Helen Humes - "Songs I Like To Sing! (Contemporary Records Acoustic Sounds Series)" / Jazz vocalist Helen Humes' second album on Contemporary Records, "Songs I Like to Sing!" was released in 1961 and is conducted by Marty Paich. Backed by musicians including Art Pepper (sax), Leroy Vinnegar (bass), Shelly Manne (drums), Barney Kessel (guitar) and Andre Previn (piano). This new edition released as part of the Acoustic Sounds Series, features (AAA) lacquers cut from the original master tapes by Bernie Grundman and is pressed on 180-gram vinyl at QRP, and presented in a tip-on jacket.

In my music I am looking for the traces of beauty and depth of expression that radiate from the tone constellations. This is nothing new, but always a wonderful challenge. An aesthetic of prohibitions is as alien to me as an indiscriminate deployment of stylistic means. Every composition has it's determination and derives from this it's contours, the sequence of harmonic colours, the nature of the melodic and formal configuration. The so-called material is set in motion by the initial idea, the inspiration, ultimately flowing into the interplay of it's own momentum and control: This is the most exciting stage of the composer's work. When the material is consistent and the ear, as the highest authority, has made it's judgement on the sequence of sounds, then, perhaps, the magic of an art that can speak emerges, where memory and imagination are fused into a work. Thomas Daniel Schlee

The concepts of Romanticism and Late Romanticism steer our thoughts towards musical epochs, but the selection on this CD is based on a word art that encompasses romantic notions and experiences such as sorrow, joy, love, anxiety, despair, expectation, and longing that have existed in all times. This CD features, for the first time, recorded works by the young composer Alvin Vikman's five-movement piece The Japanese Seasons, Agneta Skold's Dar blaklinten slog en bro, and a bouquet of songs by composers active from the mid-1800s, Laura Netzell and Valborg Aulin. For over two hundred years, the interest in choral singing has inspired choral compositions of many different kinds. It has laid the foundation for the utilization of words and tones for the human voice, which has fostered cohesion, community, and musical innovation. Therefore, the compositions of Ludvig Norman, Jorgen Jersild, and Alvin Vikman show a continuity in humanity's need for words and tones to collaborate, regardless of the epoch, giving us n

Superb performances of Beethoven Sonatas for Piano and Violin, including the justifiably famous "Kreutzer" Sonata.

MELODIA MEDITERRANEA is a collection of art songs based on the folk music of the Mediterranean region. It draws upon melodies and traditional texts, many of which are still sung today in Italy, Greece, and Spain. The project was born from a musical encounter between Yannis Tsanakaliotis, Andreas Nebl, and Lee Santana with soprano Maria Palaska. This meeting developed into a long-term collaboration, characterised by a shared longing for the sounds and images of the Mediterranean. In this project, the three instruments - piano, accordion, and vihuela - merge in a unique way with the voice, creating a distinctive musical atmosphere.

Susanne Westenfelder, music theorist and music journalist, writes in the booklet for the latest addition to the Calmus CD library 'Liebesleid', among other things: 'In 2017, the two researchers Kazuma Mori and Makoto Iwanaga published a study. The result: songs that bring tears to our eyes seem to have a cathartic effect on us, calm us down and even make us feel good afterwards. A German newspaper concluded what we all already suspected: Music helps against lovesickness. Tear-jerking songs for tear-jerking eyelids. ' We have taken on this mission - as usual across styles and eras. We move between baroque (Johann Grabbe: Three Madrigals) and contemporary music (Gordon Kampe: 'Je deviens fou... ') and also make a stopover in the German Romantic period with works by Johannes Brahms and another with folk songs from the British Isles (John Rutter: 'Five Traditional Songs'). We have also been able to recruit outstanding arrangers to tailor some of the love song dramas to us. These include our house and court arranger Juan M. V. Garcia with 'Hallelujah' and 'Another Love' as well as ex-King's singer Philip Lawson with the eponymous arrangement of Fritz Kreisler's 'Liebesleid'. Because alongside all the heartache, there is always certainty at the end: 'And if you are ever sad, don't despair, because it will always be like today: love's sorrow is followed by love's joy. '

This programme brings together composers who, for the most part, were compelled to flee their homeland. In 1920, Ivan Wyschnegradsky took refuge in Paris, where he wrote for a quarter-tone piano at a time when, in Russia, the slightest dissonance was considered a political provocation. Andrzej Panufnik left his native Poland in 1954. Alfred Schnittke settled in Hamburg in 1990, eight years before his death, having spent most of his life in the Soviet Union. Although Schubert never moved away from Vienna, the pain and solitude of his inner exile are palpable in his music. Finally, the Belgian violin virtuoso Eugene Ysaye emigrated on account of the First World War and it was in the United States, in 1917, that he wrote the melancholy musical poem recorded here, which he called Exil! Is exile nothing but pain and isolation, or also a source of inspiration which, with music, expresses what words cannot say, acting as the ultimate refuge? 'Let's listen to what they have to say', suggests Patricia Kopatchinskaja, herself 'uprooted for ever'. She is joined by cellist Thomas Kaufmann and her friends from Camerata Bern.

