Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

PRIMITIVE STILL LIFE WITH PAIR

Classical Music

Classical Music

This album showcases works by Romantic composer Daniel-Francois Auber and classical-era luminary Andre Ernest Modeste Grétry. New Orleans was one of the first cities in the U.S. to embrace opera on a significant level, becoming well-known for its French Opera House in the 19th Century. This album features some key French arias that figured prominently in New Orleans in the early 19th Century, in the overlap between eras.

Dr. Alissa Mercurio Rowe is an active choral conductor, voice teacher, and soloist. She currently serves as Professor and Director of Choral Activities at Southeastern Louisiana University. During the summers of 2003 and 2004 she served as a member of the All-State voice faculty at Interlochen Arts Academy. She conducts the Southeastern Concert Choir, Southeastern Louisiana University's premiere choral ensemble, with which she conducted several world premieres. She is active as an adjudicator, has given choral and vocal workshops in the Midwest and Southeastern states, and has conducted numerous Honor Choirs.

This new release features three of the greatest piano works by Schumann, superbly performed on fortepiano. DAVID HYUN-SU KIM has distinguished himself as one of the most thoughtful and distinctive musicians to emerge from the newest generation of American pianists. His concerts have been praised as “emotionally expansive” and “idiomatically perfect,” his interpretations as “spectacular,” and his Schumann playing has been singled out as “splendid and moving … His Florestan was elegantly calamitous, and his melodies representing Eusebius were like a dear friend whispering arcane truths to only you.” A sought-after pedagogue and adjudicator, David has taught at Yale and Harvard Universities. His students have gone on to win prizes in international competitions and been accepted for graduate study at Eastman, Oberlin, the University of Michigan, CCM, Indiana University, and similar institutions.

Nicolo Paganini (1782-1840) was known above all for his virtuosic violin performances. He was also a violist, guitarist, and composer. For this new release, Paganini’s Tre Duetti Concertanti per Violino e Fagotto have been chosen. These works for violin and bassoon were composed around 1800. Performing these works is the Apollo Ensemble: violinist Daphne Oltheten and bassoonist Thomas Oltheten.

These are to true masterpieces, even by the standards of Mozart and Beethoven. Based in Switzerland, the Fiacorda Ensemble is comprised of some of the very finest string, woodwind and brass players in Switzerland.

This is Volume 4 in Centaur's traversal of the complete organ works of Charles-Marie Widor (1844-1937), performed by Joby Bell. This is clearly going to be the seminal recording of these works. Since 2004, professor Joby Bell has served on the faculty of the Hayes School of Music, where he teaches organ and church music studies. His church music teaching emphasizes the practical knowledge needed for a solid undergraduate foundation toward successful work and further studies in sacred music. His organ teaching specializes in practice techniques, memorization, service playing, choral accompanying, and maintaining grace under pressure – lessons always best taught by example. Dr. Bell is known for "the breadth of his repertoire, technical virtuosity, and for the personal warmth which shines through in his performances." His acclaimed blog at deals with a comprehensive range of organ-related topics including teaching philosophies, recital preparation, church music, and professional concerns.

This is a great live recital performed by Antonio Pompa-Baldi. Pompa Baldi has more piano recordings for Centaur than any other pianist. This is an exceptional recital.

Ukrainian cellist Natalia Khoma and Russian cellist Suren Bagratuni are the featured performers on these 1998 recordings of works for Cello Duo by Couperin, Telemann, Handel and Bartók. Ms. Khoma, an internationally renowned, Moscow Conservatory trained and prize-winning cellist has distinguished herself as a recitalist and soloist with orchestras thorough the former USSR, the USA, Europe, Canada, South America, Asia South Africa and the Middle East. Mr. Bagratuni, 1986 Tchaikovsky competition Silver Medalist, is Prof. of Cello and String Area co-chair at Mich. St. Univ.

The Handel Album is the Aulos Ensemble's fifth in a series of critically acclaimed releases for Centaur Records, which include a collection of Christmas music, as well as albums dedicated to Rameau, Telemann and the Bach family. Soprano Dominique Labelle, whose voice has been called "angelic," "silvery," and "vibrant", is noted for her probing explorations of the repertoire from the Baroque to new music. This selection of Handel's masterful operatic arias and other vocal excerpts is interspersed with individual movements from his instrumental Trio Sonata and Concerto masterpieces.

Classical Music

Classical Music

This release features the works of Gywneth Walker, one of the most important composers of our modern day. Widely performed throughout the world, the music of Gwyneth Walker is beloved by performers and audiences alike for its energy, beauty, reverence, drama and humor. Dr. Walker is a graduate of Brown University and the Hartt School of Music. Walker's catalog includes over 300 commissioned works for orchestra, chamber ensembles, chorus, and solo voice.

Argentine-born violinist Tomas Cotik has fully devoted himself to the study and interpretation of the Bach solo sonatas and partitas for violin. This is truly one of the greatest traversals of this transcendent music. Hailed by Michael Tilson Thomas as “An excellent violinist,” Tomas Cotik is internationally recognized as a soloist, chamber musician, and professor. A much sought-after recording artist, Dr. Cotik is currently involved in more than fourteen album recordings for Naxos and Centaur records, which have received over a hundred reviews and the highest praises from some of the best-known publications. Committed to passing on his passion for music, Dr. Cotik taught at the University of Miami, Florida International University, and West Texas A&M University. He was appointed assistant professor of violin at Portland State University in 2016.

