The music of Brahms, regardless of tastes, trends or aesthetic currents, is already part of the whisper of history. It does not need defenders, it does not concern detractors. It just stays. This recording that is presented here breathes nobility. Nobility in the message of Brahms's work and nobility in an interpretation that also starts from an absolute devotion to the music of two performers in a moment of full artistic maturity. There are no hesitations here either, the ideas are clearly and emphatically exposed, everything emerges and develops as if there were no other possibility of interpretation. Pure music that demands a total surrender and that parts from the deep knowledge of the Brahmsian language that the interpreters display at all times.

Sebasti�n Dur�n is usually recognized as one of the leading Spanish composers of theater music, although this repertoire is barely performed nowadays, even in concert version. As far as we know, ten complete scores of Dur�n's stage works have been preserved, four of which are entirely sung, a number that is higher than that found in theater music by other important Spanish musicians of the 17th and 18th centuries, such as Juan Hidalgo, Juan de Navas or Antonio Literes. The fact that, in his theater music, Dur�n uses both the conventions of 17th-century Spanish court theater and some elements of the dramma per musica has placed these pieces in a diffuse and poorly understood territory, unlike what happens with the works of Hidalgo and Literes, repertoire which has been studied better. For some scholars, the theater music of Dur�n is incoherent due to the introduction of elements that are unfamiliar to the Spanish court theater, in contrast to the great dramaturgy devised by Calder�n de la Barca and Hidalgo. On the contrary, for other scholars, the music of Dur�n is remarkable for it's openness to modernity, although it is a timid modernization against the determined Italianization that is observed in Literes and other later musicians. In our opinion, however, Dur�n's theater work exhibits great originality and drama in itself, which is hardly understandable if we approach it with the abstract models that face tradition to modernity, or Spanish to Italian.

In the year 2020, the world celebrates the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz after the Holocaust. Around the same time, in the G�rlitz concentration camp, the composer Oliver Messiaen wrote his "Quartet for the End of Time", a fundamental work in the history of chamber music of the 20th century, which in 2021 will celebrate the 80th anniversary of it's premiere. This album provides the recording of two chamber music works, possibly the most important of the 20th century: The Quartet pour la fin du Temps (Messiaen) and Quatrain II (Takemitsu), both for an unusual instrumental group: clarinet, violin, cello and piano. The Quartet pour la fin du Temps was inspired by the tenth chapter of the Book of Revelation and it is dedicated to the Angel of the Apocalypse. This religious backdrop is accompanied by a great wealth of images that fed Messiaen's creativity and it finds inspiration in multiple and varied sources such as Hindu rhythms, the Greek metrics, the singing of birds... Takemitsu composed Quatrain II in 1976-1977 with the same instrumentation of Messiaen's Quartet. An homage to Messiaen, in the same way that Messiaen's Quartet is based on numeric symbolism, Quatrain is organized around the number four: four in the sense of plenitude, balance, symmetry, four instruments used, four sections... The artists of this album constitute a stable chamber group, they are regular soloists with the most important orchestras in Europe, teachers of the higher schools in Spain and regular masterclass in Europe.

Joan Enric Lluna writes of this release: "Leonard Bernstein has always loomed large among the musicians who have most fascinated me. Not only did he demonstrate huge vitality and charisma as a conductor, and compose the wonderful music that is his legacy, but he worked tirelessly as a communicator and "pedagogue". His explanations of wide-ranging aspects of music to the viewers of his television programme for children, his lectures at Harvard University and his books have all been an enormous source of information. In recognition of the centenary of his birth, we dedicate to him this recording of his works for clarinet. At the same time, we pay homage to another musician whom I greatly admire - Benny Goodman - and include two other works directly linked to the theme of this album - the impact of jazz on Bernstein's output. In "Lenny" (Bernstein's nickname among his friends and collaborators), Oscar Navarro perfectly captures the spirit of the great master's music. After playing in the premi�re of his work for chamber group, I was so impressed that I asked Oscar for a version for clarinet. I am most grateful to Oscar for his efforts. The Kapustin Trio, originally for flute, elaborates on the impact of jazz on classical composition from a more contemporary perspective. In the years between Bernstein and Kapustin, rock, pop and other trends all made their mark, and their influence can likewise be heard in this trio. I was urged to make this version by my friends and collaborators Juan Carlos Garvayo and Paco Moya, and I hope listeners will appreciate how well it works with clarinet. I have changed various octaves, enhancing the music's intensity, and translating the flute part to the specific "language" of the clarinet."

