From Irish ballads to stirring film scores (The Last of Mohicans, Titanic), via The Cranberries, U2, Enya, Sting, The Pogues, Secret Garden, The Corrs and more, Camille Berthollet brings us 16 new tracks on her latest album. Accompanied by the talented musician and arranger Johan Daalgard, as well as a host of instrumental collaborators, she celebrates the Celtic world in a refined style on violin and cello. Recorded in an ancient monastery in Brittany, this programme reveals the intimate, emotion-filled dialogue between the artist and her instruments.

Gelosia! (Jealousy!), Philippe Jaroussky's latest project with the instrumentalists of Artaserse, takes it's dramatic name from two solo cantatas receiving world premiere recordings. Programmed beside cantatas by Vivaldi, Handel and Alessandro Scarlatti, they are by the Neapolitan Nicola Porpora (1686-1768) and the Venetian Baldassare Galuppi (1706-1785). Though composed some 35 years apart, both cantatas set the same text, 'La Gelosia', written by the prolific Pietro Metastasio. "The cantata da camera or secular cantata, was an incredibly popular genre in the 18th century," explains Philippe Jaroussky. "Written for a solo singer, it often portrays a man or woman going through the torments of love and depicts the character's various states of mind... Cantatas of this kind served, I believe, as a kind of personal diary for composers. Being away from opera, with it's more academic demands, they could write as they wanted, completely free to express their feelings."

From Irish ballads to stirring film scores (The Last of Mohicans, Titanic), via The Cranberries, U2, Enya, Sting, The Pogues, Secret Garden, The Corrs and more, Camille Berthollet brings us 16 new tracks on her latest album. Accompanied by the talented musician and arranger Johan Daalgard, as well as a host of instrumental collaborators, she celebrates the Celtic world in a refined style on violin and cello. Recorded in an ancient monastery in Brittany, this programme reveals the intimate, emotion-filled dialogue between the artist and her instruments.

With Pianosong, Alexandre Tharaud pays homage to the great French singers and songwriters of the 20th century (Brel, Piaf, Barbara, Gainsbourg, Trenet, Ferr�, Berger) by transposing their songs into a new pianistic and symphonic language. This is not a cover album, nor a tribute in the conventional sense. It is a collection of musical metamorphoses, through improvisation, arrangement, orchestration, and interpretation.

'Consolation was nurtured by my aspiration to create a musical haven, a soothing balm, a ray of hope, a bundle of joy, a room to meditate, a visit back to memory lane, and an unexpected highlight in everyone's life.' Suffering people who often experienced despair and loneliness, are the inspiration behind Alain's writing of Consolation, which he started composing at the end of the pandemic. Lef�vre's music is melodic, like a soothing balm in spite of everything, each of his pieces is a little tableau of life. This is perhaps his most accomplished opus of compositions to date.

Premiered at New York's Metropolitan Opera in 2022 - with Joyce DiDonato, Renée Fleming and Kelli O'Hara as it's stars - Kevin Puts's The Hours was praised by The New York Times as "sincere and persuasive... fervent... and soaringly lyrical". The opera returns to the Met's schedule in May 2024. Based on both the award-winning 2002 film directed by Stephen Daldry and the original novel by Michael Cunningham, The Hours interweaves characters and events from three different periods of the 20th century. Joyce DiDonato, who takes the pivotal role of writer Virginia Woolf, says that: "Even though it deals with death head-on, the piece is life-affirming and tells a timeless story. The characters' struggles are shared universally, and by highlighting them through the different personalities and periods, hopefully everybody can find a part of themselves in the story."

This audio recording showcases the opera The Hours, by the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Kevin Puts, which played to sold-out audiences at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City during it's world-premiere staged production last season. Featuring a libretto by Greg Pierce, adapted from Michael Cunningham's acclaimed novel and inspired by Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, the powerful story concerns three women from different eras who each grapple with their inner demons and roles in society. Joyce DiDonato (interpreting the role of Virginia Woolf) is joined by Renée Fleming as Clarissa Vaughan and Kelli O'Hara as Laura Brown, among others in this superstar cast, conducted by Yannick Nezet-Séguin.

