Eva Zalenga, winner of the German Music Competition, makes her GENUIN debut with an album featuring colorful and striking music for soprano and diverse instrumental ensembles. Highlights include a world premiere recording of Ignaz Lachner's work, a rare find by Darius Milhaud, and renowned repertoire such as Schubert's "Der Hirt auf dem Felsen" and songs by Rebecca Clarke and Pauline Viardot. Eva Zalenga's "fine, light, and lyrical" soprano brings fresh interpretations to these works. Another standout is the revised version of Isabelle Aboulker's "Je t'aime", developed directly with the composer.

This new album by the award-winning Latvian Radio Choir conducted by Sigvards Klava - recently hailed by the New York Times as 'astonishing', 'superlative' by the BBC Music Magazine, and 'perhaps the finest chorus singing today' by NPR - is focused on the sacred choral works by one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era, Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847). This recording of the Psalms also includes the world premiere recording of Ehre sei dem Vater published by Carus Verlag in 1997.

The Czech Philharmonic and Music Director, Semyon Bychkov, continue their acclaimed Mahler cycle with the composer’s First Symphony, one of the most evocative and colourful symphonic debuts in the history of the genre. Mahler once famously said that “a symphony should be like the world, it should encompass everything.” In his First Symphony, he creates just such a world, filled with animal sounds, hunting horns, rural dances, klezmer bands and allusions to his own songs and folk song melodies such as Frère Jacques. These elements all function within a highly subjective, immersive symphonic drama, providing a blueprint for most of his symphonies to come. Semyon Bychkov and the Czech Philharmonic approach the composer’s firstling with their esteemed eye for detail and pacing, matched by their unmistakably Bohemian sound. The Czech Philharmonic is one of the world’s orchestral gems, recognised for its rich tradition with the Czech masters as well as European repertoire. Semyon Bychkov who is internationally renowned for his interpretations of the core repertoire, began his tenure with the Orchestra at the start of the 2018/19 season. Their recording of Mahler’s First Symphony follows Mahler’s Fourth and Fifth Symphonies (both 2022) and the Second Symphony (2023), part of the complete Mahler cycle to be released by Pentatone.

REVIEW:

The orchestra’s magical combination of richness, precision, and nuance is instantly in evidence, with brass and wind pinpoint and the strings characteristically shimmering and sinuous in the opening movement before making merry in Kraftig bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell. The control and perfection of Bychkov’s pacing in the third movement, and the way his forces combine in Sturmisch Bewegt with such attack one minute and astonishing fluidity the next, epitomizes a reading of beauty and depth.

-- The Sunday TImes (UK)

PH16063 Bruckner 9, Vol. 54 Edition Staatskapelle Dresden. Christian Thielemann, Staatskapelle Dresden, Live Aufnahme der Saison 2014/2015 aus der Semperoper �Ich mag die Neunte gar nicht anfangen, ich traue mich nicht, denn auch Beethoven machte mit der Neunten den Abschluss seines Lebens!� Anton Bruckner

Bernhard Lang's Monadology XXXVI is a radical "meta-composition". It deconstructs Chopin's Op. 10 �tudes through granular analysis, loops, and virtual remixing-destroying and reassembling the score into new sonic textures. The cycle consists of 12 Et�den. The last three are dedicated to Daan Vandewalle, the internationally acclaimed pianist renowned for his mastery of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, who now brings them to this album.

On one side, Francesco Corti, one of the most internationally acclaimed harpsichordists and protagonist of five acclaimed albums released by the Arcana label. On the other, Ilya Gringolts, making his debut for the same label: a violinist of extraordinary versatility, committed to contemporary music but also animated by a deep passion for the Baroque repertoire and historically informed performance. Proof of this is his recording of Locatelli's Il labirinto armonico (2021), which was awarded the Diapason d'Or and selected as Editor's Choice by Gramophone. Two artistically different but complementary personalities, united for years in a successful partnership, tackle a milestone of chamber music: the first great example of concertante sonatas for keyboard and melodic instrument. Completing the programme is Tertia deficiens, a piece by contemporary composer and Baroque violinist Andrew McIntosh (Grammy nominee), commissioned specifically for this project with the aim of creating an evocative bridge between past and present.

