Countertenor Philippe Jaroussky and soprano Emoke Bar�th appear on the soundtrack of a 2022 film by the award-winning Czech director Petr V�clav. Called Il Boemo (The Bohemian), it tells the story of the Prague-born composer Josef Myslivecek (1737-1781). He became a major figure on Europe's operatic scene, achieving particular renown in Venice, Naples and Munich and composing more than two dozen operas in all. Myslivecek is also notable for being a friend and colleague of Mozart, whom he first met in Bologna in 1770. Both Philippe Jaroussky and Emoke Bar�th make on-screen appearances - as operatic performers - in Il Boemo. V�clav Luks conducts Collegium 1704, the period-instrument ensemble he founded in Prague in 2005.

The Japanese-born pianist Kenji Miura, winner of the 2019 Long-Thibaud-Crespin Competition in Paris, ponders on the issue of identity, combining music of the French school with two pieces by Toru Takemitsu, a Japanese composer strongly influenced by French composers and by the Second Viennese School. The main works on the album are Franck's Pr�lude, Fugue et Variation, Ravel's Valses nobles et sentimentales and Debussy's Six �pigraphes antiques. Born in Kobe in 1993, Kenji Miura studied in the UK and in Berlin, where he is now based. "This album is a reflection of my own personal struggle with identity," he writes. "We live in an increasingly multi-ethnic and multicultural society - my torn-between-worlds feeling is shared by many around the world. This is my small musical letter to all those struggling with the many aspects of identity - a concept that should help us embrace who we are and our complicated, beautiful lives."

Bliss is a state of being where fear does not exist. Bliss is perfect happiness and joy. To record this album, I wanted to place myself in this state, physically and mentally. I meditated daily. Silence, nature, beauty and peace help me to alter my state of consciousness, to escape from daily reality and express myself through music. That is my vision of Bliss.

Maria Ioudenitch presents her debut album with Warner Classics, a collection of short pieces of Russian and German repertoire. The Daily Journal calls it "phenomenally musical". In 2021, Maria Ioudenitch won the prestigious International Joseph Joachim Violin Competition and the Warner Classics prize associated with it.

2 CD brilliant box. Mythologies is Thomas Bangalter's first composition for orchestra, conceived upon request of choreographer Angelin Preljocaj for the ballet of the same name. Performed by the Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine under the direction of Romain Dumas, it is a large and lyrical work in which Bangalter, co-founder of Daft Punk, reinvents his relationship to composition.

The idea behind Carlos Cipa's new album is easy to describe: one room, one piano, one pianist/composer. Taking one's time. Approaching with the greatest possible impartiality. Simply improvising, at first only from, for, and with oneself. But what at first might seem a simple concept becomes more complex at a closer look. With it's quiet, contemplative solo-piano sounds, Ourselves, as we are, is a "deeply vulnerable collection. In the age of fake authenticity, remakes... this approach is perhaps one of the few remaining ways to create art: to reveal our true selves. Radically personal. Radically intimate. Radically honest. Ourselves, as we are.

KALEIDOSCOPE

Alexandre Tharaud's relationship with film music runs deep - it also ranges wide. On his double album CINEMA, the French pianist delves into 50 celebrated film scores by composers from France, Italy, the USA, Japan, Poland, Romania and Lebanon - 19 in all. Among them are Michel Legrand, John Williams, Ennio Morricone, Francis Lai, Marvin Hamlisch, Nino Rota and Philip Glass. As Tharaud says: "This album pays tribute to them with a selection of pieces for piano and orchestra and for piano solo, most in their original versions, creating a sound-world every bit as thrilling without the motion picture." The movie magic is reinforced by Tharaud's starry partners on the album: Antonio Pappano conducts the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and making guest appearances are singers Vanessa Paradis, Cam�lia Jordana and Sabine Devieilhe, clarinettist Michel Portal and vioinist Nemanja Radulovic.

Vilde Frang : "I have wanted to record this concerto for a long time, and Elgar actually has been a very late discovery for me, the Violin Concerto. But it didn't take me a long time to become a very passionate ambassador for this piece. And I really feel that the format of this piece is such a vast piece of music and it's more on the symphonic scale than a violin concerto to me, which is why I take immense pleasure in playing this concerto." The reviews of Vilde's recent Elgar concert performances have been outstanding, media writing about a 'remarkable performance bringing out Elgar's extraordinary beauty'.

Barenboim's first Beethoven Symphonies collection recorded in 1999. That box set will be re-released. Barenboim, known as Furtwangler's follower, was recorded in a brief period of two months at a stretch, and a great performance of a heavy sound that pushed the powerfulness which pushed the enthusiasm fully enough forward. It is a high-quality one that has earned a higher reputation than at the time of the first release and it can be said to be a very standard standard collection. Berlin-Staatskapelle is also a prestigious oke-like heavy-duty sound that exudes superb functionality.