The first album from Nathalie Stutzmann as conductor features Dvořák's well known Symphony No. 9" From The New World" and the lesser known American Suite. Nathalie Stutzmann studied conducting with legendary Finnish teacher Jorma Panula, and has benefited from the mentoring of Simon Rattle and the late Seiji Ozawa. She holds two major posts in the USA - Music Director at the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and Principal Guest Conductor of The Philadelphia Orchestra - and has guest engagements with the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Bayreuth Festival amongst others. Simon Rattle told the NY times: "Nathalie is the real thing. So much love, intensity and sheer technique."

Campra Requiem; Rameau & Mondonville Motets Le Concert D'Astree (Artist), Emmanuelle Ha�m

A household word when speaking of repertoire, legendary flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal devoted just as much effort to establishing the masterpieces in their rightful place as to unearthing countless works from the baroque, classical and romantic eras. As far as concertos are concerned, cornerstones by Bach, Mozart and Vivaldi thus gained worldwide fame, and it went the same way for Ibert, Jolivet and Nielsen. Unfailing lyric sense, purity of style, magnificent tone, grace of phrasing, fabulous virtuosity, tremendous commitment... Critics, colleagues and the public were all running out of superlatives. Immediately valued as references, his recordings still fascinate and often leave the listener exhilarated. This 12 CD set tries the challenge of surrounding these marvels with some of the most dazzling rediscoveries, offering famous and less famous music, but equally glorious interpretations.

This was something I'd had in mind for a long time..." says pianist Alexandre Tharaud, "to put together an album for the sheer pleasure of it, in collaboration with dear friends and paying tribute to the wonders of the piano duet repertoire." The aptly named 4 Hands offers 18 tracks, each just a few minutes in length, each featuring Tharaud sharing a piano keyboard with a different partner. The repertoire ranges wide - from Bach to Glass by way of such composers as Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Grieg, Fauré, Satie, Debussy, Ravel, Rachmaninoff, Ravel, and Piazzolla. 15 of Tharaud's fellow performers are celebrated pianists - among them the late Nicholas Angelich, Mariam Batsashvili, Bertrand Chamayou, David Fray, Víkingur Ólafsson, and Beatrice Rana. The other three, all stars in their musical fields, are shown in a new, pianistic light: cellist Gautier Capuçon, countertenor Philippe Jaroussky and singer-songwriter Juliette. "The piano duet is one of life's miracles," continues Tharaud. "First and foremost, it is the most intimate way of playing chamber music... It was a joy to record this album... If hearing these pieces prompts people to buy some sheet music and enjoy playing duets together - just as we did in the recording studio - then I will have achieved my aim.

Erik Satie and John Cage are UFOs in the world of music, because they envisioned music through a completely different prism," says pianist Bertrand Chamayou. "They are pioneers in the sense that, for many people, they changed the very idea of what music must be." With his album Letter(s) to Erik Satie Chamayou pays tribute to two idiosyncratic, innovative and influential composers, one born in Normandy in 1866, the other in Los Angeles in 1912. There is a strong connection between them: Cage considered Satie a source of inspiration. Satie takes pride of place on the album with such pieces as the three Gymnop�dies and the seven Gnossiennes, while Cage is represented by five pieces and a work attributed to him following it's rediscovery amongst the papers of his disciple James Tenney - whose musical homage to Satie also features in the programme. Chamayou recorded the album at the state-of-the-art Miraval Studios in Provence, which inspired him to take an experimental approach: "I thought we should do something a little different - and I thought of Erik Satie. This was an opportunity to get really intimate with the piano... Satie is really a special case, a strange musician unlike anyone else.

Innovator, erudite, entertaining and acclaimed conductor Sir Roger Norrington founded the Sch�tz Choir, became founding music director of Kent Opera and established the London Classical Players, the period-instrument orchestra. His recordings of historically informed Beethoven's complete symphonies with the later that opened his collaboration with EMI received unanimous critical acclaim. The success led to a busy and productive recording programme that covered music from Purcell and Handel to Wagner, Brahms and Bruckner, encompassing orchestral works, choral works and opera. A rich and varied collection of recordings released under EMI, Virgin and Warner Classics that illustrates the Guardian's observation: "arguably the most important British conductor of the last half century... a man who has emphatically changed classical music for the better."

Conductor John Nelson and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg record Berlioz's orchestral song cycle on a libretto by Th�ophile Gautier, Les Nuits d'�t�, sung by (bari)tenor Michael Spyres. This is the first ever recording of the original 1856 version by one single voice.