The Goldberg Variations of J.S. Bach are without doubt one of the greatest of all keyboard masterpieces. Charlotte Mattax Moersch gives us an informed and gripping performance of this unquestioned masterpiece. Harpsichordist Charlotte Mattax Moersch has performed worldwide as a soloist and chamber musician. Since capturing First and Third Prizes in basso continuo and solo playing in the International Harpsichord Competitions in Paris, France and Bruges, Belgium, she has appeared in solo recitals in New York, London, Edinburgh, Rome, Geneva, Paris, and Amsterdam, and at historic venues, among them Carnegie Hall, the Royal Albert Hall, the Mozarteum, and the Palazzo della Cancelleria. Called a “nonpareil harpsichordist” by Early Music America, she has received critical acclaim for her playing, at once “dashing yet intelligent” (Classical Times, London), and “fluent and expressive” (Fanfare Magazine). As a guest artist, she has performed at the Festival of the Associazione Musicale Romana, Festival Estival de Paris, Tage alter musik Regensburg, and the Bethlehem and Boulder Bach Festivals, and has toured Europe with San Francisco’s American Baroque and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.

“There's a certain nakedness to a jazz duo. Everything is out there and exposed - no crashing cymbals to hide behind, or bass lines to get lost in. It often brings out a different side of your playing, a brutal honesty that is left after everything else is stripped away. Here is where we ended up...” Kevin Jones recently joined the Florida State University College of Music faculty as Assistant Professor of Jazz Trombone in 2016 after previously holding teaching appointments at the University of Texas at Austin, the University of South Carolina, Lander University, and Presbyterian College. As a performing artist, Dr. Jones toured with James Brown, Kenny Loggins, the Ringling Bros. Circus, and Princess Cruise Lines. He has numerous performing credits with jazz and commercial artists including the Temptations, Bucky Pizzarelli, Aretha Franklin, Joshua Redman, David Sanborn, Bill Holman, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Jim McNeely, Burt Bacharach, and Barry Manilow. Bill Peterson began his career in Chicago as a pianist and conductor/arranger/contractor for many celebrity artists, sharing the stage with celebrity greats including Ramsey Lewis, Diane Schuur, Patti Labelle, Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, Smokey Robinson, Red Buttons, Suzanne Somers, Steve Allen, Joan Rivers, Morey Amsterdam, Kathie Lee Gifford, Mary Hart, Bob Newhart, Tony Bennett, George Burns, Danny Thomas, and Las Vegas sensation, Danny Gans.

There are so many ways to take in this unique and magnificent work. The listener, with no preconceptions or prior knowledge, can simply let the music's ebb and flow direct the attention. This is special performance of this music. Performing on period instruments, Massachusetts-based Aston Magna is one of the finest Baroque music ensembles based in the U.S. The mission of the Aston Magna Foundation is to enrich the appreciation of music of the past and the understanding of the cultural, political, and social contexts in which it was composed and experienced. The goal is to reach a larger public through the use of historical instruments and practices in performances, recordings, and workshops, and through innovative interdisciplinary educational programs, publications, and electronic media.

French composer Joseph Canteloube (1879-1957) made a life's work of collecting, transcribing, and arranging folksongs. His Chants d'Auvergne has long been very popular. Much of the rest of his songs, though, have been unjustly neglected. Among these, L'arada emerges as a particularly intriguing work.

Franz Schubert is perhaps the greatest of all composers of art songs. He left huge body of songs for voice and piano of amazing quality. The song cycle Winterreise stands out even among this literature. Steven Tharp sings with great understanding and sensitivity, beautifully accompanied by Janice Wenger on fortepiano. Steven Tharp has been praised by Opera News for the “bel canto flexibility and sweetness” of his voice, while the New Yorker has described his voice as “strong, free, and forward in tone, verbally sure, lyrical in utterance.”

Centaur is pleased to release another album by prolific composer David Loeb. The works are Setsune, Five Reveries, Kiri, Fantasia sobre “Como la rosa en el guerto,” Three Friends of Winter, Suite No. 4, Cycle for the Lunar New Year, and Canon. Composer David Loeb was born in 1939 to a family which took music and the arts very seriously. He studied first with Peter Pindar Stearns at the Mannes College of Music, and then received his master’s degree from Yale. His catalog of compositions is quite remarkably extensive and diverse. In addition to the typical assortment of works for orchestra, chamber ensembles, and voice, he has also composed extensively for Asian instruments and for early music instruments.

Detours is a compilation of works for piano by composers of different origins from approximately the last century. This is an a very appealing program of music for piano. Born in Indonesia, pianist Martin Kesuma is a graduate of Texas State University and the University of Texas at Austin. He is currently pursuing his Doctor of Musical Arts degree with Professor Anton Nel at the University of Texas, where he holds the positions of Piano Project Coordinator and Class Piano Teaching Assistant. Martin’s recent highlights include first prize at the PianoHouse International Piano Competition, the Ben Gomez Award at the Texas State International Piano Festival, Honorable Mention at the San Jose International Piano Competition, Special Recognition Award at the Weatherford College International Piano Competition, and performance of Stravinsky Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments with the Density512 Orchestra.