For her first project at Cypres, young Belgian pianist Cassandre Marfin thinks big and has come up with Jusqu'a la nuit, a triptych devoted to chromesthesia, one of the many forms of synesthesia known to date. Synesthesia refers to the general alliance of two senses within the brain of an individual. Chromesthesia, on the other hand, refers specifically to the association between colours and sounds. Each volume of this trilogy is dedicated to a primary colour: blue, yellow and red. This first volume focuses on blue, which is undoubtedly the colour most present in music and the one most appreciated in the Western world. According to Cassandre Marfin, it evokes the world of night and dreams, something intangible and indefinite. It is a source of multiple representations in our imaginations. Through a skilfully conceived programme, the pianist associates this colour with ideas, metaphors and compositional systems that allow us to form our own personal impression of blue.

In keeping with the fascinating rediscoveries of French music made by the Palazzetto Bru Zane, this programme of sacred music presents works by well-known composers such as Saint-Saens and Faure as well as lesser-known works such as the Kyrie by Clemence de Grandval and Charlotte Sohy, the Ave Maria by Leon Boellmann and Fernand de La Tombelle, and a Cantique de Jean Racine composed by the deeply religious Mel Bonis to a different text from that chosen by Faure, in memory of her deceased son edouard. Instruments were added ad libitum for performances in the most prestigious religious buildings to encourage performances of the said works in other places as well. Faure's Tantum ergo, for example, with organ, piano or harp and double bass, could be played in church, in concert, or at home. These discoveries are what make this programme so interesting, bringing the Choeur de Radio France together with vocal and instrumental soloists of the highest calibre under the expert direction of Christophe Grapperon.

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's 36-year collaboration with the legendary guitarist Andres Segovia resulted in 35 works featuring the guitar, including three concertos, several large cycles and numerous shorter pieces. Castelnuovo-Tedesco first met Segovia at a festival in Venice in 1932 and composed a new work for the legendary guitarist almost every year afterwards. Among the towering masterpieces in guitar literature is Castelnuovo-Tedesco's Platero y Yo (Platero and I), a cycle of consisting of 28 settings, arranged into four groups of seven-movement suites with a total playing time of 1 hour and 49 minutes. Originally conceived as an accompaniment for a recitation of selections from the Nobel Prize-winning Catalan poet Juan Ramon Jimenez's collection of poetic sketches of the same name, the composer gave his permission for the work to be performed without spoken text, which is how it is performed here. You can read Jimenez's texts in English translation while listening to the music and enjoying the wonderful illustrations for each movement by the award-winning artist Halfdan Pisket, especially commissioned for this recording. In preparation for bringing this masterwork to life, internationally acclaimed, multi prize-winning Danish guitarist Niklas Johansen not only studies the Spanish language to appreciate Jimenez'sprose-poems in their native language, but travelled to Spain, not far from Jimenez's hometown of Moguer. The close relationship with the language and culture has lent Johansen's interpretations a personal resonance. This album was recorded in Fredensborg Palace Chapel by the Danish masters of sound, Preben Iwan and Mette Due who beautifully captured the exceptional acoustics. We wish to express our sincere thanks to His Majesty King Frederik X, who personally granted us permission to record in Fredensborg Palace Chapel.

In 1955, the conductor Gary Bertini founded the Rinat Choir and thus established professional choral music in Israel. The founding of the Rinat had a significant influence on the development of the Israeli choral scene; the choir was finally named the national choir in 1972. Psalms, verses and hymns were set to music for the Rinat Choir by the country's leading composers and transformed into extensive Hebrew motets and oratorios. The founding generation of Israeli music consisted of outstanding professional musicians who were born in Europe around the turn of the century. Although these composers came predominantly from Germany, Eastern Europe and Russia, their sources of inspiration can by no means be reduced to the music of their respective countries of origin. On the contrary: what united many of these composers was their fascination with the traditional music of the Jews, especially of Sephardic, Persian and Yemenite origin, and with the music of the Arabs they encountered in Palestine. The next generation of Israeli composers were not necessarily born in Israel either, but were strongly influenced musically by this country from the very beginning. In the 1960s and 70s, this generation disseminated their inspirational sources and borrowed from contemporary styles that they had become familiar with during their studies in Europe and the USA. While some representatives of this generation carried on the tradition of the founding generation, other composers introduced current developments in the musical world into the Israeli art music of their time. The pool of influences was also expanded to include American composers such as Aaron Copland, George Gershwin, John Cage and Lukas Foss.

