Brahms' Cello Sonata No.1 was composed at a time of great emotional upheaval in 1865. His mother was dying, and the composer having visited her in Hamburg, had immersed himself in the music of Bach for solace. The finale of the sonata has an uncanny resemblance to Contrapunctus XIII from The Art of Fugue. The second sonata is a product of the tranquil summer holiday Brahms spent in the scenic lakeside suburb of Hofstetten, outside Thun in Switzerland in 1886. The work is on a large symphonic scale in four movements, and in contrast to the earlier sonata's pensive and unsettled nature, is bathed in afternoon sunlight. Stanford composed his Ballata and it's companion, the Ballabile in 1918 for cello and orchestra. This is the product of the end of his compositional career, after his 7th and final symphony, and the large scale concertos. Effectively a cello concerto minus a first movement, Stanford made the version for cello and piano the same year. The Ballata is a delightful slow movement.
Herbert: Naughty Marietta / Blazer, Harrington, Morris, Catholic University of America A Cappella Choir, Millennium Chamber Orchestra
Harbinger Records
CD · 1 disc
$19.99Jun 25, 2021
For the first time on album, the Smithsonian Institution’s 1981 first complete recording of Victor Herbert’s classic musical, Naughty Marietta, is available through Harbinger Records. This is the most complete recorded performance of the original score of a Victor Herbert operetta. It provides the listener with an opportunity to hear this brilliant score as if complete for the first time. The recording began as a concert at the Smithsonian Institution in 1981. The reception was so great, the company went right into the studio and recorded the 2-LP set under the direction of the Division of Performing Arts’ Director, James R. Morris. A young Judy Blazer played Marietta, an early step toward her becoming a Broadway star. Naughty Marietta is Herbert’s best and most popular score and became a key bridge between the English, French and Viennese operettas popular in the late 19th-century and the thoroughly American style of entertainment that dominated our musical stages after 1920. Herbert’s collaborator on the project was Rida Johnson Young, who supplied the libretto and the lyrics. She was the first significant lyricist of the 20th-century American musical theater. Her best work transforms the florid language of European operettas into colloquial speech. She wrote plays, acted, and wrote the standard, “Mother Machree” for the show Barry of Ballymore. She wrote the lyrics for over 500 songs including works by Jerome Kern, Sigmund Romberg and Rudolf Friml, all giants in the world of musical theater. Naughty Marietta has become a staple of light opera companies throughout the world. After the Broadway engagement the show toured the United States to rave reviews and sold-out houses. Nearly two decades later the show returned to Broadway to great acclaim.
The Glory & The Dream: Choral Music by Richard Rodney Bennett / RBC Chamber Choir
SOMM Recordings
CD · 1 disc
$20.99Jul 20, 2018
Somm Recordings celebrates the sublime choral music of Richard Rodney Bennett – best known to a wider audience for his Academy Award-nominated scores to Murder on the Orient Express and Far from the Madding Crowd – with 11 first recordings and a vivid new recording of his choral masterpiece, The Glory and the Dream. Performed by the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir, directed by Paul Spicer and with dexterous support from organist Nicholas Morris, The Glory and the Dream features 12 varied and vivacious choral pieces composed over more than 50 years. The album’s striking title work sets Wordsworth’s ode Intimations of Immortality to music that conjures childhood rapture and adult fears with the utmost finesse and feeling and features a fearsomely complex and challenging organ accompaniment. Dating from 1961, the earliest pieces here are Two Madrigals in which Bennett treats the rich ornamentations of the 17th century to a wholly modern perspective. The most recent work, One Equal Music – a sinewy, austere anthem with a serene ending – was completed in February 2012, just 10 months before the composer’s death at the age of 76. Bennett’s fascination with the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras is also to be found in the elegiac partsong A Contemplation Upon Flowers, the vocal fanfare This Day and Time, a somber meditation on the finality of life and lasting effulgence of Christ’s eternal being, and the simple but affective carol I wonder as I wander. Other seasonal pieces include the early, plainchant-infused The Sorrows of Mary, the gentle ‘hush song’ Lullaby Baby and late, substantial Remember, O thou man, a fervent and heartfelt prayer ending in quiet contemplation. Previous Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir recordings on SOMM have included admired recordings of choral music by Herbert Howells, Samuel Barber and John Joubert, together with partsongs by Ireland, Delius and Stanford.
