Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Almost every music lover has probably heard Erich Höbarth play at least once: active as Nikolaus Harnoncourt’s concertmaster, as first violinist of the Quatuor Mosaïques, and in many other positions of musical life, heard in numerous recordings and television broadcasts, he is an almost omnipresent figure. Höbarth unites historical performance practice with the self-assured poise of an individual artistic personality. The Viennese violinist has found here a congenial partner in the young Aapo Häkkinen from Helsinki, who, exactly like Höbarth, can already boast extensive experience as an ensemble director.

Violin and Harpsichord – these are namely the instruments that Bach himself played as ensemble director and as soloist, and that he brings together in the present sonatas as if at a chamber music summit meeting. Already in the eighteenth century, the six-sonata cycle BWV 1014–1019 numbered among his best works. Höbarth and Häkkinen captivate with wonderful ensemble playing. Aapo Häkkinen plays a – today rarely found – 16’ harpsichord, that is to say, with an additional, lower sounding register. It has been reported that Bach likewise had a 16’ instrument at his disposal in Köthen, where he composed the sonatas. - Aeolus Music

Classical Music

V 2: POLISH HARPSICHORD MUSIC

On the occasion of Erik Satie's 150th birthday, Fumio Yasuda embarks on a quest for hidden works of music and adapts rarely performed compositions for his piano trio: pieces that are well worth their discovery! Following a tour through Spain and France, Yasuda recorded this album in Bordeaux in October, 2016. In the early 20th century, Erik Satie was part of the Dadaist circle of artists in Paris. He worked with René Clair, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Léonide Massine, Man Ray and, most importantly, Jean Cocteau. Fumio Yasuda selected Satie's music for René Clair's filme masterpieces "Entr'acte" as well as the works "Dance de travers" and "Airs à faire fuir" from "“Pièces froides" and several additional compositions to arrange and interpret them in a completely new style. Satie has an entirely different view from many of his colleagues: He is convinced that a composer has no right to waste the time his audience dedicates to him. And so he develops his idea of background music - and calls it "Musique d'ameublement" (which translates approximately as "Music as furniture", or "Musical furniture"). Music is meant to be in a room just like a table or a chair. Satie rejects finesse and virtuosity. "Everyone will tell you that I'm not a musician. And they're right." Satie has a very special place in the history of music. Without seeming obtrusive, Fumio Yasuda bows to Erik Satie and shows his respect fo rthe great master, who so often is little appreciated since his compositional style is misunderstood or his oeuvre reduced to a few popular pieces. For many listeners, some pieces will be a new discovery, thanks to Fumio Yasuda's selection.

This set of idiomatically lyrical, rhythmic, and colourful interpretations by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and its Chief Conductor, Kirill Karabits, who appears on Chandos for the first time, marks the start of a new series dedicated to lesser-known composers from former Soviet Union countries. At the dawn of Karayev’s centenary, Kirill Karabits pays homage to the composer by exploring some of his best-known works: the Persian-inspired orchestral suite The Seven Beauties (later expanded into a full-length ballet), a movement from the ballet The Path of Thunder, the exuberant Don Quixote (drawing on music for a film), as well as the symphonic poem Leyla and Mejnun, after a poem which Byron called ‘the Romeo and Juliet of the East’.

Hänssler Classic/SWR Music is proud to announce the latest release of jazz great Sammy Nestico in performance with the SWR Big Band. Sammy Nestico is widely considered to be one of the most important American composers and arrangers in the world. He returns once again, to collaborate with the multi-Grammy nominated SWR Big Band on a program featuring entirely his own compositions.

While renowned for his thrilling arrangements of jazz standards, Sammy Nestico is also one of the great jazz composers, as you will hear for yourself on this new recording. In addition to scintillating new arrangements of tunes from the Grammy-nominated "Fun Time," Maestro Nestico adds a sheath of other originals in new charts especially created for the jazz virtuosos of the SWR Big Band.

The result of this latest meeting of the Grand Old man of Swing, with the SWR Big Band will continue to delight jazz collectors everywhere.


"Nestico’s arrangements are mostly about eruptive brass and life-affirming energy, but in the occasional slow piece, like “A Song for Sarah” and “Samantha,” there are rich colors and subtle sonorities which this recording beautifully renders and arrays across a lifelike sound stage." -- Thomas Conrad, JazzTimes.com

Includes fantasia(s) by Alonso de Mudarra. Soloist: Julian Bream.
Includes passacaglia(s) for lute by Silvius Leopold Weiss. Soloist: Julian Bream.

Cambodian composer Chinary Ung was an extreme disadvantage in terms of his musical background; the only Western instrument he was able to study in his native Cambodia was the E flat clarinet, which he learned well enough to enter the Manhattan School of Music in 1964. Since earning his doctorate in music composition at Columbia in 1974, Ung has largely made his career in the United States as a teacher and, partly owing to that, missed the genocide conducted in his home country, although most of his family was not so fortunate. After taking most of the 1980s off to retrieve what he could of Cambodia's seriously endangered traditional music, Ung returned to the United States, his music and perspective forever changed. Prior to October 2007, Ung's highest profile CD release had been the inclusion of his Inner Voices on an Argo disc conducted by Dennis Russell Davies. Jeff von der Schmidt's expert group Southwest Chamber Music, which has already done so much on behalf of Mexican composer Carlos Chávez, now turn its attention to Ung on the Cambria disc Chinary Ung: Aura, Oracle, Still Life After Death.