Carmina Burana, the staged cantata by Carl Orff, is a work unique in musical history, claims conductor Paavo Jarvi: 'The convergence of medieval texts with such daringly original orchestral colours creates a soundworld that is both archaic and yet beyond time, in which chorus, orchestra and soloists vie in splendour.' The work also has an unusual history: composed shortly after the Nazi takeover of Germany, it was at first rejected because of it's Latin texts and the erotic character of some of it's songs; yet Orff and his work subsequently became highly prized by the Reich. The composer (who was secretly 'a quarter Jewish') did not support the regime, but made the best of his success... Orff was 42 by the time he experienced this breakthrough with his Carmina, which he designated as his Op. 1, disowning all his previous compositions. Departing from the Romantic style, he now wanted to create music linked to rhythm, simple repeated melodies, and non-complex forms. This work's popular success confirmed that decision.

Night Windows, the title of Fabien Waksman's work, is the general theme of Lucile Dollat's recital, playing out the many sonorous possibilities of the Grenzing organ in the Maison de la Radio et de la Musique Auditorium. This "window open on the night" invites us on an unpredictable journey, awash in mysterious resonances, intangible or thunderous, calling up fleeting and poetic images, flashes of improvisation, all combining to rekindle the imagination through a new vision of the repertoire.

For it's first recording for BIS Records, the Marmen Quartet tackles three major works from the twentieth-century string quartet literature. The two quartets by Gyorgy Ligeti belong to two different periods in the composer's output. Written before Ligeti left Hungary and emigrated to the West, the First, subtitled 'Metamorphoses nocturnes', represents the peak of his 'Hungarian' period. Regarded as a virtuoso exercise, the work reveals the influences of Bela Bartok, particularly from his Third and Fourth Quartets. Ligeti's Second Quartet belongs to his second period, particularly rich in significant works. Considered by the composer as a response to the works of his illustrious predecessors such as Mozart, Beethoven, Bartok and Berg, the Second Quartet, with it's calculated anarchy, dynamic extremes and sublime climaxes, is not only one of Ligeti's masterpieces but also a true classic of modernism. Bela Bartok's Fourth Quartet, which had a particularly strong influence on Ligeti, is widely seen as one of his most radical; it requires high levels of technical accomplishment from the performers, yet reveals a deep understanding of the instruments, and draws an unprecedented range of colour and character from them.

Peter Donohoe's first album devoted to Busoni was enthusiastically received by the critics, and nominated for a BBC Music Magazine award. This second volume offers playing and musicality of the same high standards. His programme opens with two of Busoni's finest Bach transcriptions, widely seen as a pinnacle of the repertoire for pianistic virtuosity, and much more widely played than Busoni's own compositions. This is followed by the Variations on Chopin's Prelude in C minor - a work in which Busoni demonstrates his innate skill of re-interpretation, and his mastery of counterpoint, and a piece he reworked several times. The following works are 'all Busoni' - the first and second sonatinas, and the Fantasia contrappuntistica, in the composer's later adaptation for two pianos. The first Steinway Artist of Indian origin, Karl Lutchmayer is equally renowned as a concert pianist, a lecturer, and a broadcaster. He joins Peter Donohoe in the Fantasia, and also performs the Second Sonatina.

Coming soon

Volume 11 of the 'Next Generation Mozart Soloists' series presents Violin Concerto No. 5 in A Major along with Piano Concertos KV 40 and KV 449. The Piano Concerto No. 3 is a very early work, derived from works by other composers, whereas No. 14 was written in 1784 by a fully mature Mozart, who was moving away from functional music towards expressing his ideas in a more dramatic structure. What links the two, says Swiss-Canadian pianist Teo Gheorghiu, is that they are both "concertos mainly joyful and optimistic in expression". French violinist David Castro-Balbi says "of Mozart's violin concertos, No. 5 has the strongest operatic character". These two soloists are accompanied by the Mozarteumorchester Salzburg under the baton of Howard Griffiths.