Pianist Nicolas Stavy, who has already made recordings devoted to works by Boris Tishchenko (BIS-2189) and Dmitri Shostakovich (BIS-2550), now presents the first instalment of a complete survey of Alfred Schnittke's compositions for solo piano. This recording presents works from various periods of the Russian-German composer's career - from the 1950s, which the composer described as the 'years of obscurity', to the 1990s, a time shaped both by world fame and serious illness. While Schnittke wrote relatively little music for the piano, each work reflects - or sometimes anticipates - the phases of the composer's creative development. The Five Preludes and Fugue and the Prelude and Fugue belong to Schnittke's first creative phase, when he was still under the influence of Shostakovich. The Little Piano Pieces, composed for the composer's six-year-old son, are an example of his 'polystylism', juxtaposing and combining music of various styles from the past and present. The Sonata No. 2 and the Five Aphorisms, both from 1990, return to a more ascetic and abstract language, with a bleaker tone, no doubt echoing his serious health problems.

An exciting listening adventure: The "Ten Preludes" by Sofia Gubaidulina from 1974 merge with the Allemandes from Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Suites into a fascinating dialogue between past and present.

The three Suites recorded on this CD (BWV 1007, BWV 1008 and BWV 1010) were transcribed for guitar by the performers themselves, following a practice customary for Bach and absolutely familiar to him (the Fifth Suite for cello has come down to us in two versions, one for cello and one for lute: we are not sure which came first). One should therefore recognise the full aesthetic legitimacy of the guitar transcription of these compositions, a practice, moreover, that has now been established for decades. This procedure is ultimately legitimised by the primacy, in Bach’s language, of the harmonic and contrapuntal dimension over their sonic realisation, a primacy that led Ferruccio Busoni, for whom the concept of “transcription” occupies a position of absolute centrality in his aesthetic thought, to transcribe for piano not only numerous compositions for organ by Thomaskantor, but also the Chaconne from the Second Partita in D minor for solo violin. With specific regard to the guitar, one cannot fail to mention the name of Andrés Segovia, who transcribed for his instrument and recorded in 1946 the highly famous Chaconne.

In the early 1960s, four young musicians who had been playing chamber music at Rudolf Serkin’s Marlboro School and Festival in Vermont were encouraged to form a string quartet. In July 1964, the Guarneri Quartet gave its first concert and less than a year later made its first recordings under contract to RCA Victor. For the next 45 years, with only one change of personnel, the Guarneris performed all over the world and amassed a large, wide-ranging, prize-winning discography. Sony Classical now presents, for the first time in a single collection, all the recordings made by the Guarneri Quartet for RCA between 1965 and 2005.

When the announcement came of its retirement at the end of the 2008–09 season, the eminent British critic Rob Cowan wrote a perceptive, affectionate tribute to the Guarneri Quartet in Gramophone, comparing it to the Juilliard Quartet, the other superb ensemble that had dominated the American quartet catalogue for so many years. Using their respective Bartók recordings as an example, he contrasted the “cut-glass precision” of the Juilliard’s early-60s set to the Guarneri’s “volatile, free-spirited, generously expressive and tonally rich” performing style in its RCA cycle from the mid-70s.

That characterization of the Guarneri Quartet’s playing runs through virtually all the reviews garnered in their long recording career, a story that began with the 1966 release of two of Mozart’s late “Prussian” Quartets and an album coupling Dvořák and Smetana. HiFi Stereo Review wrote that “not since the Juilliard String Quartet set the New York music world on its collective ear some 25 years ago has a new chamber group created such a furor as the Guarneri Quartet on the occasion of its New York début in February, 1965. This pair of discs demonstrates eloquently what all the shouting was about, for these players – Arnold Steinhardt, John Dalley, Michael Tree, and David Soyer – blend precision with flexibility of phrasing and rhythm in a way not often encountered in contemporary American string groups. Here, indeed, is the influence of the seed bed from which the quartet stems – the Marlboro of Rudolf Serkin, Alexander Schneider, and Pablo Casals … To the Smetana [‘From My Life’] the Guarneri Quartet brings blazing intensity and fierce rhythmic verve, while the wonderful slow movement of the Dvořák [Op. 105] comes forth from the stereo speakers with an almost orchestral lushness, yet with inner voices flawlessly balanced.”

