This album aims to highlight one of the instruments that Barrios loved and played most, his Francisco Simplicio guitar, made in 1927. The selected pieces underline the main musical directions that stand out within the vast repertoire linked to Barrios, also making reference to the works of authors that he used to perform and who therefore had a voice on this instrument, like Chopin, Bach or Tarrega.
Both accomplished musicians based in Bayreuth, Anna Bon and Wilhelmine von Bayreuth devoted a significant part of their output to the flute, the instrument of choice of Frederick II. Their sonatas reveal a marked taste for bold harmonies and a remarkable sense of invention. Several decades earlier, Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre had already dazzled the court of Louis XIV with her violin sonatas, described by the Sun King as "very beautiful" and above all "original, a quality found all too rarely today." Too rarely performed, these works find in Marta Gawlas, in her first solo album, a sensitive and inspired interpretation, fully equal to their uniqueness and poetic depth.
This program focuses on the Missa pro defunctis by the composer Charles d'Argentil. Recorded for the first time here, it is one of only a dozen musical settings of the liturgy of the dead written before 1550 to have survived to this day. Little-known today, Charles d'Argentil, who worked in the prestigious Papal Chapel in Rome, was a key figure in the French Renaissance, as well as in the establishment of musical settings of the Requiem for papal ceremonies. His setting sits alongside the three Lamentations du samedi saint by Claudin de Sermisy, composer to the French royal chapel under Francois I, and Jehan Barra's Salve Regina. The Gilles Binchois ensemble here sheds light on an all-too-often overlooked part of musical history, through the generation that directly followed Josquin des Pres. The art of these three composers bears witness to the high level of mastery attained by that productive and talented generation.
The Royal Scottish National Orchestra joins Ukrainian pianist Svetlana Andreeva, conducted by Sergey Neller, to record works by French composer Christian Schittenhelm. The author of numerous musicals performed throughout France and Europe, he is also the creator of a rich symphonic and concerto output. The lush sonorities of Air, his fourth piano concerto, and his symphonic poem Dawn, to which the musicians of the RSNO lend their sumptuous color, meet here with Debussy's Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune, which completes this triptych.
Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre was a virtuoso harpsichordist, as well as the author of many pioneering works. She left an abundant output of cantatas, both secular and sacred. Here the soprano Mailys de Villoutreys, Heloise Gaillard and her Ensemble Amarillis pay tribute to her with the cantatas Judith and Semele, inspired by two women who embody virtue and courage on the one hand, temerity and pride on the other. Whether intimate or more operatic, both works highlight the composer's innate sense of drama. This recording also includes some of her instrumental works. The Suite in G major, from her Pieces de clavecin of 1707, is a pioneering work, representing the new genre of accompanied harpsichord music. Her Trio Sonata No.4, in a totally new instrumentation, shows the influence of Corelli, while the art of ornamentation in this, one of her finest achievements, is purely French.
Liszt combined the whirlwind life of a virtuoso traveling all over Europe with a deep attachment to the Catholic faith and the Church. While his brilliant technique and fiery interpretations made him an unparalleled virtuoso, his sacred music, for which he was less well known, represented what was dearest in his own eyes. From 1856 onwards, he devoted himself more particularly to this field and set about reforming religious music in order to restore it to it's rightful place of honor, capable of meeting the demands of conveying the divine message and mystery. His musical discourse becomes sparer but is also profoundly innovative, with many individual turns of language and harmonic daring. Dominique Vellard turns his attention here to the lesser-known works of this period, such as the Septem sacramenta or Pater noster, which exude the same serenity, the same feeling of peace and light.
No one who is aware of Ravel's talent for transcription will be surprised to find his music performed here on the marimba! On Ravel Influence(s), Trio SR9 and their guests, Kyrie Kristmanson, Shani Diluka and Astrig Siranossian, explore his various sources of inspiration, from Spain to Russia. The program features transcriptions of works by Rachmaninoff, Faure, de Falla, as well as the world premiere recording of Prisme for three prepared marimbas by Colombian composer Daniel Arango-Prada.
