--29 December 2012, The Phoenix Studio, Budapest.
- Three delightful Flute Quintets by Friedrich Kuhlau, the "Beethoven of the flute", as his contemporaries called him.
- In 1828 Kuhlau met the great Beethoven, his lifelong inspiration and example. Though no composer can even think of imitating such a musical giant, Kuhlau's works contain certain Beethovenian features, such as structural strength, motivic development and a true expression of feeling.
- Excellent performances by Italian star flutist Ginevra Petrucci, and the internationally acclaimed Kodály Quartet.
- Contains liner notes on the works and performer biographies.

Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger was active in Italy during the late 16th and early 17th centuries, a time when many questions were arising about the unity of speech and music. Kapsberger was known to influence Girolamo Frescobaldi and Domenico Mazzocchi, but during his lifetime reactions to the composer differed wildly among his contemporaries; he was simultaneously hailed as a genius and reproached for his supposedly lack?lustre compositions. This disc presents the First Book of Tablature of 1611 in its entirety, with the pieces showing the influence of the stylus phantasticus, as outlined by the famous theorist Athanisius Kircher, in which music was not bound by words and could instead take on its own free form.

Bulgarian Yavor Genov studied classical guitar at Sofia University, where he developed a keen interest in music of the Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods. He has performed in festivals and recitals throughout Europe and has recorded several pieces for Bulgarian National Radio. This disc marks Genov’s first recording for Brilliant Classics.

MORE INFORMATION:
* Recorded March 2012, Studio of the Bulgarian National Radio, Stara Zagora.
* Contains notes on the composer and a biography of the artist.

Although John Cage was trained in the European tradition, he came to reject the Western dramatic development concept of music, viewing music instead as a state of mind, changing but not goal-directed. This approach is particularly apparent in his percussion works – the focus of this CD. Ars Ludi is a variable percussion ensemble that uses its global concert activity to advocate for more contemporary percussion repertoire. Integral to all the works is the piano, played here by Giancarlo Simonacci.

This is a unique coupling on record, but a perceptive and satisfying one: a trio of Romantically inclined serenades from composers of Northern Europe, writing in the last decades of the 19th century when the drive to define a Nationalist spirit through culture was at its height. And so these works are distinctively, variously Russian, Czech and English in their different ways, while never relinquishing a debt to the German tradition in which their composers were to a greater or lesser degree educated. The Ferruccio Busoni Chamber Orchestra have previously appeared on Brilliant Classics with their music director Massimo Belli in an album of viola concertos by Alessandro Rolla. The orchestra celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2015. Many of their previous releases have received five-star reviews from the Italian press.

When spirits are low, the music of Jacques-Martin Hotteterre is sure to raise them. Now the most celebrated member of a distinguished family of flute makers and players, he paid his way into the French royal court through his father’s well-rewarded success, and became ‘grand hautbois du roy’. In turn he passed the post on to his son, who married the daughter of the organist Balbastre. Even taking into account the prolific output of his contemporary Boismortier, there is surely no more dazzling and uplifting Baroque music composed for the flute and recorder than the suites of Hotteterre which are presented here complete in new recordings, led by the Madrid-based musician Guillermo Peñalver: the sessions took place in the magnificent chapel of San Lorenzo in the city’s Escorial Palace. Several quicker movements present the soloist with considerable technical challenges. The Allemande of the Third Suite appears to imitate waterfalls from the fountain in the gardens of Saint-Cloud through descending arpeggios. Yet the virtuosity is always lightly worn in Hotteterre, never written for the sake of sheer display but always to charm and delight the listener. Within the same suite is one of his most beautiful pieces, Le Plaintif; a simple rondeau with subtle, imperceptibly entangling ornamentation. In addition to the suites, Peñalver presents several brief flute solos, and then the two extraordinary Préludes in which Hotteterre sums up and condenses all of his skill, artistry and science. While nominally cast in D major and G minor, each of them moves through every key belonging to their respective scales in a remarkable feat of compositional ingenuity, introducing abundant changes of mood and character along the way: so much for the commonplace idea of the French Baroque as a polished idiom as orderly as the courtly etiquette which accompanied it.

It was not until the 20th century that the viola became the object of truly serious attention as a solo instrument. Paul Hindemith (1895-1963) – himself an excellent violist – was largely responsible for rescuing the instrument from relative oblivion. This CD features a selection of his viola sonatas composed during Europe’s interwar decades. Violist Luca Sanzò and pianist Maurizio Paciariello are both in-demand contemporary music interpreters as well as conservatoire professors in their native Italy.

The art form that became known as the lied may not have been a prominent feature of Haydn's output, but his collections of songs for solo voice have nevertheless retained their appeal to this day. This recording presents a selection of these charming works, drawing especial attention to the two stages of development into which they are divisible: while the first set, written in the 1780s, centre around witty epigram (be they pastoral in mood, containing moralising overtones or expressing unrequited love), the second set, composed in the following decade and based on texts by the English poetess Anne Hunter, highlight what one contemporaneous newspaper described as Haydn's 'sophisticated popularity' and reveal a predilection for folk song through their rhapsodic and often elegiac flavour.

Accompanied by Walter Olbertz and performing these works is one of the greatest artists of the past century, acclaimed soprano Arleen Augér. The recording is testament to what the late American singer did best: her exceptional command of the lied, which became an increasingly important part of her later career, and her predilection for the Classical and Baroque repertoires. 'Listening to a song recorded by Arleen Auger, one might be inclined to credit the engineers for some of the apparent perfection. That any singer should be able to sustain such effortless lines, such pure and exquisitely gauged sound, so consistently, seems unbelievable. Believe it.' (Los Angeles Times).

Other information:
- It is already 20 years ago that the great soprano Arleen Auger tragically died at the age of 53, one of the most wonderful, moving and unique voices of her generation.
- This issue of Haydn songs is a tribute to that voice, which finds pure poetry, clarity and beauty in these relatively unassuming Lieder of Joseph Haydn, elegant, charming and witty as they are.
- Recorded in 1980, booklet providing liner notes, biography and songs texts in original language (both German and English).