Other critics concurred in their reviews of these two LPs: “The foursome produces an unfailingly luscious tone, plays with letter-perfect intonation, and displays all sorts of felicitous pinpoint balances and coloristic effects. And how these gentlemen stay together … even in the most wayward of tempo changes. In short, this is ensemble work of a transcendental variety … The Guarneri Quartet is the most gifted group of its kind I have heard in years” (High Fidelity). “This is distinguished Mozart playing indeed. Its technical excellence needs little comment: as with the Dvořák/Smetana record … last month, with this team you take technical mastery for granted as soon as you hear the first phrase, and straightaway it's the intensely musical quality of the playing which strikes you. Theirs is Mozart played with the classical virtues, above all with firm line, poise and sensibility. The surface of the music is polished, but how much the Guarneri Quartet find beneath” (Gramophone).

Arthur Rubinstein was the quartet’s longtime keyboard partner. In 1966, they recorded the Piano Quintets of Schumann and Brahms: “Rubinstein and the Guarneris search out to equally convincing effect the flowingly lyrical aspects of the music, and this yields special rewards in a ravishing slow movement [the Brahms]” (HiFi Stereo Review). Dvořák’s followed in 1971: “The performance is beautifully balanced between the gentleman at the keyboard and the gentlemen with strings, and the sense of give and take comes from the experience of many collaborations” (High Fidelity).

They also recorded the piano quartet literature, beginning in 1967 with “beautiful performances” (High Fidelity) of Brahms. Their reading of Fauré’s Op. 25 in C minor was judged (also by High Fidelity) to be “beautifully played and exquisitely well reproduced. The instrumental lines are wonderfully clear in this highly directional recording … Rubinstein displays his regal style.” And in a disc containing both of Mozart’s piano quartets, “the playing throughout both sides is extremely beautiful … and superbly integrated – at once expressive and elegant, making all of Mozart’s points with clarity, straightforwardness, and the exalted give-and-take that is the life’s breath of real chamber music. The recorded sound, too, is exceptional for its richness, balance, and clarity” (HiFi Stereo Review).

One of many other composers who feature prominently in Sony’s Guarneri collection is Haydn. About the ensemble’s 1977 recording of the two Op.77 quartets, HiFi Stereo Review wrote that “these spirited, attractive performances of Haydn's two greatest string quartets are marked by a sense of real involvement. Articulation is crisp, ensemble is impeccable, and there is an organic flow from the first phrase to the last in each work”, while Gramophone praised their “deeply thoughtful, powerfully paced” 1986 reading of Haydn’s Seven Last Words.

With reinforcement from the Budapest Quartet in 1965, the Guarneris produced an “absolutely stunning performance (HiFi Stereo Review) of Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence sextet. In 1966, they recorded quartets by Mendelssohn and Grieg (the latter receiving its CD première in this set): “The Guarneri ensemble does itself proud throughout this disc – most notably in the Mendelssohn, in which they display a tonal homogeneity and a warmth of phrasing that are truly striking. It is as though one instrument, not four, were producing the lovely sound that emerges from the speakers. Happily, the RCA recording staff has come up here with a string quartet sonority of the utmost intimacy, yet endowed with just enough room tone to enhance the naturally warm tone of the Guarneris” (HiFi Stereo Review).

But the heart of any string quartet’s repertoire is inevitably the Beethoven cycle, and it is with these works that the Guarneris were most closely associated. They made their complete recording for RCA between 1966 and 1969. Gramophone described the Early Quartets as “elegant and buoyant, with well-chosen tempos, subtle bowing, crisp articulation, telling contrasts between staccato and legato, and a consistent sense of style.” HiFi Stereo Review enumerated the virtues of their Middle Quartets: “(1) excellent intonation; (2) glowing tone; (3) ensemble that is balanced and accurate but always flexible and natural; (4) superb phrasing and line-building; (5) good feeling for a high Beethoven style. These are strong and expressive readings that often achieve great poetic insight and a powerful dynamic impulse.” The HiFi Stereo Review’s critic rhapsodized over their Late Quartets: “If I had to make the choice of a very few records to take with me to a desert island, I’d choose recordings of the last five Beethoven string quartets. Now, with the arrival of this new album (complete with the Grosse Fuge) by the Guarneri Quartet, I’ve got my island package. All I need is the island. The Guarneri is, without a doubt, one of the most extraordinary string quartets before the public these days: the group has an absolutely stunning sense of both soloistic and ensemble color. Indeed, I can’t think of another string quartet that can match them for sheer sensuous appeal.”