Of the few pupils of Clara Schumann to make recordings, Fanny Davies (1861 - 1934) was by far the most important. She studied for two years with the great pianist and very much saw herself as a disciple. She went on to have a significant career and was praised for her noble and unsentimental approach to the music of Robert Schumann in interpretations that were said to resemble Clara's very closely. The three recorded works she left us are thus some of the most important documents of 19th-century pianism we have, and we are delighted to return them to the catalogue in new transfers. Adela Verne (1877-1952) is less well-known today, perhaps because she left only two recordings, made in 1917, but in her day, she was a major figure, starting life as a prodigy and giving the first performance of Brahms' 2nd Concerto at the Proms in 1905. Her principal teacher was her elder sister Mathilde Verne, another Clara Schumann pupil. This is the first time her discs have been reissued.

On the path to true faith and it's practice to please God, there have been regular heated debates over the role of music. Reactionaries repeatedly closed the lid on excessive cheer. This was also the case in the Netherlands of the 17th century. The reformist spirit of the Frenchman John Calvin led to an almost complete ban of music during worship services, despite the fact that the psalms of David ("Sing unto the Lord") provide unassailable proof to the contrary. Shortly before 1600, the great Dutch composer Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck discovered how these psalms could be, and were permitted to be, set to new music. The "Orpheus of Amsterdam" succeeded in transforming imposed restrictions into acoustic wonders. Our small selection of psalms, alternating with several organ works, proves once again the victory of the spirit over heavy subject matter

In his new GENUIN album, pianist Viktor Soos presents a musical dialogue between three individuals bound together by love, friendship, and artistic mastery. The prizewinner of the 2021 International Robert Schumann Competition performs works by Clara and Robert Schumann, as well as Johannes Brahms - three of the most renowned musicians of the Romantic era. These are key works from their respective oeuvres that move us today just as they did two centuries ago. In his historically grounded interpretation, Soos places particular focus on the hidden dedications found throughout the pieces on this album.

While cpo is currently preparing a box set with all of Austrian composer Egon Wellesz' nine symphonies, the Aron Quartet has begun recording a cycle of his string quartets. This contemporary of Alban Berg and private pupil of Arnold Schoenberg had a remarkable life and career, both in that genre as well as in orchestral music. His career began at the end of the post-Romantic period, whose signs of harmonic dissolution could no longer be overheard, but whose Romanticism was expounded upon in all of it's autumnal charm. Later, we witness a constructive reorientation that reveals the strict architectural underpinnings of chamber music without compromise. The interplay, migrations and transformations of motifs, the shifting force fields between the individual voices, the dynamic urge to break new ground - all invite the listener to participate with intensity and fascination.

The title "Awaking" carries a double significance. On the one hand, it refers to the musical awakening that marks my artistic journey; on the other, it reflects the collective awakening that marked the end of the Corona pandemic. I hope that "Awaking" reflects not just the sound of my music, but my appreciation of all the people who have shared this creative path with me.

Scott Wollschleger wrote�Lost Anthems�as part of The 20/19 project, violist Leilehua Lanzilotti's commissioning enterprise. The twenty five minute work is divided into fifteen discrete sections, what Wollschleger describes as "a melodic, song-like structure in search of itself." By titling the works "anthems," Wollschleger invokes a music that is inherently communal and symbolic of something larger than itself; by presenting music that is often introspective, he subverts the bombastic underpinnings of many anthems.

