For baritone Alexandre Beuchat and pianist Marija Bokor, life with music is an exciting and never-ending journey; a journey through a wide variety of works and eras, a journey to faraway places and a journey to themselves. For the album "Songs of Travel", they have embarked on a journey that is as arduous as it is rewarding, with songs by Vaughan Williams, Schubert, Bloch and Mahler.

Alisa Weilerstein and Inon Barnatan present Brahms' two Cello Sonatas, alongside their arrangement of his Violin Sonata in G Major on the cello. This Brahms portrait is a logical next step after the duo's acclaimed interpretation of Beethoven's complete Cello Sonatas, released in 2022. While Beethoven's sonatas reveal the gradual ascendancy of the cello as the proper solo instrument over the piano, Brahms opens a new chapter in the history of the cello sonata, realizing a glorious marriage of equals between the two instruments. This congenial relationship between cello and piano is further enhanced by Weilerstein and Barnatan, whose musical partnership (in addition to their thriving solo careers) has been a stable factor over the years.

Since signing an exclusive contract with PENTATONE, Alisa Weilerstein has released Transfigured Night (2018) as well as Bach's Cello Suites (2020), while also featuring on Old Souls (2019) and Inon Barnatan's Beethoven Piano Concertos Part 1 (2019), on which she performed the composer's Triple Concerto. This album was part of Inon Barnatan's complete Beethoven piano concertos recordings on PENTATONE, of which Part 2 appeared in 2020. 2021 saw the release of his solo album Time Traveler's Suite, while Rachmaninoff Reflections appeared in 2023, followed by Darknesse Visible in 2024. Brahms Cello Sonatas is the second PENTATONE album by Weilerstein and Barnatan. Their interpretation of Beethoven's complete Cello Sonatas appeared on the label in 2022.

BALTIC SKETCHES by composer Scott Brickman is a collection of symphonic works inspired by Brickman's Baltic and Slavic ancestry. The album features his Symphony No. 5, which draws on Latvian folk traditions, including folk dances, songs, and Lutheran liturgical music. It also includes Symphony No. 1, an exploration of neoclassical form influenced by contemporary socio-political events, including military conflict in the Middle East and the climate crisis. Symphony No. 6 for wind ensemble explores textural and timbral color and nods to the Lutheran chorale, In Dulci Jubilo. Blending classical forms with asymmetrical dance meters and folk melodies, Brickman's BALTIC SKETCHES finds unexpected connections between time-honored traditions.

At the end of the world, on the mythical island of Ogygia, while Neptune unleashes a storm, the inconsolable Calypso tries to seduce a handsome young castaway named Telemachus… Will Ulysses' son respond to the nymph's dangerous charms? Will he manage, as a humble mortal in the scheme of the gods, to escape the island where his father was once a prisoner ? A quintessential Homeric epic, Télémaque & Calypso is a flamboyant tribute to Destouches' own dramatic efficiency, and his particular attention to "lively speech" and natural declamation. After Sémiramis, Sylvain Sartre continues his brilliant journey through the masterpieces of the adventurous composer and musketeer, which are now finaly revealed.

First recording of this special collection of very early chamber music. Several pieces are world first recordings. Beautiful acoustics of a church of the time when the music was composed. Very diversified instrumental settings. Use of some nstruments that are nearly unknown today.

The singing quality of string instruments ties together "SONGS FOR A NEW CENTURY," a program featuring both world premiere recordings of new music commissioned for the artists and world premiere recordings of masterpieces by Mendelssohn.

The program opens with a set of Mendelssohn’s Songs Without Words, beginning with the Opus 109 written by the composer for cello and piano. It continues with a set of arrangements for cello and piano, some recorded for the first time, by the 19th-century cellist Alfredo Piatti, a personal friend of Mendelssohn’s upon whose cello Jonathan Miller plays. Gabriela Lena Frank’s Operetta for violin and cello, the composer writes, expands upon Mendelssohn’s concept of the “song without words,” creating opera without words that evokes scenes and characters through singing music for the duo of violin (Lucia Lin) and cello. Scott Wheeler’s second cello sonata, Songs Without Words, was inspired by Miller’s singing cello tone. Finally, Judith Weir’s Three Chorales for cello and piano meditate on religious poetry, departing from hymn texts –– and in the third Chorale, a melody from Hildegard of Bingen –– in a triptych that evokes the human condition.

"Operetta," "Three Chorales," and "Cello Sonata #2: Songs Without Words" were commissioned by Jonathan Miller and Diane Fassino for the Boston Artists Ensemble.