SUMMARY:

• With the first release of the Guarneri Quartet’ recording of Mendelssohn’s Quartet No. 3, transferred and edited from the session reels using 24 bit / 192 kHz technology

• 9 quartet recordings for the first time on CD, transferred and mastered from the original analog tapes, 3 quartets remastered, using 24 bit / 192 kHz technology

• Includes collaborations with Arthur Rubinstein, Leonard Rose, Mischa Schneider, Pinchas Zukerman, Walter Trampler, Ida Kavafian, and more

• Original LP sleeves and labels, booklet with full discographical notes

With the energy of a jet engine, violinist Oscar Bohorquez and pianist Frank Braley dive into a whirlwind exploration of unknown and thrilling American repertoire. Duos by Paul Schoenfield, William Bolcom, Aaron Copland, Mike Mower, and Brazilian composer Mozart Camargo Guarnieri - blessed with a name as remarkable as his music - bring the rhythmic vitality of the Americas into your living room. From jungle and desert-infused melodies to the spirit of tango, samba, rumba, square dance, and New York jazz clubs, this album offers a wonderfully vibrant and captivating musical experience.

Andreas Staier’s informed and inspired interpretations have left their mark on the discography of both the harpsichord and the fortepiano and have enabled us to see Bach, Mozart and Schubert in a completely new light. This is Staier’s first solo album of a projected series for Alpha Classics, in which he also presents his own compositions for the first time. “Two motifs connect the works in this recording: the first is a ancient cantus firmus, a melody in long notes […] the second is the interval sequence of octave, fifth, sixth, and third. […] Anklange, my six pieces for harpsichord, grew out of several conversations I had with the composer Brice Pauset about what it means to compose in our time, and in particular what it implies to compose for historical instruments. This led me to ask myself how I could express and capture my own conception of music in notes, marked as it is not only by Byrd, Bach and Schubert, but also by the music of the 20th and 21st centuries."

REVIEW:

This release is a good example of Andreas Staier’s intelligent program building, both intellectually and musically speaking. Two motifs form a thread that runs through most of the works assembled here. One is the note sequence E–F-sharp–A–G-sharp–F-sharp–E that appears in Johann Caspar Ferdinand Fischer’s E major Prelude and Fugue from Ariadne Musica, Bach’s E major Prelude and Fugue from The Well-Tempered Clavier Book II, plus Froberger’s Fantasia II and Ricercar IV (the latter transposed to begin with G). The other motif is based on a sequence of intervals: octave, fifth, sixth, and third. Other pre-Bach composers include Louis Couperin and Johann Joseph Fux

At the recital’s midpoint, Staier features his own six pieces for harpsichord composed in 2020 that comprise a suite entitled Anklänge. His style forgoes tonality for the most part, yet his boundless palette of sonorities, his dramatic registral deployment, and his instincts for when and how to leave space all generate palpable tension and release. The fourth piece, for example, makes arresting use of thick spread chords that resonate for a long time under the fingers, while No. 6 features aphoristic lines that unfold like skywriting, with plenty of air between each utterance.

Indeed, resonance and breathing room characterize Staier’s performing style, which revels in the colorful variety of stops offered on his harpsichord modeled after a 1734 Hieronymus Albrecht Hass model. You’ll notice this in how Staier times and differentiates his arpeggiations of chords throughout the Couperin Pavane, as well as in the melting impact of his masterful finger legato in the Froberger Meditation. Surprisingly, Staier takes a forthright tempo for the aforementioned Bach Fugue, where his octave couplings have a rather upholstered effect that, for my taste, works against the music’s reflective and vocally oriented nature. Still, Staier remains the masterful instrumentalist and thinking musician that has long enamored me to his extensive and wide-ranging discography.