Eric Tanguy's focus on "imagination, poetry and an interior world" has helped to make him one of the most widely performed French composers of today. Belonging in a line that leads back from his mentor Henri Dutilleux to Messiaen and Debussy, he does not identify with any specific 'school' of composition. His aesthetic has also been shaped by the music of Sibelius and his technique is characterised by intricate use of modes. "There is rigour and purpose behind my music," he says, but I don't expect the listener to have to decode it... It's the feeling that matters." The album In a Dream takes it's title from a piece for violin and piano, one of the eight chamber works on it's programme. Composed between 1999 and 2019, they are performed here by violinists Alexandra Conunova and Rosanne Philippens, viola-player Lise Berthaud, cellist Edgar Moreau, clarinettist Pierre G�nisson, pianists Suzana Bartal and David Kadouch, and string ensemble Quatuor Diotima.

"We take you on a journey that leads to new places - beyond the places you know," is how Jakub Josef Orlinski describes the idea behind his album Beyond. The multiple award-winning countertenor has already been celebrated by international critics for his selection of works for his album Facce d'amore. Now he has put together an extraordinary program of vocal and instrumental works by 18 composers of the early Italian Baroque. They were important figures in their day, but their names have since been almost forgotten. Alongside Claudio Monteverdi, Giulio Caccini, Johann Caspar Kerll and Francesco Cavalli are certainly among the musicians who are still known today - but they are rarely heard: Names such as Pallavicino, Marini and Jarzebski.

Together with musicologist Yannis François, the countertenor delved deep into the repertoire of the 17th century and unearthed a repertoire that is second to none: "This music reaches beyond its time. It is still lively, vibrant, moving and entertaining," says Orlinski enthusiastically. His selection includes ten world premiere recordings, for example the aria "Dolcissime catene" from Giovanni Cesare Netti's opera La moglie del fratello. The album is also a varied compilation of arias, cantatas, madrigals, concerti and purely instrumental works such as sonatas and symphonies. In the original sound ensemble Il Pomo d'Oro, Jakub Josef Orlinski has found a musical partner full of esprit and enthusiasm.

A musician as loved as he was admired, the pianist Nicholas Angelich died in Paris in April 2022 at the age of 51. Angelich was a modest, thoughtful man who brought tremendous integrity, depth and insight to the most demanding repertoire. His association with Warner Classics lasted some 20 years, and the label pays tribute to him with this 7CD collection of previously unreleased recordings of solo, chamber and concerto repertoire. Made either in the concert hall or for radio broadcast between 1999 and 2016, they range wide, including works by Bach, Bart�k, Beethoven Berg, Brahms, Franck, Haydn, Liszt, Mussorgsky, Ravel, Rachmaninov and Zemlinsky. Appearing with Angelich are Martha Argerich, Quatuor Eb�ne, Myung-Whun Chung and the Orchestre philharmonique de Radio France, and Tugan Sokhiev and the Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse.

Opera audiences in 19th-century Paris may never have visited India, but they loved to dream about it. After the successes enjoyed by Lesp�cheurs de perles and Le roi de Lahore Delibes knew what he was doing when he chose to set an adaptation of Pierre Loti's exotic Indian novel Rarahu and duly scored a hit with his opera Lakm� at the Op�ra-Comique in 1883. The opera is nothing without a star in the title-role.

Destination Paris is a concept album from our best-selling core classical artist, following the success stories of Intuition (84,000), Emotions (145,000), and Sensations (63,000). Well-known lean-back repertoire from popular film melodies to French chansons to classical pieces - including "La Foule" by Édith Piaf, the main theme from Summer of '42 by Michel Legrand, "Beau soir" by Debussy, Sicilienne by Fauré, and "Chi Mai" by Ennio Morricone. Recorded with pianist Jérôme Ducros, the Maîtrise de Radio France, and the Orchestre de chambre de Paris under conductor Lionel Bringuier. Jean Jacques Goldman, one of France's most popular songwriters and composers, wrote a new song for this album, "Pense à nous", for cello, children's choir and orchestra and made a special arrangement of his "Envole-moi". Paris will be a worldwide destination in 2024 as the hosting city of the Olympic Games, for which Gautier's album will be the perfect soundtrack.