Conceived on a grand scale, Lloyd's late choral works build fruitfully upon his previous experience in other genres. They share with his operas an innate lyricism, natural affinity with the human voice and feeling for the long line, while their structural balance, intensive working out of motifs and rich orchestral palette owes a significant debt to his prolific symphonic output.

Conceived on a grand scale, Lloyd's late choral works build fruitfully upon his previous experience in other genres. They share with his operas an innate lyricism, natural affinity with the human voice and feeling for the long line, while their structural balance, intensive working out of motifs and rich orchestral palette owes a significant debt to his prolific symphonic output.

DANZAS - from Taboo to Triumph: Initially frowned upon and forbidden, then socially accepted and the height of fashion.�Despite being at times banned by the authorities, their popularity was not reduced. In this "crossover" project by La Ninfea, the genres and dances meet and mix. Historical dances suddenly turn into tangos, while a tango shows itself in baroque dress -� a musical bridge spanning centuries and social conventions.

If someone told you there was music that could lull pillowy-winged moths into a fluttery state of happiness, that the Aurora Borealis can sing even better than you and I, or that the roots of the American elm trees in Central Park are a bustling ensemble waiting for their cue, would you believe them? Matthew Burtner would, and he'd have no trouble proving it on PROFILED FROM ATMOSPHERES, the veteran ecoacoustic composer's sixth release with Ravello Records. Burtner lifts the veil between humanity and it's planet, translating it's messages into an intimate medium invariably understood amongst it's inhabitants. These messages make an urgent case in the titular work Profiled From Atmospheres, a collaborative work between atmospheric sound profiles derived from humanity's top three greenhouse gas emissions and saxophone/percussion duo Michael Weiss and Elizabeth Soflin. The result is an eerie, haunting sonification that serves as a poignant reminder; if we want to continue hearing the songs of the atmosphere and the planet it blankets, it's our responsibility to preserve it.

One might be tempted to think that there is no crossover in music that hasn't been done yet; and thankfully, one would be mistaken. DEEP RIVER presents a vibrant selection of 21 African American spirituals, interpreted by countertenor Michael Walker II and Old Music consort Alchymy Viols. A curious collaboration? Not at all, according to director Philip Spray. The viol consort's historical purpose was to arrange popular tunes of it's day; so it appeared only logical to try this setup on America's first folk songs. It worked. Additional harmonies are provided by a distinctly anachronistic grand harp, and counterpoint by a small field pump organ. The effect is stunning: a music so utterly, distinctly American, one wonders why this hasn't been done before.

Nathan Granner presents tenor arias by Paer, Mozart, Gluck, Salieri and Bologne, showcasing the rise of the tenor in the late eighteenth century, as well as the Enlightened spirit of the age. The Orchestre Philharmonique de Marseille, under the baton of Clelia Caffiero, partners with Granner to navigate a vast emotional landscape of classical period arias producing a timeless and compelling musical experience. Nathan Granner enjoys a unique and diverse performing career, allowing him to leverage his golden age timbre in many projects and productions. He returns to PENTATONE after having sung the title role in a highlights recording of Gordon Getty's opera Goodbye, Mr. Chips (2022), of which a complete recording with Granner in the same role will appear on the label in 2025. The Orchestre Philharmonique de Marseille has appeared on PENTATONE multiple times, on albums ranging from Martinu Double Concertos with the Kodama and Nemtanu sisters to re-citals by Lisa Delan and Kevin Short (all in 2018). Clelia Caffiero makes her PENTATONE debut.

The great French pianist Roger Muraro joins Alpha Classics for several recording projects. Born in Lyon to Venetian parents, he was a pupil of Yvonne Loriod and is regarded as the leading specialist in the music of Olivier Messiaen, to which he has devoted much of his career. But this noted pedagogue, a former professor at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, is also renowned for his profound and sensitive approach to the music of Ravel, Chopin, Schumann – and Liszt, of whom he is particularly fond. He now presents a monumental masterwork by Liszt which is in his view a work of ‘universal intimacy’: ‘I admire the freedom with which the evocations of the soul, of nature, of the colors of the masters of Italian painting unfold in succession. Everything Liszt saw during his pilgrimage to Switzerland and Italy contributed to a process of reflection, a journey, a quest to bring him closer to his ideal where silence became the ultimate authority.’

