This album features three works by distinguished composer Alec Roth, each setting poetry on themes of nature and human reflection. A Road Less Travelled is a cantata for tenor and guitar using poems by Edward Thomas, written before his death in 1917. The Garden Path is a cycle for mezzo-soprano and string quartet setting poems by Amy Lowell, many inspired by her garden. Other Earths and Skies sets Vikram Seth's translations of LI Bai's poems for tenor and oboe. Performers include Mark Padmore, Morgan Szymanski, Martha McLorinan, the Sacconi Quartet, Hugo Hymas, and Nicholas Daniel.
BR-KLASSIK is dedicating a second portrait edition to the eminent Dutch conductor Bernard Haitink, containing a total of 9 CDs. Bernard Haitink died in October 2021; he would have turned 95 in March 2024.
These exceptional live recordings document the long-standing and intensive collaboration between Bernard Haitink, the Bavarian Radio Chorus, and the BRSO. Since Haitink conducted a subscription concert for the first time in 1958, he repeatedly led the BRSO for over six decades—sometimes in the Herkulessaal of the Residenz, sometimes in the Philharmonie im Gasteig. The orchestras’ musicians and singers were just as happy to work with him as the Bayerischer Rundfunk’s sound engineers.
The box set includes complete recordings of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 (CD 1) from 2019, Bruckner‘s Symphonies No. 4 (CD 2) from 2012, No. 7 (CD 3) from 1981, and No. 8 (CD 4 / CD 5) from 1993, as well as his Te Deum (CD 4) from 2010. Also featured are Dvořák‘s Symphony No. 7 from 1981 and his Scherzo Capriccioso (CD 6) from 1981, Mahler‘s Symphony No. 7 (CD 7) from 2011, and Shostakovich's Symphonies No. 8 (CD 8) from 2006 and No. 15 (CD 9) from 2015.
It is difficult to say anything about Mozart's famous Requiem – the masterpiece having been described and analysed all too often. It is known to almost everyone in the world, either in its entirety or in large parts, or is familiar to them at the very least from its title. Almost everybody has come into contact with the Requiem’s music, whether from the concert hall or merely from watching Miloš Forman's 1984 film drama "Amadeus". What breathes new life into this work and this music time and again are congenial performances with outstanding casts. A true highlight in the performance history of the Requiem was Mariss Jansons' interpretation of it in May 2017, which absolutely delighted the Munich concert audience and was also highly acclaimed by the trade press. Under Jansons' direction, the Bavarian Radio Chorus and the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks gave of their best, with an excellent quartet of vocal soloists rounding off the outstanding ensemble. This made the performances of Mozart's Requiem in the popular completed version by his student Süßmayr a truly memorable experience.
The live recording from the Herkulessaal of the Munich Residenz was made on May 11 and 12, 2017 and has now been released on a single CD by BR-KLASSIK.
Roth: The Traveller; Seth: Earth & Sky / Ex Cathedra, Britten Sinfonia
Signum Classics
CD
$9.99$19.99Save 50%Aug 18, 2023
THE TRAVELLER for choir, children’s choir, orchestra, tenor, violin and speaker. The Traveller was the third in a series of four major works with words by Vikram Seth and music by Alec Roth, commissioned jointly over four years by the Salisbury, Chelsea and Lichfield Festivals (2006-09). Each work featured the violinist Philippe Honoré as soloist, and each took a different geographical/cultural area as its starting point.
EARTH AND SKY for children’s choir and piano (with optional percussion). Earth and Sky was commissioned by the BBC for the Proms 2000 season. In keeping with the millennial theme, a work presenting a vision of the future was requested. Trying to be helpful, the BBC provided me with a video containing the predictions of various experts, but their ideas seemed dizzyingly contradictory.
-Alec Roth
Ex Cathedra has performed Alec’s music in over 200 concerts since 2007. There have been large-scale commissions and recordings and many short ‘gems’. It is of consistently high quality with moments of absolute genius. The relationship continues to flourish.
Mariss Jansons was one of the most important conductors of our time, celebrated worldwide and held in the highest regard – all the more so since his unexpected death on December 1, 2019. "Mariss Jansons - The Edition," comprising 70 recordings and a box set in representative LP format, documents the final phase of his life and career: his work as chief conductor of the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks and the Bavarian Radio Chorus between 2003 and 2019. Predominantly live recordings from Munich, Tokyo, Vienna, New York, Waldsassen, and the Vatican enable listeners to experience for themselves musical highlights that are as moving as they are exciting. The set contains a remarkably diverse repertoire, ranging from symphonic music and great choral works to opera, and from the First Viennese School to 20th century classical music. "Mariss Jansons - The Edition" contains works by a broad range of composers, including complete cycles of the symphonies of Beethoven, Brahms, and Mahler respectively. It is supplemented by fascinating rehearsal recordings that bear witness to Jansons's trusting artistic collaboration with the musicians in his orchestra, together with a large-format, approximately 72-page-long booklet containing background information, essays, an interview, and a detailed track listing.
A recording of Ludwig van Beethoven's "Ninth" is always a great event, especially because the symphony's final chorus, Schiller's "Ode to Joy", is understood around the world as a plea for peace and international understanding. It was no coincidence that the catchy melody to the text "Joy, beautiful spark of divinity" was chosen as the Hymn of the European Union. This recording of Beethoven's great choral symphony under the direction of Bernard Haitink and with excellent instrumental and vocal soloists is not only an outstanding interpretation of the work but also very much an event in itself -because these recordings document Haitink's last ever concerts with the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks. Only a few months after his two Munich concerts on February 21 and 22, 2019, the great Dutch conductor -who celebrated his 90thbirthday on March 4 -announced the end of his career.
Even though Jonathan Dove is best known as a vocal or choral composer, with operas and works for children forming the backbone of his output, his chamber music reveals similar predilections for narrative, drama, atmosphere and a sense of the personal. His new commission from the Sacconi Quartet In Damascus was inspired by the violinist Hannah Dawson’s suggestion for a work that should reflect aspects of the conflict in Syria; not because music can offer any political solution, but simply as an expression of empathy, sorrow, even outrage at those terrible events. Featuring a performance by tenor Mark Padmore, the text is taken from prose-poems by Ali Safar that draw on his first- hand experiences in Syria, eloquently translated by Anne-Marie McManus. The Sacconi’s present this new work alongside his string quartet work Out of Time, and his Piano Quintet – performed with pianist Charles Owen.
Following Mahler's Ninth and Bruckner's Fifth, this live recording of Joseph Haydn's "The Creation" is already the third CD recording to feature master conductor Bernard Haitink at the helm of the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, an orchestra he’s been guest conducting for over 50 years. The BRSO and its Choir joined forces for this recording, together with a team of renowned soloists - soprano Camilla Tilling, tenor Mark Padmore and bass-baritone Hanno Müller-Brachmann. This is the first and only currently available recording of "The Creation" featuring Bernard Haitink.