-- ClassicsToday.com (Jed Distler)

Following his recordings dedicated to Beethoven's piano concertos (BIS-2281) and Franz Liszt's Transcendental etudes (BIS-2681), the gold medal winner at the 13th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 2009, Haochen Zhang, now brings these two composers together on this new recording with two summits of 19th-century piano literature: Beethoven's 'Hammerklavier' Sonata and Liszt's Sonata in B minor. The Piano Sonata No. 29, the 'Hammerklavier', is the longest, richest and perhaps the most masterful of Beethoven's 32 sonatas. In it, he pushes the instrument and the performer to their limits, and even beyond. It's immense complexity, the utter diversity of it's movements and it's daring structural conception give the sonata an unrivalled place in Beethoven's �uvre. It was very rarely played during Beethoven's lifetime, and Franz Liszt contributed to it's discovery with a concert performance in Paris that has since gone down in history. No stranger to the description 'unperformable', Liszt also wanted to write 'the' piano sonata that would reconcile his own approach to pianism with Beethoven's legacy. His Sonata in B minor, a monumental work that transforms the piano into a virtual orchestra, is a landmark work that sums up Liszt's genius.

Bach's trio sonatas, once written as teaching pieces for his eldest son Wilhelm Friedemann, show Johann Sebastian Bach at the zenith of his compositional art: three independent voices engage in a captivating dialogue, combining cantabile melodic lines with an artful yet natural-sounding counterpoint - all embedded in an experimental formal design and balanced proportions. Martin Neu makes this core repertoire his own with his lively and eloquent interpretation on the Ahrend organ in Herzogenaurach. The unusual directness and proximity to the pipework of the organ, combined with the excellent acoustic conditions, create a unique sound experience. For the first time, this is also available immersively in Dolby Atmos - a sonic innovation that allows the music to be experienced with unprecedented intensity.

Lepo Sumera (1950-2000) was one of the most important figures in Estonian music after WW2. Sumera can also be considered among the most important European symphonists of his era: between 1981 and 2000 the composer wrote an impressive series of 6 Symphonies. These dramatic and emotionally-packed works of great beauty and contrasts were greatly admired, among others, by John Adams. This new album by the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra and conductor Olari Elts is first instalment in a new fascinating symphony cycle.

'The Fifth is a cursed piece. Nobody understands it,' said Gustav Mahler in March 1905 after a performance of his Fifth Symphony in Hamburg. He had been working on his new symphony for almost three years before it premiered on 18 October 1904: in Cologne, with the Gurzenich Orchestra and Gustav Mahler at the podium. To many of his contemporaries, the work seemed too bold, too radical - perhaps also insufficiently explained, given that programmatic explanations had been added to the so-called 'Wunderhorn' Symphonies Nos. 2 to 4. Not only the number and the order of the movements seemed new, but stylistically Mahler also broke new ground with his Fifth. But now, all at once, his musical language changed, a transformation that evidently gave him some unease later. Shortly before his death, he made corrections to the instrumentation. Today the work is considered the beginning of his new creative phase, which culminated in his Ninth Symphony and it's one of his most popular symphonies. Gary Bertini was born in Bessarabia (now Moldova) in 1927. After the Second World War, he studied at the Milan Conservatory, then at the Tel Aviv Academy of Music (where he graduated in 1951), and finally at the Paris Conservatory and the ecole Normale de Musique. He founded and directed first the Rinat Choir - later named the Israel Chamber Choir - and then the Israel Chamber Ensemble with which Bertini made numerous appearances in Europe and the USA. Over the years, he has been principal conductor of the Frankfurt Opera and the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra, artistic director of the New Israel Opera, and music director of the Rome Opera and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra. Bertini's breadth of repertoire was very impressive, reaching from the 16th century to contemporary composers.

Misha Dichter was born in 1945 in Shanghai, where his Polish parents had fled to by way of the trans-Siberian railroad in order to wait out the war. In 1947 the Dichter family moved to Los Angeles where Misha began studying piano. His first significant teacher was Aube Tzerko, who had studied with Artur Schnabel. “He literally started me from scratch,” Dichter recalled. But the hard work finally paid off when he was accepted into Rosina Lhévinne's class at the Juilliard School.

“In the fall of 1965 I saw a poster in the Juilliard coatroom announcing the third annual Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow,” recalls Dichter. “I had just lost a few local competitions in Los Angeles, so I thought, why not just go for the big one?” The young pianist’s Silver Medal victory in 1966 led to a contract with RCA Victor, for whom he made the three acclaimed albums reissued here, and to the international career of this “most polished pianist” (High Fidelity).

