The acclaimed pianist Mark Bebbington marks his Resonus Classics debut, and the start of a new French music series, with a major new recording of works by Francis Poulenc. Joined by conductor Jan Latham-Koenig, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, this varied programme of works for piano features the Piano Concerto (the last of his five concertos) and the rarely-recorded piano version of the Concert champêtre so often performed by Poulenc himself. Bebbington is also joined by oboist John Roberts and bassoonist Jonathan Davies for the Trio for Piano, Oboe & Bassoon, and the Sonata for Oboe & Piano.

FRANCIS POULENC. TENEBRAE; NIGEL SHORT, CONDUCTOR. MASS IN G; LITANIES A LA VIERGE NOIR; SALVE REGINA; UN SOIR DE NEIGE; FIGURE HUMAINE; QUATRE PETITES PRIERES DE SAINT FRANCOIS D'ASSISE.

Paul Huang and Helen Huang have been exploring the repertoire for violin and piano for now a decade. As a way of celebrating their fruitful and enriching collaboration, they have devised this album as an ingenious game of mirroring. The title of this second album for na�ve is not accidental, as the two musicians offer highly diverse perspectives. This new recording focuses first on two sonatas composed by Francis Poulenc (1942-1943) and Sergei Prokofiev (1938-1946) during the second world war of the 20th century, respectively at the opening and closing of this album. Between these two pieces, Spiegel i'm Spiegel by Arvo Part (1978), a page with ethereal lines, a moment of introspection and calm that becomes a space for contemplation and reflection necessary in this otherwise dense and angular programme.

Frensh Music For Flute And Har

PROKOFIEV, S.: Oboe Quintet, Op. 39 / Overture on Hebrew The

Composing over 150 works for piano and voice over a period of 44 years, the songs of Francis Poulenc remain consistently popular to concert audiences the world over. Varying in their individual style and character in a way that defies generalization, Poulenc set music to a wide range of different French poetry - both ancient and modern, and from the serious to the surreal. This is the fourth release in our series that will encompass the complete songs of Francis Poulenc, performed by some of the greatest singers of the day and accompanied by the exceptional Malcolm Martineau.

Composing over 150 works for piano and voice over a period of 44 years, the songs of Francis Poulenc remain consistently popular to concert audiences the world over. Varying in their individual style and character, Poulenc set music to a wide range of different French poetry – both ancient and modern, and from the serious to the surreal. The final disc in Signum’s series of The Complete Songs of Francis Poulenc features a cast of the finest singers of our generation, accompanied by Malcolm Martineau as well as additional instrumental soloists for Poulenc’s larger-ensemble settings of his songs.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Stephen Layton and the Danish National Vocal Ensemble put together a program representing both Francis Poulenc's secular and sacred choral music. He was a man of contradictions, often glaring ones at that; Poulenc was a declared homosexual and devout Catholic in the first half of the twentieth century. The traditionalists called him a modernist, the modernists called him old-fashioned. His music sounded so good that many people were loath to admit him to the serious musical world of Europe. Poulenc died in 1963, and the rascal half of him was there until the end: “Even though you may think the music is in bad taste, you must play your heart out all the same. I am quite aware of what I can do. And pianists must remember that you can never use too much pedal!”

Francis Poulenc is not an easy composer to relate to. Not the man himself perhaps- though possibly that too- but his music. It is somehow dated. Here is a composer who produced his best works, all more or less completely tonal, at a time when Arnold Schoenberg was writing twelve-tone music and Poulenc's countrymen Oliver Messiaen and Pierre Boulez were into innovative rhythms, scales and techniques to lift the music out of the realm of subjective emotionalism. This release features three concertos by Francis Poulenc. The Concerto for Organ, Strings and Timpani (1938) is considered to be the most popular and, perhaps, the most serious. The Piano Concerto (1949), a light concerto a wellspring of musical ideas, more or less brutally juxtaposed. The Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra (1932) lies perhaps somewhere between these two.

Classical Music

Classical Music