Paul Hindemith (1895-1963) is without a doubt, one of the most revolutionary composers of the 20th Century. Among his achievements, completing a sonata for each of the orchestral instruments shows how versatile this composer was. As an acclaimed violist himself, he dedicated to the viola an extended part of his complex and unique composing literature. These four monumental sonatas for viola solo represent the backbone of the viola repertoire, which also demonstrates a synergy of compositional language rooted in the Baroque, representing the technical, structural and philosophical evolution of this German composer. Thirty-year-old Spanish violist Jesus Rodolfo Rodriguez is widely recognized for his performances, which combine the spontaneity and fearless imagination of youth with the discipline and precision of a mature artist. He has been praised by the New York Times, Digest, as "... Jesus Rodolfo is a start whose light transcends the stage...”, his authority over the most complex technical demands of the repertoire as well as for the depth of his musical insight made his stand among the top young musicians in the world.

Now I have this conscientious and exquisite work in my hands, Pr�lude, which contains a series of musical pieces inviting us to define the pianist both for his selection and for his interpretation. If we listen to them attentively, we are revealed the performer's personality. Here is the delicate spirit that is born from the respect for compositions and the art of combining it with a passion which is increasingly evident in him, a more determined and mature, almost daring. The playing of these notes in the hands of Antonio Galera is not based on an exhibition of skills that are no longer questioned but on the talented flow of music, which turns simplicity into poetry and passion into what is most difficult in it's development. (Elvira Lindo, journalist and writer)

The present release is the result of a determined and independent search for sound. It represents a commitment shared between the composer, performer and producer to popularize a little known musical repertoire; one which has been largely ignored in recent contemporary Spanish compositional history, but one that is nevertheless deserving of recognition. In the search for this sound, we began with the composer Luis de Pablo (b. Bilbao, 1930), that indefatigable seeker with the wide intellectual profile. With his sterling reputation as an artist, a study of Luis de Pablo is an essential ingredient to any understanding of contemporary Spanish music. Above all, we observed the behaviour of this leading composer; assuming, in his case, it stemmed from a deep personal conviction; one which led him to manage, promote, and disseminate contemporary creativity in all of it's many expressions.

The six Suites are today the musical bible of cellists, the work with which they touch the sky, the limit which marks their arrival to absolute maturity. And this is how Asier Polo also approaches it. His interpretation goes to the essential. It is modern and made from the knowledge of historicist criteria. It puts music and it's author before the performer. For a long time Polo had known he had to go to the core of the piece, stripping it of the guise that has covered it throughout the 80 years since the first recording. For this reason, he has dispensed with some resources related to color because he seeks the original value of the piece, it's foundation, without caring that such a vision places the performer in the background, as opposed to others that are much more personal. For a cellist, Bach is the destination. Once the interpretation of the six suites has been refined enough to record them, nothing is ever the same again. The rest of the music is no longer seen in the same way. Even fans do not see the same person playing them, because of the quality of the score and of the aura surrounding it.

The recording of such a complex and ambitious work as Gustav Mahler's Fifth Symphony by the Malaga Philharmonic Orchestra (OFM in Spanish) is a demonstration of the determination and enthusiasm with which the group is facing his 30th anniversary. Highly artistic work, Mahler's Fifth Symphony is of great extension and expressive intensity; it is full of deep symbolism and evident spirituality. It is a musical and intellectual monument testing the quality of an orchestra and it's conductor. It is a challenge that, in a market full of references to the Austrian composer's masterpiece, the OFM faces with all the potential the work demands. In his first four symphonies, Gustav Mahler tried to identify with four ideas: the first, the power of will against destiny; the second, hope in the resurrection; in the third a certain "Nietzschean" pantheism, and the fourth is a musical manifesto about innocence. There is in all of them that kind of youthful lyricism which it's first songs have, a style that is nipped in the bud in his Fifth Symphony, completed in 1902 and premiered in Cologne by the G�rzenich Orchestra on 18 October 1904 under the direction of the author. The language he uses in his Fifth Symphony seems to be anticipating the future, in a kind of progressive tonality tending towards a certain harmonic instability and reinforcing the words of the composer himself who, sure of his technical mastery, goes so far as to say: "There will be no romantic or mystical elements in my work; it will simply be the expression of an unparalleled power of the activity of a man in the light of the sun, who has reached his vital climax".

In their last recording project Handel Tribute, L'Apoth�ose pays homage to the great composer by performing six chamber music top pieces chosen from his op. 2, op. 5 and solo instrument with basso continuo repertoire. Mozart is reputed to have said of G. F. H�ndel (1685-1759): Handel understands affect better than any of us. When he chooses, he strikes like a thunderbolt. L'Apoth�ose is considered as one of the reference groups in the historical interpretation in Spain. In recent years the ensemble has won 12 national and international awards including the First Prize at the 2019 York Early Music International Young Artists Competition (United Kingdom), First Prize at the G�ttingen H�ndel Competition 2017 (Germany), Second Prize at the prestigious International Van Wassenaer Competition 2018 within the Oude Muziek Festival in Utrecht (Netherlands) and the Second Prize at the Concours International de Musique Ancienne de Val de Loire 2017 (France) chaired by William Christie. All these merits have brought L'Apoth�ose to become "Ensemble in Residence" of the 2019/2020 season of the CNDM (Centro Nacional de Difusi�n Musical) in Spain and to the main international and national venues.