Building a new organ is always an exciting journey for an organ builder. What should a new organ look like, how should it sound, how should it fit into the church interior, what traditional reference points are there, what should be played on this new organ in addition to the important church music, how historical, how modern may the action, wind system and finally the entire pipework be built. In the Church of the Four Evangelists in the Protestant parish of Berlin-Pankow, the requirements were clear. An organ by the famous Berlin organ builder Carl August Buchholz (1796 - 1884) no longer existed in the church. Is it possible to rebuild a Buchholz organ in such a way that it seems possible that C.A. Buchholz would have built this new organ in exactly the same way in 1840, for example? We organ builders at the Wegscheider organ workshop set ourselves this special task, having already restored and reconstructed several Buchholz organs, visited and examined other surviving Buchholz organs and were very familiar with this particular organ sound language of the first half of the 19th century in the Prussian lands. A suitable specification with 27 stops was created, an early Schwellwerk with side doors (entirely in the Buchholz style) was designed, the metal and wooden pipes as well as the reed stops were built according to the models and the voicing was adapted to the church interior in terms of response, sound volume and dynamics. Particular emphasis was placed on the feel of the keys, which must harmonise with what the player hears. The aim was not to build a particularly light action, but rather one that harmonised with the early romantic sound. The historical keyboard aesthetics with the stop action, the music desk, the swell lever, the historical proportions between the manual pianos and the pedal keyboard also serve to immerse the performer completely in the early romantic tonal spirit. Kristian Wegscheider, master organ builder Dresden, Henry Fairs, Professor of Artistic Organ Playing at the Berlin University of the Arts, plays the complete works for organ by Robert Schumann.

Following the success of Prokofiev Milestones Vol. 1, SOMM Recordings is pleased to announce the release of the second volume of Prokofiev Milestones featuring the Slovenian violinist Lana Trotovsek and Spanish pianist Maria Canyigueral. For Russian composers born in the last decades of the nineteenth-century, the October Revolution of 1917 was cataclysmic. Sergei Prokofiev (1891 - 1953) was born in Ukraine, known at that time as 'Little Russia,' and he sought exile in the United States in 1918. By 1924, he had appeared as soloist in his first three piano concertos in London. But the pull of his homeland remained strong, and in the mid 1930s he decided to return. The initial works that Prokofiev produced in the Soviet Union-the film score for Lieutenant Kije, the children's tale Peter and the Wolf, and the ballet Romeo and Juliet-enjoyed wide public success. It was against this backdrop that Prokofiev began work on his First Violin Sonata, Op. 80, one of his most serious works with a singular depth of expression. The second sonata on this release was commissioned by the Soviet Committee of Arts Affairs. The Sonata for Solo Violin, Op. 115 is a remarkably approachable work in neo-classical style. It wasn't publicly performed until six years after Prokofiev's death due to a decree in 1948 condemning the 'formalism' of much contemporary Soviet music. This recording also includes four transcriptions. During his first visit to America in 1918, Prokofiev composed a short suite for solo piano, Tales of an Old Grandmother. The second tale, an evocative piece with a nostalgic character, was later transcribed by the�Russian-born violinist, Nathan Milstein. While in California, Prokofiev composed a set of songs without words, Five Melodies for soprano vocalise and piano. Five years later, in 1925, he arranged the pieces for violin and piano. After his return to the Soviet Union, and following the success of Romeo and Juliet, Prokofiev produced another highly successful ballet, Cinderella. Five pieces from the ballet were transcribed by the Soviet violinist Mikhail Fichtenholz for recital repertoire. In 1939, Jascha Heifetz published his transcription of the March from Prokofiev's 1921 opera, The Love of Three Oranges, which won praise from the composer himself. Prokofiev's instrument was the piano. This fact makes his lasting contributions to the violin repertoire, and his deep understanding of the inherent nature of the instrument, all the more remarkable. Of Vol 1: "a real coup for die-hard fans of my grandfather" Gabriel Prokofiev "This is an intriguing start to a series by imaginative and sensitive musicians."� "... both Boris Bizjak (flute) and Lana Trotovsek (violin) advocate for their respective versions with great affection and sympathy for the style. The well-balanced contribution of pianist Maria Canyigueral allows both flute and violin to take flight over a broad palette of timbres." Gramophone�(Maria Frolova-Walker) "Sterling performances. Certainly, Prokofiev is in good hands." Textura