SYMPHONY NO 8: SYMPHONY OF THE THOUSAND

LA DANSE

Richard Strauss considered Mozart to be "the most sublime of all composers". Both Mozart and Strauss wrote exquisitely for the soprano voice and Sabine Devieilhe, with pianist Mathieu Pordoy, has assembled a beautifully balanced programme of their songs. Among them is Strauss's sublime 'Morgen', which brings a guest appearance by violinist Vilde Frang. When Devieilhe and Pordoy performed Mozart and Strauss at London's Wigmore Hall, The Spectator wrote of a "heart-stopping soprano" who made the songs "sound dewy-fresh. Her voice picked up and outlined each word; long lines sounded spontaneous but wholly considered. The clarity and the lightly worn self-awareness of Devieilhe's singing made for a seductive combination."

The sixth album of the prodigy sisters with 470,000 albums sold. French classical crossover stars go back to their roots and revisit the repertoire they loved growing up. An enticing assortment of lean-back repertoire, including Hans Zimmer's "Now We Are Free" (from the movie Gladiator), Pr�lude from Bach's Cello Suite No. 1, Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah", Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", The Beatles's "Yesterday", and Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. Some tracks feature piano accompaniment. Camille and Julie Berthollet's second album has now sold more than 100 000 copies in France and is now a Platinum Album.

Leonard Bernstein - "The Maestro - Very Best of Leonard Bernstein" / Electrifying conductor, brilliant composer, gifted pianist, inspiring teacher: Leonard Bernstein is one of the most famous and influential musicians of all time. Highlights of the Maestro's legendary recordings for Deutsche Grammophon include his incandescent interpretations of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Mahler, composers for whom he felt a profound affinity. 2 CD set with 4-page folder. Verve Label Group; Deutsche Grammophon; Classical

For his debut on Warner Classics, the 17-year-old pianist Yoav Levanon has chosen a demanding programme of works by Liszt, Chopin, Mendelssohn and Schumann. Liszt's mighty Sonata in B minor forms the centrepiece of A Monument for Beethoven, an album honouring the four composers' contribution to the festivities which in 1845 marked Beethoven's 75th anniversary in the city of Bonn, his birthplace. When Yoav Levanon performed the programme in Paris in 2020, Le Monde declared him "already a great pianist". He describes the album as "a "musical journey that traverses many distinct planes" and which is "emblematic of the great fellowship and solidarity that exists among musicians".

Not the least extraordinary thing about this wonderful blend of the sublime and the humane is that it draws from all musicians the best of which they are capable... This issue is specially commended to those who are after the mystery and elevation of The Magic Flute. - Gramophone

Beethoven was Wilhelm Furtwängler's guiding musical force. In his interpretations of the symphonies, the conductor generates irresistible dramatic momentum - and a constant sense of imaginative freshness - through the interrelationship of form, harmony, texture, rhythm and tempo. These recordings, all made in the late 1940s and early 1950s, in the Musikverein in Vienna and at concerts in London, Bayreuth and Stockholm, have been remastered in 192kHz/24-bit at Art & Son Studio (in 2021 for the 7 recordings included in The Complete Wilhelm Furtwängler on Records and newly for this edition for the 3 other ones), bringing their sound more alive than ever before and for the first time here on a physical medium.

As a bonus the 5th Symphony live performance from 1950 in Copenhagen restored in HD from an excellent condition analogue source has been added.

The Dutch modern-classical composer/pianist is back with a new album (digital, CD, vinyl) - beautiful solo piano tracks and some tracks created with various keyboard instruments and synthesizers - another relaxing and exciting journey through Matteo's unique sound world. In this latest project, Matteo again explores the subject of longing. In a way it's a follow-up to the first one - but while "Notes of Longing" still suggested a longing to the future, "A brief nostalgia" is composed mainly with a nostalgic look at the past. Regardless of whether this consists of sadness, desire or bliss! This new work employs a wide arsenal of keyboard instruments: Grand piano, upright piano, harmonium, organ, choir organ, various synthesizers and drum computers.