In the three works mentioned in the front title, composed between 1995 and 2006, Ung creates a seamless merger between the capabilities of Western instruments, contemporary techniques, and the influence of the traditional music of his homeland. The pieces are highly theatrical, with Still Life After Death described as "a small theater work [...] inspired by an ancient Cambodian ritual." Such rituals are closely tied with Buddhism; Aura utilizes two sopranos, singing high-flying passages in Pali and Khmer, floating over a chamber orchestra in which nearly everyone is required to play additional percussion instruments, including bowed crotales, little cymbals common to the ancient world. Current events figure into Ung's texts and music as well; a portion of Aura is a commemoration of the devastation left by Hurricane Katrina, whereas the oracles consulted by the Dalai Lama before his final departure from Tibet is a significant element in the second work, Oracle.

In preparation for his work with Ung, Jeff von der Schmidt himself traveled to Cambodia and Vietnam and toured Angkor Wat; Southwest Chamber Music was the first professional ensemble to perform Ung's music in Cambodia for Cambodians. Its polished, dedicated performances here well-represent Ung's music, and as with the Chávez issues, Cambria's recording here is top quality. There is every reason to support Cambodian culture; at least 3,000 years old, Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge nearly wiped it off the face of the earth. Nevertheless, that is not the only reason to listen to the music of Chinary Ung; he is an excellent, visionary composer, and his work speaks eloquently about his people and the need to rebuild.

-- Dave Lewis, All Music Guide

Classical Music

Doric String Quartet
Alex Redington violin
Jonathan Stone violin
Simon Tandree viola
John Myerscough cello
Recorded in:
Potton Hall, Dunwich, Suffolk, 9-11 February 2011

The three string quartets, Op. 41 make up Schumann’s only published contribution to the genre. They were completed during a period of intense creative activity in 1842. In February, Schumann noted in his diary that he was having ‘continual quartet thoughts’. In April and May, he devoted himself to studying the quartets by Beethoven, Haydn, and Mozart; in early June, the first two quartets were completed, and the third followed soon after in July that same year.

Brimming with the canons with which Schumann was so taken, as well as his characteristic turn of melody, these works all display in full the spirit that one would expect from this most romantic of romantic composers.

Schumann arranged for the first, private, performance of the quartets to take place on 13 September 1842, as a present for his wife, Clara, on her twenty-third birthday. Clara, always supportive of her husband’s efforts, praised them as ‘lucid, finely worked, and always in quartet idiom’. The esteemed theorist and composer Moritz Hauptmann said: ‘His [Schumann’s] first, which delighted me immensely, made me marvel at his talent… it is cleverly conceived and held together, and a great deal of it is very beautiful.’

The Doric String Quartet, exclusive Chandos artists are among the most impressive young quartets on the classical music scene today. They regularly perform at major festivals and venues throughout the UK as well as across continental Europe, Asia, and the US.

Classical Music

Classical Music

This CD contains both DDD and ADD recordings.

Classical Music

"...Recordings of a work like the Trout always have a problem due to the difficulties of balance between piano and a small string ensemble. In this instance the engineers have avoided the pitfalls and have come up with a good balance. A fresh sounding, lively performance appeals with the important piano part played tastefully by Emanuel Ax and a pleasing degree of shading and contrasts from the strings. Good ensemble playing from a highly regarded group... The String Quintet version of Eine Kleine Nachtsmusik makes a welcome second item. More normally heard in a chamber orchestra version, this minimised Mozart (an option from the time of its composition) is a refreshing change. To hear the five lines (two violin parts not a doubling) is a delight, and the 'authentic' movement of recent years must take some credit for the greater appreciation the reduction gives... [An] attractively compiled CD..." -- Harry Downey, MusicWeb International

Bringing together hundreds of performances commercially recorded over the course of 48 years (from 1928 to 1976), the Arthur Rubinstein Collection is a handsome and smartly executed achievement. Its 81 volumes chronologically chart Rubinstein's studio legacy, with each volume serving up liner notes and photographs that place the recordings in satisfying context.
Rubinstein was 88 years old when he recorded Beethoven's last piano concerto. It is a truly wonderful thing to hear the meeting of these two great musical minds in this performance. There is the composer who had, by the time of the "Emperor," thoroughly mastered and transformed the genre of the piano concerto. And there is the pianist who had, by this point in his long and prolific career, mastered and transformed the art playing the piano. Rubinstein's technique is as sure as it ever was, and his sound is unmistakable, especially in the utter refinement with which he ends a phrase. Never, however, does he overpower Beethoven's music with his own musical personality. No, this is a true collaboration between composer and interpreter, one which conductor and Rubinstein protegé Daniel Barenboim fosters with appreciative verve at every turn.

The Ambache is a flexible group fo from three to thirty players. Since its formation in 1984, it has become known for its performances and for the cohesiveness of its collaborative, unconducted teamwork. The Ambache is famous for its championship of music by women composers. Their previous recording of Amy Beach (CHAN9752) was given a Rosette in the Penguin Guide to CDs. Recorded in: St Michael's Church, Highgate, London 28-30 October 2002 Producer(s) Rachel Smith Sound Engineer(s) Jonathan Cooper Matthew Walker (Assistant)

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music