REVIEW:

This realization of Années de pèlerinage can only be described as a careercrowning achievement. Muraro accomplishes it through his unflagging attention to the most minute details of Liszt’s score and, above all, by the disarming sincerity of his readings. Heartily recommended without reservation to all those interested in Liszt, as well as to lovers of fine, richly imaginative piano-playing.

— Gramophone

Renowned pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard’s recording of Olivier Messiaen’s Catalogue d’Oiseaux created a sensation when first released on PENTATONE in 2018, and now returns to the market in an attractively priced stereo reissue./p>

Aimard had intimate ties to the composer himself and his wife, Yvonne Loriod, for whom Messiaen wrote the Catalogue, a grand hymn to nature from a man who never ceased to marvel at the stupefying beauty of landscapes or the magic of birdsong. With his Catalogue, Messiaen tried – in his own words – “to render exactly the typical birdsong of a region, surrounded by its neighbours from the same habitat, as well as the form of song at different hours of the day and night,” suggesting an almost scientific approach to his subjects. The idea of ‘reproduction’ may have been central to Messiaen’s conception of the Catalogue d’Oiseaux, but in the finished work we hear a great composer at work, a master of innovative structures who finds an astonishing range of piano sonorities. Thanks to Aimard’s ability to evoke this colourful opus, his interpretation has turned into an absolute reference recording.>/p>

This first release within Aimard’s exclusive partnership with PENTATONE received many accolades, including a Jahrespreis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik. Since then, recordings of Beethoven (2021), Bartók (2023, with San Francisco Symphony and Esa-Pekka Salonen), and Schubert (2024) have appeared on PENTATONE, as well as piano four hands albums with Tamara Stefanovich (Visions in 2022 and Nicolaou: Etudes & Frames in 2023).

“Here loving service is done to a composer who is perhaps Sweden’s most important symphonist and certainly its most popular one.” This is what FonoForum wrote of Vol. 2 of our edition of symphonic works by Hugo Alfvén, who numbers among the most productive and most versatile Swedish cultural personalities. Alfvén’s Symphony No. 2 brought him a success that he termed his definitive artistic breakthrough. A second performance was held during the same year, and it was not long before it was also being presented in foreign countries. This work became his most popular symphony and the first of his compositions to appear in print (1900). At the time national Romantic tones had long dominated music by Swedish composers, while Alfvén adopted a taste that was more Continental – a fact that reviewers registered with astonishment. His Swedish Rhapsody No. 3, a composition featuring impressive work with motifs from Swedish folk music, rounds off this album.

In 1731, at the height of his London fame, Handel created his 28th opera seria: a vocal pyrotechnic about the rivalry, in love and war, between Alexander the Great and the Indian King Porus. Rage and spite, love and glory drive the extraordinary arias that Handel entrusted to two of his favourite singers: the castrato star Senesino for the title role, and the soprano Anna Maria Strada del Pò as the treacherous Cleofide. It was a sign of the work's success and the prestige of its cast. Poro was performed twenty times in 1731, a virtually exceptional figure. The young tenor Marco Angioloni - singing the role of Alexander - brings this opera back to life with his Ensemble Il Groviglio, and a magnificent cast that would have delighted Handel!

Conceived on a grand scale, Lloyd's late choral works build fruitfully upon his previous experience in other genres. They share with his operas an innate lyricism, natural affinity with the human voice and feeling for the long line, while their structural balance, intensive working out of motifs and rich orchestral palette owes a significant debt to his prolific symphonic output.

Conceived on a grand scale, Lloyd's late choral works build fruitfully upon his previous experience in other genres. They share with his operas an innate lyricism, natural affinity with the human voice and feeling for the long line, while their structural balance, intensive working out of motifs and rich orchestral palette owes a significant debt to his prolific symphonic output.

Conceived on a grand scale, Lloyd's late choral works build fruitfully upon his previous experience in other genres. They share with his operas an innate lyricism, natural affinity with the human voice and feeling for the long line, while their structural balance, intensive working out of motifs and rich orchestral palette owes a significant debt to his prolific symphonic output.

Until their dissolution, the Verdi Quartet was one of the most prominent ensembles in the German chamber music scene for over three decades. They have made invaluable contributions far beyond their home with their highly-regarded complete recordings of Schubert and Brahms and the, until now, unique recordings of the string quartets of Ernst Toch. Cpo has now released the "farewell gift" of the quartet, fulfilling a long-held wish by the ensemble - the three quartets of the British "late Romantic" Ralph Vaughan Williams. These again offer the "Verdis" the opportunity to live out their much-praised virtues in all their intimacy and go full circle from his early declaration of love for the English folk song to the consoling swansong that the great composer wrote in the darkest of times at the age of 72.