It was inevitable, perhaps, that Dichter’s début release for the label would be given over to the Tchaikovsky B-flat minor Concerto, the same work that catapulted the competition’s first winner Van Cliburn to international stardom. Dichter was to perform the Tchaikovsky at Tanglewood, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Erich Leinsdorf, so RCA duly set up recording sessions.

Dichter’s second RCA Victor album juxtaposed selected Brahms piano pieces with Stravinsky’s 3 Movements from Petrushka, and with his third RCA release, the pianist devoted himself to Beethoven and Schubert. Arthur Rubinstein approved of Dichter’s Schubert, to the extent that he famously invited his younger colleague to his Paris home, where a film crew captured Dichter playing Schubert’s B-flat Sonata D 960 in Rubinstein’s presence. Dichter holds an equally special affinity for the A major Sonata D 959 – “it still represents to me what paradise looks and sounds like.”

Though naturally closely associated with the organ and harpsichord, Bach had a special relationship with the violin, his father's instrument, throughout his life. Moreover, we know that he was a highly skilled player, performing regularly at the court of Weimar, and probably also at Kothen and Leipzig. He wrote and transcribed concertos and sonatas for violin, but above all created the unprecedented collection of Sonatas and Partitas for solo instrument. And it is precisely for this vehicle of pure virtuosity that Marco Serino's new project offers four masterpieces, only one of which - the Partita No. 2, the most ambitious work in the group - has survived in a version for violin. Both the first two Suites for cello and the Toccata and Fugue BWV 565, however, already boast an important tradition of violin transcriptions. Pervaded by the virtual polyphony so characteristic of the celebrated Sei solo, these extraordinary pieces, which are presented from a different perspective than usual, celebrate this art of transformation pursued by the artists of the Baroque as an ideal of continuous and fruitful metamorphosis.

Star pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard presents Ländler, a collection of delightful dances composed by Franz Schubert. Rustic and cheerful, these miniatures display a fascinating side of Schubert’s musical persona. Their simplicity is deceptive, as these dances are frequently shaken up by Schubert’s harmonic wandering soul, yet remaining lyrical, picturesque, and tuneful. For Aimard, there is a kinship between Schubert’s Ländler and Kurtág’s Játékok, pieces that he often performs side by side, sharing a combination of playfulness and Modernism that also calls the great twentieth-century miniaturist Anton Webern to mind. By avoiding almost any repetition, Aimard evokes a sleepwalker’s journey rather than a series of dances.

A renowned champion of twentieth-century music, Pierre-Laurent Aimard has released multiple acclaimed albums in his exclusive contract with Pentatone, including Messiaen’s Catalogue d’Oiseaux (2018) and Visions de l’Amen (2022), along with Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata & Eroica Variations (2021). He also joined Tamara Stefanovich in Etudes and Frames (2023), with music by Vassos Nicolaou, and recorded Bartók's Piano Concertos with the San Francisco Symphony and Esa-Pekka Salonen (2023).

When Christian Ferras died at age 49. his friend and colleague Yehudi Menuhin wrote that Ferras was"possessed by music, immensely talented, and of both a generous and intense temperament."

Christian Ferras was one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century. Born in 1933, he was a guest soloist of the Nice Symphony orchestra in1942. In 1948 he won the First Prize at the International Scheveningen (Holland) Violin Competition and in 1949 won the top prize at the International Long-Thibaud Competition. Thereafter, he pursued a successful career as soloist with many of the world’s leading orchestras and in recitals with his long time accompanist, pianist Pierre Barbizet. He recorded for EMI and from 1964 for DG where he recorded the four main repertoire violin concertos, Brahms, Sibelius, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, with Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.
Fortunately, Christian Ferras left behind a rich recorded legacy, that enable us to continue to enjoy his great artistry.

