This album received the 2006 Grammy Award for "Best Instrumental Soloist Performance (without Orchestra)."
All tracks have been digitally mastered using 24-bit technology.

This is a DSD (Direct Stream Digital) recording

Leen de Broekert present his own Van Vulpen organ in the Abbey in Middelburg with adventurous music. With music by Buxtehude, B�hm, Bach, Mozart, Mendelssohn and Bo�ly. Included on this CD: Aria: La Capricciosa is by far Buxtehude's most extended composition for keyboard instrument. In 32 variations the composer unleashes his imagination on the Bergamasca, a 15th-century dance-tune from the region of Bergamo. Many 16th- and 17th - century composers took the melody and/or harmonic scheme of the Bergamasca as a starting point for a series of variations. Perhaps, being a manualiter work, La Capricciosa is firstly conceived for the harpsichord. However, if one concentrates on the variations written in an idiom appropriate for the organ, the variations 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 11, 12, 15, 20, 19, 24, 29, 30, 13 and 1 may be convincingly arranged as a cycle of 16 parts. Whilst still a boy of fourteen, Felix Mendelssohn composed the Ostinato in C minor. It is obvious that he must have modeled this work on Bach's Passacaglia in C minor. As towards the end of the piece Mendelssohn's writing seems to have become more and more sketchy, the danger of an anti-climax looms. By putting, where necessary, some flesh on the bare bones of Mendelssohn's composition, Leen de Broekert tried to bring the work to a convincing culmination. He also added a short introduction. Leen de Broekert (1949-2009) studied Piano and Organ at the Royal Academy of Music in The Hague. He graduated in both subjects. He also qualified as a harpsichord player and fortepianist with Jos van Immerseel. In 1979 he was one of the laureates of the International Contest for Organ in Bruges, with an honourable citation for his Interpretation of Bach. As a fortepianist and organist he was frequently asked for concerts in Germany as well as in Holland. He also performed in England, France, Belgium, Sweden, Austria, Italy and Switzerland and recorded several CDs both on pianoforte and organ. Leen de Broekert was the organist of the Koorkerk (Abbey church) in Middelburg. He died, at the age of sixty, after a short illness, in Middelburg on 29 July 2009.

GUITAR MUSIC

A monumental set of 33 variations built from a simple waltz theme by Anton Diabelli. A stunning performance of a legendary masterwork by one of the great pianists of our time. Pianist Gabriel Chodos has been a revered New England Conservatory faculty member for a quarter-century.

•This year’s 90th anniversary of Ferruccio Busoni's (1866-1924) death provides the occasion to present an album mostly of his transcriptions. Pianist David Theodor Schmidt (b. 1982) is one of the young generation of musicians who already enjoy great acclaim in the musical world. His busy concert schedule includes recitals and concerts at prestigious venues in Germany and the rest of Europe. “... (he is) new idol of all piano enthusiasts.” - Süddeutsche Zeitung

Direccion Sur

• World Premiere recordings of groundbreaking Chinese piano music by Joel Schoenhals, one of America's foremost pianists.

Schumann: Fantasie - Liszt: Piano Sonata in B minor

Acclaimed by audiences and critics alike, the Israeli artists Sivan Silver and her partner Gil Garburg set new standards in the high art, often too little appreciated, of the duo on one or two pianos. + Their new recording, consisting of two highly virtuosic works by Igor Stravinsky, “Le sacre du printemps” and “Petrushka”, finds the duo debuting as exclusive artists on the Berlin Classics label. + Stravinsky arranged his ballet music, some of the most revolutionary works of the 20th c., both for orchestra and for four hands, making great demands of his pianists both technically and comparatively. + Ms. Silver and Mr. Garburg were well on the way to promising solo careers when they paired up first privately and then at the piano. + They relish the constant contrast between recitals as a duo and orchestral concerts, between intimate pieces that call upon them as a unity, works conceived as dialogue, and those in which they sit at two pianos and summon up the massed power of a full orchestra.

A beautifully programmed collection anchored by the strength of Ragna Schirmer's piano. Clara and Robert Schumann borrow from each other's compositions in the early years of their great love affair in two sets of playfully intimate variations. Twenty years later, the theme is woven anew into two more sets of variations: a revisiting on the theme by Clara Schumann and one by her friend Johannes Brahms. Performing on an original Blu�thner grand piano of 1856, Ragna Schirmer's long association with the music of both Clara and Robert deepens the sense of rediscovery of these rarely recorded works for the listener.