'If, in a parallel universe, Wagner wrote a symphony rather than a sixteen-hour Ring, it might actually resemble my Ring Odyssey.' These are the words used by the new music director of the Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine, Joseph Swensen, to present this anthology of Der Ring des Nibelungen for soprano, tenor, bass-baritone, male chorus and orchestra, which he composed on the basis of Wagner's monumental tetralogy. The American conductor confesses that, during a performance of Tristan, Wagner was suddenly revealed to him as 'a dreamer' full of 'humility, tenderness, vulnerability and generosity'. Swensen has made a point of following the chronology of the operas and respecting the original music: 'My solemn promise to Wagner was that, aside from the occasional solo timpani roll denoting the passage of time, I would not change or add a single note to his masterpiece.' An enthralling traversal, recorded at a memorable concert and delivered by exceptionally committed singers and instrumentalists.

Presented as 'An Experiment in Modern Music' when it was premiered in 1924, Rhapsody in Blue made George Gershwin famous, and he soon set to work on a version for solo piano, recorded here by Claire Huangci. In her first solo disc for Alpha Classics, Claire was keen to celebrate this centenary alongside her roots in America, where she was born, studied music and made her debut as a concert artist at the age of nine. The brilliant improviser and transcriber Earl Wild (1915-2010) took Gershwin's songs (Liza, Fascinatin' Rhythm, Somebody Loves Me, I Got Rhythm, Embraceable You, Oh, Lady Be Good, The Man I Love) to form the basis of his Seven Virtuoso Etudes for solo piano. Equally virtuosic is the Op. 26 Sonata by Samuel Barber, whom Vladimir Horowitz (who premiered the work in Havana in December 1949) regarded as one of the few Americans capable of writing for the piano. The New Hampshire-born composer Amy Beach took her inspiration from the folk music of both the New World and the Balkans, while retaining her harmonic language inherited from the Romantics. Her Variations Op. 60 (1904) bear witness to these influences.

The Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin continues it's PENTATONE Mozart series with the composer's 29th and 33rd symphonies. These works are coupled with his ravishingly beautiful Clarinet Concerto, performed by Ernst Schlader in the original edition for basset clarinet. Schlader, a specialist in historical instruments, has written an essay on the basset clarinet for the album booklet that includes a rare historical image showing the original shape of the instrument used in the years after the concerto's premiere. The first release of this series was longlisted for the Preis der deutschen Schalllplattenkritik. The Akademie fur Alte Musik is generally seen as one of the best period-instruments ensembles of today, and has a substantial Pentatone discography, including CANTATA with Bejun Mehta (2018), Handel's Concerti grossi Op. 3 and 6 (released in 2019 and 2020), Telemann's Miriways (2020), Handel's Messiah (2020), Haydn's L'isola disabitata (2021), La Passione with Christina Landshamer (2022), a recording of Mozart's Paris and Haffner symphonies and Oboe Concerto with Xenia Loffler (2023), and Telemann's Ino (2024).

Since the Baroque revival of the late 1980s, Iphigenie en Aulide is Gluck's only French opera to have remained unrecorded on period instruments. To celebrate it's 250th anniversary in 2024, Julien Chauvin, Le Concert de la Loge, Les Chantres du Centre de musique baroque de Versailles and a top-flight cast led by Judith van Wanroij, Stephanie d'Oustrac, Cyrille Dubois, Tassis Christoyannis, Jean-Sebastien Bou and David Witczak have filled that gap with a new recording of the work which revolutionised the aesthetics of French opera. It is underpinned by in-depth musicological and stylistic research carried out by the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles in collaboration with Julien Chauvin, in this, his first operatic recording.

Guitarist Daniel Lippel's "Adjacence" features a collection of new chamber works for guitar, including works by Tyshawn Sorey, Charles Wuorinen, Tania Leon, Nico Muhly, Mario Davidovsky, Ken Ueno, Peter Gilbert, Tonia Ko, Bernadette Speech, Peter Adriaansz, and Sidney Boquiren. The works occupy a broad range of aesthetics, from modernist to minimalist, incorporating improvisation and microtonality, and featuring a variety of instrumentations with Lippel's colleagues in the International Contemporary Ensemble, counter)induction, as well as other active performers in the New York contemporary music scene.