CORO: inspired by Luciano Berio's 31-song composition of the same name, George de Decker painted a cycle of 31 canvases. The key sentence Berio took as his starting point comes from a poem by Pablo Neruda: 'Venid a ver la sangre por las calles' (Come and see the blood in the streets) - a caustic reference to General Pinochet's seizure of power in Chile in 1973. For the exhibition of this cycle of paintings, de Decker wrote a composition for female voices. On the soundtrack, he incorporated vocal recordings of Els Van Laethem, Anne Marie Honggokoesoemo and Herlinde Ghekiere. At the request of pianist Geert Callaert, he added a piano part, so that CORO ultimately became a composition for solo piano, with a soundtrack with female voices. CORO is preceded by two new scores in the same sound idiom.

Alpha Classics proudly presents "Baroque Stories", a new series of recordings devoted to young talents in early music; it's first recording introduces Louise Acabo, a French harpsichordist and winner of several international competitions who divides her time between Paris and Basel. She has chosen to devote her debut recording to Jacques Champion de Chambonnieres (ca1601-1672), composer of more than 150 harpsichord pieces and the first French musician of the 17th century to publish volumes of works for harpsichord. "Once you have heard the harpsichord played by the Sieur de Chambonnieres, you need hear nothing else", stated the Harmonie universelle of 1636. It was this unique relationship with sound that appealed to Louise Acabo: "his writing, eminently vocal, demands that the player transcend the mechanical aspect of the instrument and approach it's strength and fragility with suppleness". Although Chambonnieres never left France, his work crossed borders and influenced composers abroad, the English in particular. Louise Acabo has constructed her own list of works from available sources, alternating works by Chambonnieres with compositions by Locke, Preston and Bryne.

Camille Saint-Saens was only fifteen years old when he composed his first symphony in 1850, which is known as his Symphony No. 0 - his official Symphony No. 1 would not arrive for another three years. Gounod was thirty-seven years old when his La nonne sanglante was removed from the repertoire of the Paris Opera by a new director; he swiftly restored his spirits by composing a symphony for the Societe des Jeunes Artistes in March 1855. Bizet, aged seventeen, began work on his Symphony in C major that same year. Gounod's symphony clearly influenced Bizet's work, as Bizet had just completed a transcription of it for piano four hands. This recording marks the beginning of a collaboration between the Alpha Classics label, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and it's music director Kazuki Yamada, a great lover of the French symphonic repertoire and also music director of the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and principal guest conductor of the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra and the Seiji Ozawa International Academy.

For her second recital with piano, mezzo-soprano Adele Charvet reunites with Florian Caroubi, who has been her regular duo partner since 2015. Together they celebrate the belle epoque of the great French melodists (Massenet, Debussy, Faure) and their proteges,�including Chausson, Hahn, Koechlin, Aubert, Caplet, Messager, Enesco, Albeniz, Madeleine Dubois and Nadia Boulanger, as well as the much less known�Xavier Leroux and Ernest Moret. This is a programme about lines of descent and musical transmission, energised by the texts of great poets such as Verlaine, Mallarme, Maeterlinck, Banville, Leconte de Lisle, Lou�s and Toussaint.

Alexander Gadjiev's album Legends takes listeners on a journey through the timeless legends and stories hidden within music, revealing it's power to conjure entire worlds. In Debussy's La cathedrale engloutie, ghostly bells rise from a submerged cathedral, bringing a Breton myth to life. Liszt's Funerailles rages with thunderous chords, evoking a battle against mortality, whilst Musorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition unfolds a vivid tapestry of Slavic folklore and European scenes. Prokofiev's Legende tells an enchanted tale of light and shadow, and Scriabin's Sonata No. 9 (Black Mass) immerses us in an eerie, otherworldly soundscape. Franck's Prelude, Fugue et Variation offers a sublime reflection on the soul's journey, while Bach-Siloti's Prelude in B minor resonates like a timeless, universal hymn. The Italian-Slovenian pianist has designed this programme to offer listeners a profound and mythical experience.