Bach’s Cello Suites, the finest of all such works in the literature, speak in pure and clear voice, always spiritual yet down to earth. Isang Enders (b. 1988) was principal leader of the Dresden Staatskapelle cello section for four years before embarking on his solo career. He is a co-founder of the Ceres Ensemble and a founding member of the Int’l Shostakovich Festival. “The suites should speak, sing, dance, hunt and contemplate – altogether subjectively and characteristically. The subjective aspect of this recording is the result of my firm conviction." – Isang Enders

Piano Music: Grand-Mondain

Keyboard Cubed is Cervetti’s second recording for Navona and takes the listener into a world of kinetic and emotionally charged sound forged from 3 keyboard instruments. Sometimes it is the pianoforte, the double keyboard of the harpsichord and the organ.

This compilation features 11 English choral works by 5 contemporary composers, performed by 6 unique ensembles showcasing the diversity and depth of the choral subgenre. On-disc enhanced content includes extended full-color liner notes, study scores for analysis and performance consideration, and more.

Composer, pianist, teacher, poet, and writer, Robert Nathaniel Dett (1882-1943) is regarded as one of the most important musicians in American history, lauded in his lifetime as the first American composer to fuse African American folk idioms with the European art music tradition in a sophisticated way. On his debut album on Navona Records, MY CUP RUNNETH OVER, pianist Clipper Erickson presents the first complete collection of Dett’s piano works, a milestone for American music discography.

From the first time Dett heard Antonín Dvo?ák’s works performed at Oberlin College, he strived to incorporate African American folk music themes in the highest forms of musical art. The piano suites embrace almost all of the composer’s creative life, from Magnolia, written soon after his graduation from Oberlin, to the Eight Bible Vignettes, written during the last two years of his life. They show a great development, variety and richness of style, and his lyrical gift; truly reflecting his struggles, triumphs, and deepening philosophical interests. Erickson’s performances on this album deliver some of the most significant music of early 20th-century America to the world, reminding us of the prominent role of African American spirituals and folk music in contemporary American art, culture, and philosophy.

-----

Review:

It’s surprising that no one until Clipper Erickson has essayed Dett’s complete piano output on disc. However, the wait was worth it, for this music is simply wonderful, while Erickson’s idiomatic, colorful, technically adroit, and caring interpretations do the repertoire full justice. The music’s consistent creativity always holds interest. This historically and musically important release not only fills a crucial catalog gap but sets reference standards. No serious aficionado of the history of American piano music can afford to miss it.

– Gramophone (Jed Distler)

On his debut Navona Records release, ALL THE WAY BACK, pianist and composer Vytautas Smetona presents a collection of keyboard repertoire that highlights his enthralling and committed interpretations of some of the great composers' masterworks as well as an example of his faculty as a cultivated and dynamic composer.

The pieces on this album offer Smetona technical feats and expressive themes, all of which the pianist handles with ease, determination, and eloquence. From Bach's lyrical and joyous Prelude and Fugue in C-sharp Major, BWV 848 to the somber and dramatic range of Liszt's Funerailles (October 1849), Smetona evokes passion and refinement in his performances. The technical mastery of works such as Brahms's Intermezzo in B-flat Minor, Op. 117, No. 2, Schumann's Fantasie in C Major, Op. 17, and Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 is handled by Smetona with sophistication, lucidity, and powerful passage work. Smetona shows us a balance between accurately playing the notes on the score and interpreting the feeling between them.

Antonio Vivaldi, musical avant-gardist, extravagant violin virtuoso and ingenious composer, was in great demand all over Europe. He travelled to cities including Rome, Prague, Vienna and Amsterdam - but the "red-haired priest" never saw Dresden. Despite this, his music was very much present at the Dresden court: the Saxon royal seat was considered the centre of the German cultivation of Vivaldi. Heinrich E. Grimm has transcribed Vivaldi's most famous programmatic cycle, The Four Seasons, for the organ completely in the spirit of Bach. When recorded on an original instrument, the result is a refreshingly rustic-baroque sound.

This release is a compilation of Lieder, instrumental works, and poems both composed by and inspired by Franz Schubert. Julian Pregardien joins with Marc Hantai, Xavier Diaz-Latorre, and Philippe Pierlot for this recording. The musicians performing are early music specialists with high credentials.

Imaginary Pictures

Schumann, Knussen & Liszt: Piano Works

This is the second volume of a two-CD series presenting the first recording of the complete Chants in over 20 years; it also contains the world premiere recording of of Alkan's Chapeau bas! Playing a repertoire from the 18th to the 21st century, Stephanie McCallum is especially noted for her performances of virtuosic music of the 19th century, particularly the music of Liszt and Alkan, and also for her advocacy of demanding contemporary solo and ensemble scores.

Bach: Italienisches Konzert - Französische Ouvertüre

Vogel, Harald: Recital at Church of the Ascension

Wang Lisan: Complete Piano Works