Offenbach: La grande duchesse de Gerolstein / Valentini-Terrani, Villaume
Dynamic
CD · 2 discs
$18.99Aug 26, 2016
Jacques Offenbach's masterpiece La Grande-Duchesse de Gérosltein should be performed much more often. This re-edition has an excellent cast lead by Lucia Valentini-Terrani and Carlo Allemanno. Offenbach composed the music to La Grande-Duchesse during the height of his compositional career and premiered the opera in Paris in 1867.
The Evening Hour: British Choral Music from the 16th & 20th Centuries / Williams
Signum Classics
CD · 1 disc
$19.99Apr 08, 2016
All of the pieces chosen for this new release center around the theme of evening time. Mark Williams and his Choir of Jesus College Cambridge have released four prior albums with Signum, all of which have gained critical praise. The programme of this album blends ancient and modern, featuring works from Thomas Tallis, William Harris, Gustav Holst, and many more.
• The Temple Church Choir gives the world premiere recording of Nico Muhly's Our Present Charter - a brand new fourmovement work commissioned by the choir to celebrate 800 years since the sealing of the Magna Carta. • Directed by Roger Sayer and featuring organist Greg Morris, the recording also features choral works by Parry, Vaughan Williams, Walton, Bairstow, Tavener and Haydn. • The Temple Church Choir, founded 1841, consists of eighteen boy choristers and twelve professional choirmen. • It is still considered to be one of the finest choirs in London, a reputation it quickly gained after it's founding. • The American composer Nico Muhly (b. 1981) received his Masters in Music from the Juilliard School where he studied under Christopher Rouse and John Corigliano. • He also spent several years working for Phillip Glass as a MIDI programmer and editor. • His wide scope of work for soloists, ensembles, and organizations covers multiple genres, including music for film, opera, choral, chamber, orchestral, vocal and electronic forces in solo or combinations there of.
This recording of recorder sonatas by Handel and an 18th c. transcription of the Royal Fireworks Suite is the work of three Melbournians who have made important contributions to early music performance in Australia for over thirty years. Published By John Walsh c. 1750, this is the only recording of the adaptation of the Fireworks Music (originally for flute, violin or harpsichord) in this arrangement. All instruments are faithful reproductions of authentic originals, historically accurate, carefully researched and tuned to a version of period temperament, giving each key its own character.
Dark, edgy and superb electric guitar work from Joe Morris in a trio with Stave Lantner on electric keyboard and Jerome Deupree on drums, the final part of what Morris calls "Big Loud Electric Guitar Trilogy" that started with "Sweatshop" and "Racket Club", following the Hendrix legacy.
On this release Scott Morris plays new arrangements of Erik Satie’s music for guitar with soprano and oboe. “Morris plays with considerable elegance and charm […]” (American Record Guide). Additional musicians include Grammy-winning Andrew York from the LA Guitar Quartet.
Sally Ann Morris and Adam Tice began working together in 2008, when Sally was asked to compose a few tunes for Adam’s first collection, Woven into Harmony. This initial collaboration was the beginning of what has become a dynamic partnership. In this symbiotic pairing new inspiration emerged, generating contemporary but timeless music where text and tune seamlessly unite. The a cappella choral writing on “Will You Hold Me in the Light,” and “This Is My Body” is so lush and intricate that accompaniment is not necessary, while the poetry of “God Give Me Faith like a Child,” and “Breath of God, Breath of Peace” illustrate the innocence and fearlessness essential in our love and trust of God. Stylistically ranging from a cappella choral to Latin jazz, each piece offers a musical and textual sophistication that powerfully conveys themes of journey and longing for God’s guidance.
Raffaella Angeletti, Nino Batatunashvili, Annuziata Vestri, Massimiliano Pisapia, Enrico Cossuta, and Thomas Morris star in this Sferisterio Opera Festival Macerata production of the Puccini opera conducted by Daniele Callegari and staged by Pier Luigi.