Gautier Capu�on's new album Sensations is a mix of popular music, classical (Smetana's Moldau), film (John Williams's Schindler's List), and well-known French songs ("La Vie en Rose", Jacques Brel's "Quand on n'a que l'amour").

An ode to silence is how harpsichordist Jean Rondeau has described Bach's Goldberg Variations. "I feel they were written for silence, in the sense that they take the place of silence," he says. "All Bach is there in the Goldberg Variations... all music is there... and I will no doubt spend my life working on them." To prepare his interpretation he consulted an original printed edition of the work, containing Bach's own markings and corrections. "Through delving into this precious musicological source, I was able to make what I felt to be the most authentic choices." Rondeau performs the set of variations in it's complete form, with the indicated repeats and with judicious insertion of moments of silence.

Countertenor Philippe Jaroussky and soprano Emoke Bar�th appear on the soundtrack of a 2022 film by the award-winning Czech director Petr V�clav. Called Il Boemo (The Bohemian), it tells the story of the Prague-born composer Josef Myslivecek (1737-1781). He became a major figure on Europe's operatic scene, achieving particular renown in Venice, Naples and Munich and composing more than two dozen operas in all. Myslivecek is also notable for being a friend and colleague of Mozart, whom he first met in Bologna in 1770. Both Philippe Jaroussky and Emoke Bar�th make on-screen appearances - as operatic performers - in Il Boemo. V�clav Luks conducts Collegium 1704, the period-instrument ensemble he founded in Prague in 2005.

For me, Strauss is one of the greatest composers," Diana Damrau has said. "The way he handles the soprano voice is a joy. And to be able to sing his music with my voice feels like coming home." The centrepiece of this album of Strauss songs is the sublime Vier letzte Lieder, in which Damrau - born and trained in Bavaria - joins forces with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and it's long-standing Chief Conductor Mariss Jansons. Her partner in a tempting and diverse selection of songs with piano is Helmut Deutsch. "Not only is Strauss's music gorgeous," says Damrau, "there's the way he combines words and notes - and the psychology.

Renaud Capu�on expands his wide-ranging concerto discography with Bart�k's two violin concertos. Composed almost three decades apart, they are highly contrasted, inhabiting very different emotional and musical worlds. Partnering Capu�on is the London Symphony Orchestra under it's Principal Guest Conductor, Fran�ois-Xavier Roth. - Firmly established as one of the world's greatest violinists, Renaud Capucon's career both on the stage and as a recording artist has spanned a wide gamut of concerto repetoire, chamber music and recitals. He has a reputation for impeccable performances and fine interpretations of classics and lesser-known repetoire, from his most recent albums with critically-acclaimed readings of the Bach Violin Concertos and the Vasks Violin Concerto, and a recital disc with Khatia Buniatishvili, to the Beethoven / Korngold and Brahms/Berg concerots, Renaud has become known for the breadth of his repetoire, his world-class chamber music partners, and the quality of is playing.

Cellist Edgar Moreau, with the WDR Sinfonieorchester and conductor Andris Poga, performs two concertante works from the mid-20th century: Mieczyslaw Weinberg's Concerto in C minor (1956), and Henri Dutilleux's Tout un monde lointain... (1970). Both were premiered by the great Mstislav Rostropovich, which creates a special link with Moreau: in 2014 in Paris, he won the Young Soloist Prize in the Rostropovich Cello Competition. In recent years, interest has grown in the music of the Polish-born Jewish composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg, who was mentored by Shostakovich. The title Tout un monde lointain... evokes a distant world, and Dutilleux's five-movement work does indeed take us to a very different place from Weinberg's, drawing inspiration from the sensuous poems of Charles Baudelaire. Praising Edgar Moreau's last Erato album, Transmission, Gramophone wrote: "His tone is beautiful, his phrasing rapt, and the intensity of his delivery is magnified in the immediacy of his presence in the sound picture."

In Dualit�, an album of arias from nine Handel operas, soprano Emoke Bar�th explores "the duality of the female soul - in which sensitivity unites with power" and the potential of the female voice to characterise both heroines and heroes. At the same time, she provides an insight into the careers of her 18th century counterparts, notably the prime donne of Handel's opera company in London. Bar�th is partnered by Artaserse under the direction of Philippe Jaroussky.