Dario Salvi's acclaimed survey of overtures by Auber continues with Volume 7. The Janacek Philharmonic Ostrava who were the featured orchestra on Volume 5 (8.574335) return to the series in a volume that includes several world premiere recordings.

REVIEW:

Conductor Dario Salvi is the creative force behind these recordings. All his albums maintain a high standard of performance. And all benefit from innovative programming. The Janacek Philharmonic Ostrava is in fine form here. Under Salvi’s direction, they play with a lighthearted elegance fitting the fairy operas. And they can also deliver some dramatic thundering when necessary.

Including additional music from the operas has slowed Salvi’s traversal of the overtures. But these recordings are about the journey, not the destination. These ballets and incidental music show Auber’s genius. His orchestrations set the stage and tell the story — in music, not words. Another fine addition to this edition.

— WTJU-FM (Ralph Graves)

This album showcases a selection of Ives’ shorter works for orchestra. Experiments, marches, arrangements, and enticingly incomplete fragments are included alongside the Four Ragtime Dances and Chromâtimelôdtune, one of Ives’ most startling creations. Ives specialist James Sinclair conducts. Includes seven world premiere recordings. Released to mark the 150th anniversary of Ives’s birth.

Anne-Catherine Bucher studied harpsichord and basso continuo with Michele Deverite, Robert Kohnen, Francoise Lengelle, and Huguette Dreyfus, and organ with Norbert Petry. She has taken master classes with Jesper Christensen and Gustav Leonhardt and has performed concerts throughout Europe and Latin America with the finest ensembles specializing in Early Music. Passionate about research, she creates original programs and develops new forms of concerts and encounters with audiences of all kinds. She is professor for harpsichord at the Metz Metropole Conservatory. She has taught master classes in France, Belgium, Finland, Poland, Germany, Mexico, and Cuba, and has recorded several radio and television programs. This release contains Bach's Goldberg Variations played on harpsichord by Anne-Catherine Bucher and comes with a detailed form analysis in the liner notes.

The Ukrainian violin virtuoso Solomiya Ivakhiv presents a selection of Ukrainian Christmas carols arranged for violin and orchestra by Bohdan Kryvopust - the much-lauded composer whose works have been performed internationally. Accompanying Ivakhiv in these world premiere recordings is the Lviv National Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra conducted by Serhii Khorovets.

Following on from the critically acclaimed Anthems, Hymns and Gloria (8.574130) released in 2020, Nicholas Childs and the Black Dyke Band return to the music of John Rutter with this album of Christmas carols arranged for brass. The Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus is also featured on O Clap Your Hands, Nativity Carol and Te Deum. Includes twelve world premiere recordings.

The flute concertos heard on this album were written by composers who lived and worked in East Germany during the four decades of it's existence. These world premiere recordings of concertos by Gunter Kochan, Gisbert Nather and Siegfried Matthus are performed by the stellar German flautist Claudia Stein with the Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt conducted by David Robert Coleman.

These exuberant and technically demanding 18th-century concertos for two horns are performed by JoAnn Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic with soloists Jacek Muzyk and Daniel Kerdelewicz, the orchestra's Principal and Associate Principal Horns respectively. The Hoffmeister concerto is a world premiere recording.

Vassily Sinaisky's widely acclaimed cycle of Schmidt symphonies with the Malmo Symphony Orchestra is now available as a 4-CD box set. Also included are the popular orchestral excerpts from the opera Notre Dame, Variations on a Hussar's Song, the Fuga Solemnis for organ, brass and percussion, as well as the monumental Chaconne. From 8.570828, 8.570589, 8.572118, 8.572119

These delightful dances, including Waltzes and Landler, may be small scale but they are quintessential Schubert. Containing 99 tracks, many of which are rare gems, this album presents the composer's lighter side with beautifully balanced works that are accessible to pianists.

La finta amante was composed during Paisiello's time at the Russian court of Catherine II and it soon became a triumph across Europe. The opera features only three characters, composed for a small travelling ensemble, part of the monarch's entourage on a journey to visit the Emperor of Austria, Joseph II. Stefano Parisse conducts this world premiere recording.

ChromaDuo (Tracy Anne smith and Rob MacDonald) is one of the world's greatest guitar duos. The works recorded here were all composed within the last 20 years, and four of the five works are dedicated to ChromaDuo. World premiere recordings.

Xiaogang Ye's interest in mysterious and beautiful plants has led him to write many pieces inspired by subtropical flora - The Faint Gingko, the oldest tree species in the world, represents an expression of Ye's care and concern for nature. Heard here in a version without words, Song of Farewell is an opera with exquisite textures, beautiful melodies and refined orchestration. World premiere recordings.

This album of Gurney's songs, Volume 24 in the English Song series, presents a wide selection of his works. Featuring several masterpieces - among them Sleep and Severn Meadows - this collection also includes twelve world premiere recordings. Snow is performed here in it's corrected edition. Prize-winning baritone Marcus Farnsworth is accompanied by Eric McElroy.

Romain Descharmes is one of the foremost French pianists of his generation. This album of concertante works includes Poulenc's alluring and seductive Piano Concerto and Faure's Ballade in F sharp minor. Descharmes is also the soloist in the complete Saint-Saens Piano Concertos on 8.573476-78.

Adam Fischer and the Danish Chamber Orchestra continue their ground-breaking survey of Haydn's late symphonies. This fourth volume presents Haydn's final three London symphonies performed with the same excitement and energy that can be found in Volumes 1-3 of this critically acclaimed series.