The double bass is the instrument through which I express myself in it's purest form. I feel that creating this album is my way of expressing gratitude to it. It is essential for me that everything has meaning. By taking the sonata form as the guiding thread for the album, I have meticulously assembled the pieces, as if they were a puzzle. Each of the works holds great significance for me, representing an important part of my relationship with music. The sonata is the structural form that has been widely used in European classical music since the mid-eighteenth century. Therefore, given that Johannes Brahms, especially his sonatas for violin and piano, has had the most significant impact on my musical life, I wanted to pay him a small tribute.

In this recording, you will find a dialogue between two of the most essential funerary musical works of the German Baroque.

In 2022, we celebrated Heinrich Schütz, a central figure of the album, on the 350th anniversary of his death. As a culmination of a series of projects around his person and work, this recording wants to serve as a tribute to an extraordinary musical legacy that found in Johann Sebastian Bach, its greatest supporter. The manifest bond between both composers here is seen in the way in which death is shaken and beaten for later, collected from within our soul, be restored and sublimated by two artistic personalities capable of transcending a rich amalgamation of religious, cultural, and musical aspects around the ars moriendi of his time. Schütz’s Musikalische Exequien and Bach’s Actus Tragicus stem from a creative attitude toward death that is very close to home one from the other. Thus, it is not by chance that with their listening, both works fill us with peace and the deep sense of rest with which they do it.

On the 20th of August 2022, the centenary of the passing of Felipe Pedrell transpired—an occasion marking the solemn remembrance of the esteemed progenitor of Spanish musical nationalism. The catalogue of musical compositions by Pedrell, established in 1977, comprises a total of 231 titles. However, it encompasses more than five hundred works when considering revisions and reinterpretations of certain compositions. In the catalogue of his works, there is a notable emphasis on his interest in art song with accompaniment, serving as the foundation for his musical creations and a key element in his nationalist ideology. His initial compositions for voice and piano date back to 1857, where he endeavours to distance himself from the prevailing trends in Spanish music during his era and align with European musical styles. He achieves this by utilizing texts from Germanic poets associated with the early Romantic period, such as Heine and Uhland, while also drawing influence from the Italian operatic tradition. Expanding his list of authors, he incorporates the works of his contemporaries from France, Catalonia, and the rest of Spain, being the first Spaniard to title his collections of songs and melodies with the German word Lieder, starting from 1871. The Pedrell songs are marked by enormous contrast, and all closely related to the text’s message. The voice and piano accompaniment are superbly treated, and some songs exhibit exotic influences (Arab), at times mysterious and at others romantic. Undoubtedly, a work worthy of being among the most important lyrical repertoire.

The Resonare Fibris project arises from the need to confront times, that is, to put them in dialogue and submit them to a game of mirrors. Superposition and mixture, contraposition, dissolution, decontextualization, deconstruction… ways of proposing an approach to music that goes beyond proposing a merely contemplative listening to become a challenge: that of achieving an active listening. The meeting and dialogue with the pianist Mario Prisuelos, the poet Pilar Martín Gila and myself, gave shape to a proposal where music and poetry share a common point: the reinterpretation of a past time, that of the Spanish Renaissance. This dialogue between the ancient and the present stems from essential voices: among others, Tomás Luis de Victoria, Francisco Guerrero, Cristóbal de Morales or Sebastián de Vivanco. The work is written for piano and electronics, where the latter is conceived as a spatial extension of the instrument.

In many ways it was Joaquín Rodrigo’s own work that eclipsed the vast majority of what he composed. The international success of Concierto de Aranjuez has meant that much of the rest of his work remains relatively unknown. With this in mind, it is interesting to note that Rodrigo is one of the twentieth century’s most prolific Spanish composers, with a huge opus of around 170 works awaiting rediscovery. He is, therefore, much more than just the composer of the Concierto de Aranjuez. This album is a step along the path to bringing the composer’s other music to the public’s attention. Rodrigo had very close ties with the European Neoclassicism of the nineteen thirties which sought inspiration in the classical musical tradition. In this sense, although folkloric elements are certainly present in his music, what differentiates the composer is his ability to focus his attention on the tradition of Spanish classical music. It is this which marks him out so significantly from the generations of earlier composers who tended to seek inspiration in popular music. The Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana (OCV), leading orchestra at Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía, comprises international musicians, personally selected by the founder music director, Lorin Maazel, who has been leading the orchestra from 2006 to 2011. Joan Lluna has performed as a conductor-soloist with orchestras as the Manchester Camerata, Luzerne Festival Strings, Covent Garden Chamber Orchestra, Orquesta de Valencia, ADDA simfònica, etc.