Even their genesis seems mysterious: manuscripts of Johann Sebastian Bach's toccatas have not survived. However, it is assumed that the works were composed in the years of his Arnstadt and early Weimar period, when Bach was gradually working his way up to become a renowned organist. And it is no wonder that he chose the toccata as the playground for his development: since the days of the Roman Girolamo Frescobaldi, the toccata was a kind of musical laboratory in which one could try out anything with impunity. There are virtuosic, glittering improvisations next to strict but extremely energetic fugues, expressive arias next to lively, folksy dances. Bach has thus compiled entertaining suites and potpourris with great freedom, but always allowing them to breathe under great dramatic arcs. Jonathan Ferrucci is certain that the toccatas are among Bach's most interesting piano works. 'He is bubbling over with ideas and always creates abrupt contrasts when you least expect them. There is this wild, youthful energy with which he explores all the affects and formal possibilities of the music of the time. And when I play, I feel as if I'm composing the music together with Bach in the moment - that's because of this incredible spontaneity and his delight in invention.' Born in Florence to Italian-Australian parents, Ferrucci's childhood was already characterised by the glorious history of the Renaissance and Baroque periods and the vast Australian landscape.

Pianist Luisa Imorde, deeply inspired by Brahms, presents an album of his works, contextualizing his music with pieces that influenced him, like those by Bach and other Baroque composers. Through her sensible and virtuosic playing she engages with musical traditions, creating a dialogue between compositions and earlier works, just like Brahms had done before her.

Why Poesia? Because this album explores the cello as a lyrical instrument, with resonances close to the human voice. From the bel canto of Mercadante, a little-known but refined opera composer, to Vanherenthals' flamboyant Rhapsody on the Themes of Richard Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier, each work evokes the vocal universe, sometimes with modesty, sometimes with exuberance.

Ondine’s third album devoted to the music of Lithuanian-American composer Žibuoklė Martinaitytė (b. 1973) focuses on her music for unaccompanied chorus. On this album, four of her works are performed by the award-winning Latvian Radio Choir, conducted by Sigvards Kļava.

REVIEW:

The four a cappella choral works by Zibuokle Martinaityte on this haunting album unfold in a world beyond language. There are no texts, just free-floating vowels and tremulous ululations. And yet the emotional impact of this bewitchingly beautiful music is direct and at times devastating.

— New York Times

The Ninth Symphony, which Antonin Dvorak himself titled 'From the New World', was a huge success when it premiered on 16 December 1893 at Carnegie Hall in New York: 'The newspapers say that never before has a composer enjoyed such a triumph.' However, it was by no means uncontroversial - Dvorak had been invited to the USA and given the task of creating an American national music. He therefore studied the music of the indigenous population, the descendants of slaves and various other inhabitants, and created the symphony with all these sources in mind. Though many critics did not consider that the goal of an authentic American national music had been achieved, the work itself belongs until today to the most popular symphonies ever written. Much earlier, Dvorak had composed the Serenade for Wind Instruments, Violoncello and Double Bass in D minor. He was probably inspired by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's 'Gran Partita', and the unusual instrumentation of Op. 44 - with two oboes, clarinets and bassoons, a contrabassoon, three horns, two cellos and double basses - is a strong indication of this. Finnish conductor Pietari lnkinen has been principal conductor of the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie since 2017. He will step down from this position in the summer of 2025 to focus more on his international commitments. He has received numerous awards, including the Franco Abbiati Prize. In October 2023, the film portrait 'A Baton and a Passport - Pietari lnkinen Conductor' was released.

The son of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), Carl Philipp Emanuel, described his father’s Sonatas BWV 1014–1019 as among the best works his father ever wrote and continued to perform them extensively after his father’s death. This is music of implication and inference, the emotions no less real for their apparent lack of specificity. There is pleasure in the paradox: even without a text, the music sings. “They still sound very good and give me much joy, although they date back more than fifty years. They contain some Adagios that could not be written in a more singable manner today”, writes C. P. E. Bach. In these new recordings, some of the greatest exponents of Baroque music in the Nordic countries, violinist Sirkka-Liisa Kaakinen-Pilch and keyboardist Tuija Hakkila join forces. Tuija Hakkila plays copy of a Gottfried Silbermann fortepiano 1747 by Andrea Restelli — J. S. Bach played one of his fortepianos in 1747 in Potsdam for Frederick the Great and his court musicians.

