Classical Music

This second release from versatile cellist Mayke Rademakers on Challenge Classics features a well-thought-out selection of Spanish and Latin American works based on flamenco and tango music. Rademakers first undertook tuition from Hungarian cellist Gy�rgy Schiffer, and graduated with honors under his guidance. Her previous recordings - with works by composers such as Brahms, Liszt, Rachmaninov, Shostakovich, Bridge, and Bach - have been highly acclaimed by the international press.

In today's world, one often perceives a division between art and academia, and composers and musicologists generally don't have much to say to one another. But that division has not always existed. Brahms himself was surrounded by a circle of academics who for him were also a source of animated comradeship. With some of them, Brahms would go on long walks outside Vienna and even on summer holidays.+ The men enjoyed long and sometimes loud, discussions about their shared obsessions, discoveries and findings. Brahms had these very discussions to thank for his lifelong interest in "early music". He even collaborated intensively on the critical editions of Couperin, Handel and Bach's sons and received interesting and useful advice form his friends. Since adopting a new artistic profile, The Hague Philharmonic is demonstrating more than ever that symphonic music can still be meaningful to large and diverse audiences in the 21st century. The ensemble performs regularly at various major concert halls around the world. Their ambitions are spreaheaded by a proactive education policy and are the driving force behind music education in the region.

Classical Music

An enthralling journey through the cultured popular music of the 1920s, featuring music by such young lions as Weill, Gershwin, and Britten, representatives of the innovative attempt to connect classical music and popular song. The program features bold and effective arrangements for voice and reed quintet by Calefax, one of today's most original and challenging young European ensembles. They are joined by Dutch mezzo-soprano Cora Burggraaf, who graduated with distinction from the Royal Conservatoire in the Hague and has been the recipient of many prizes, including the 2009/2010 ECHO Rising Star Award.

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

For about 150 years it was believed that Schubert composed his Ninth Symphony in 1828, not long before his death but, musical scholarship being a continuous process, this theory was later disproved. It was discovered late in the 20th century that in fact he composed most of this work three years earlier and revised it in 1826 and 1827. Following a period of poor health, 1825 was a better year for Schubert, while his finances were also improved. Schubert never heard a single performance of many of his works, including this great symphony. When it was rehearsed in 1827 at the Gesellschaftder Musikfreunde in Vienna, the string-players complained that passages in which a rhythmic figure is obsessively repeated, especially in the finale, were unplayable. In May 1824 Schubert attended the first performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Beethoven revolutionized symphonic form, expanding its expressive range enormously, his Ninth Symphony in particular being conceived on a much grander scale than any previous symphony. Schubert was just one of many composers influenced by Beethoven’s achievements. Many scholars have suggested the various ways in which Schubert was influenced by Beethoven, but the most extraordinary aspect of Schubert's mature music is its complete individuality. The compositional techniques, the handling of tonality and structure, and the orchestral sound of these two contemporaries have very little in common. Schubert’s own profound originality is all the more striking for its emergence at a time when Beethoven's impact on the development of the symphony was so revolutionary and far-reaching.

Classical Music

Finally the Challenge Classics catalogue accommodates an account of violin's literature highest work: Bach's Sonatas and Partitas. As an ever inquisitive label, Challenge has chosen a young violinist with an outstanding personality. Van der Ent does more than merely give a performance; he pursues a daring journey with the listener. Even the simple choice of a 1828 violin, gut strings and a certain bow give this account a thoroughly unique sound world. Bob van der Ent is one of the most prominent and versatile violinists in the Netherlands. He has been described by the press as "a highly gifted and virtuosic violinist with a beautifully spacious and rounded tone". Bob van der Ent regularly appears in the Netherlands and elsewhere as both soloist and chamber musician, in concerts, at festivals and on radio and television.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

The present release is a set with which Challenge Classics intends to make its contribution to the celebrations for the 250th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven. It is a unique and completely original collection in the panorama of today’s discography, as it contains the complete corpus of the symphonies, as well as all the works for (instrumental) soloist and orchestra, i.e. all the concertos. All the works recorded here are directed by a single conductor, Jan Willem de Vriend, at the head of a single orchestra, the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra. It is clear that this aspect provides a unity, an organic force and therefore an authority that other collections featuring different directors cannot boast. Finally, all the recordings presented here were curated by Bert van der Wolf of Northstar Recording, one of the most innovative and capable sound engineers of the classic milieu.