Lahav Shani, Chief Conductor of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra for the past five years, conducts the Dutch ensemble in Bruckner's epic Symphony No 7. He admires the Austrian composer for his proverbially grand musical architecture, but also for his vision and the atmosphere he creates as he builds to mighty climaxes over extended periods "... from a hint of light to the whole world". Shani's sense for symphonic structure and drama, and the Rotterdam Philharmonic's response to it, was evident in their Warner Classics recording of Shostakovich's Symphony No 5 (released in 2022). Gramophone magazine's reviewer praised "... an account where the feeling is refreshingly one of rediscovery... Shani has a wonderful nose for atmosphere... [He] reminds me just how achingly beautiful the slow movement of this piece is... and I don't think I have ever heard the transition into the hushed final pages sound quite as breathtaking... A terrific disc."

Almost every story about minimal or repetitive music starts with the triumvirate Steve Reich, Philip Glass and Terry Riley. Each in their own way, paved the way for one of the most exciting and thriving movements in music of the 20th and 21st centuries. Minimal music has been an inspiration for Eric Sleichim since the 1980s. Today, BL!NDMAN's demarche towards the renewal of early music finds more than ever a connection with Reich, Glass and Riley whose works draw inspiration from the oldest polyphonic techniques. In this programme, BL!NDMAN offers a sampling of the exceptional timbres generated by his unique line-up: with his saxophone, string and percussion quartet, piano, electric guitar, tubax and electronics, BL!NDMAN conjures up a 21st-century orchestral sound. The solo works combine the virtuosity of the soloists with the use of electronic doubling, while in the tutti works, the instrumentation and powerful consonance of the full BL!NDMAN ensemble provide the very diverse perspectives that give full credit to these extraordinary compositions. The choice of relatively well-known and, above all, lesser-known works by the three icons of repetitive music gives raison d'�tre to a triple album that will be released on April 14th 2023.

This recording of Turandot, Puccini's spectacular final opera marks a number of important firsts. Before the recording sessions in Rome in March 2022, Sir Antonio Pappano had never conducted Turandot; neither Sondra Radvanovsky, who takes soaring title role, nor Jonas Kaufmann as Turandot's suitor, Calaf - who sings 'Nessun dorma' - had previously performed the opera. It is also the first studio recording of Turandot to include the entire, crucial final scene as completed after Puccini's death in 1925 by Franco Alfano. Radvanovsky and Kaufmann are joined by Ermonela Jaho as the slave Li�, Michele Pertusi as King Timur and Michael Spyres - a star tenor in a character role - as the Emperor of China. Pappano conducts the forces of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. The success of the entire project was confirmed by a public concert performance, greeted with a standing ovation, that took place a few days after recording had been completed:.Stunningly beautiful," was the view of Opera magazine,.Pappano brings out the dramaturgical sense of every moment of the score... The singing was outstanding." Il Corriere della Sera wrote that.First and foremost, this Turandot will be remembered [for] Antonio Pappano's absolutely inspired achievement... It really felt like discovering a new Turandot."

Two life-affirming works from Leoš Janáček's prodigious final years are performed by the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg under Marko Letonja, it's Music Director from 2012 to 2021: the Glagolitic Mass, both monumental and exuberant, and the colourful, multi-faceted Sinfonietta. The vocal soloists are Malin Byström, Jennifer Johnston, Ladislav Elgr, and Adam Plachetka, who are joined by organist Johann Vexo and the Czech Philharmonic Choir of Brno - the city where Janáček made his home and which he evokes in the Sinfonietta. This recording uses a 2011 critical edition of the Glagolitic Mass which captures the true adventure and passion of Janáček's score.

Beatrice Rana combines Clara Wieck-Schumann and Robert Schumann's piano concertos with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe under conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin In an interview with the New York Times, Rana, who called the piano concerto by Clara Wieck "a genius work in many ways," said: "I think that it's very, very underestimated - the intellectual value of this concerto in the history of music. It's fascinating to see that she conceived of this music free from any limitations; that as a teenager she composed an uninterrupted concerto with no breaks between the movements. We think of Liszt's First Piano Concerto as revolutionary in that regard, but Clara wrote hers so much earlier, unbroken and with connecting themes linking the movements."

Elisabeth Leonskaja states, "When I play, I am not presenting myself on the stage, but the music I am playing. It is the music that matters." For her second Warner Classics album, she performs Beethoven's Piano Concertos 3 & 4 recorded with the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse under conductor Tugan Sokhiev. One of the most celebrated pianists of our time, she remains true to herself and to her music, and in doing so following in the footsteps of great Russian musicians such as Sviatoslav Richter and Emil Gilels. French magazine Diapason has written: "Elisabeth Leonskaja's journey leads from one peak to another. By constantly excelling herself, driven by her own personal demands, by her passion and her intelligence, she has earned a place among the greatest, not just of today, but of the past." Winner of Germany's prestigious Opus Klassik Award in 2020, she is admired as an interpreter who respects the truth of the music.