This sequel to the Gramophone Award-nominated Americascapes album (ODE 1396-2) by the Basque National Orchestra and Robert Trevino is a thrilling and a deeply personal journey into the music of three American composers. All three composers had very unique aesthetic worlds and with two of the composers conductor Robert Trevino also had direct artistic collaboration. Where my first 'Americascapes' album looked at lesser-known major American works that had influenced European composers (rather than the other way around), for this follow-up, I went back to a more basic thought - "What is America?". Since America is many things to millions of people, I realise that my question had to mean, "What is America to me? (...) Selecting the composers for this American Opus took well over a year. Yet I eventually refined the list to these three composers, with all of whom I feel a close kinship and all of whom are deeply meaningful to me. Two of them I even had a direct artistic relationship with. As a group, they also embody some of the diversity and the radically different aesthetics that thrive in the Americas." (Robert Trevino)

REVIEW:

The hunt for buried treasure is quite an industry these days, but coming up with gold is far from guaranteed. No problem, it appears, for Robert Treviño and the Basque National Orchestra. American Opus is the sequel to 2021’s excellent Americascapes (Ondine ODE 1396-2) and once again the Mexican-American conductor demonstrates a gift for sorting the wheat from the chaff. With the Revueltas set beside the Crumb and the Walker, Americascapes Volume 2 is a complex, thoroughly satisfying national portrait.

— Limelight

Originally issued on the 2LP set Nativity in 1976, this classic Vox recording is a fine example of Robert Shaw’s expertise as a choral conductor. The album features a selection of carols, choral works and orchestral Christmas favourites performed by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. Produced by the legendary Elite Recordings team of Marc Aubort and Joanna Nickrenz, and newly remastered from the original analogue tapes in high-definition.

He went on to head major orchestras in Dallas and Atlanta and to guest conduct leading ensembles all over the world. But before that, Louis Lane honed his craft while working in the shadow of one of the great masters: in 1947, legendary maestro George Szell chose the young, inexperienced Texan to assist him in Cleveland - "I think you will do" was the gruff maestro's verdict, exceptional praise indeed from that notorious perfectionist.

Between 1959 and 1972 - with the full Cleveland Orchestra, the somewhat smaller Cleveland Pops and the chamber-sized Cleveland Sinfonietta - Louis Lane made a series of critically acclaimed recordings for Columbia. They display the "exceptional breadth and impeccable taste" for which this gifted but perennially undervalued conductor was lauded in a tribute by the orchestra's executive director. Sony Classical is pleased to present them now - many for the first time on CD - in a new 14-disc set.

Reviewers were effusive in their praise when these albums were originally released on LP. Here is a sampling: Pop Concert U.S.A. (1959) - music by Copland, Gershwin, Bernstein and other American composers: "If only all the pops (or, for that matter, all the classics) were as good as this!. The orchestra plays splendidly" (Gramophone). On the Town with the Cleveland Pops (1960) - selections from On the Town, My Fair Lady, Oklahoma, The King and I and other Broadway musicals: "Scintillating. Under Lane's enthusiastic direction, the Clevelanders play these familiar musical comedy excerpts with such precision and virtuosity that they emerge with glistening freshness" (High Fidelity). Music from the Films (1961) - Henry V, Louisiana Story, Bridge on the River Kwai, Gigi, Exodus and other motion pictures: "This concert of music from the movies is so superior to most issues of it's kind that it calls for special commendation. Lane has coaxed some beautiful playing from the Cleveland orchestra, and the engineers have provided him with rich and glorious sound" (High Fidelity).

Cappella Amsterdam and its artistic leader Daniel Reuss present their third Pentatone album with a recording of Alfred Schnittke’s Psalms of Repentance. Schnittke composed the piece in 1988 to commemorate the Christianisation of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus in 988, and based it on anonymous Russian texts from the 16th century about guilt and repentance. It is one of the most impressive large-scale works for a cappella choir written in the twentieth century, setting intensely emotional texts to equally expressive music, and approaching centuries-old Orthodox musical traditions through the lens of late twentieth-century music. This recording uses the original manuscript, which differs in multiple ways from the published score, resulting in an interpretation that aims to be closer to the composer’s intentions. Since its foundation in 1970, Cappella Amsterdam has shown an exceptional mastery of contemporary and early vocal music, with acclaimed excurses to Romantic repertoire as well. Daniel Reuss has been Artistic Leader of Cappella Amsterdam for over three decades now, and has worked with several renowned choirs and ensembles. Their PENTATONE debut album In Umbra Mortis (2021) won an Edison Klassiek Award, and was followed by David Lang: the writings in 2022.