In Puccini’s anniversary year, Chief Conductor of Welsh National Opera Carlo Rizzi has created new, purely orchestral versions of some of his most well-known and beloved works. Staying pure and faithful to Puccini’s original orchestration without anything added to ‘cover’ any perceivable lack of vocal line the brilliance of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, Tosca and other works shine through in this album of world premiere recordings.

REVIEW:

This fabulous album of world premiere recordings is just exhilarating from start to finish. I do hope that by the end of the year Maestro Rizzi will give us other orchestral suites, say, from La bohème or Turandot. I am sure they will be welcomed most enthusiastically.

This is an irresistible programme full of shimmering melodies that help us to really discover Puccini’s orchestral mastery which is often overshadowed by the singing and heartwrenching drama of the stories. This exceptionally innovative music that strongly enhances the total mastery of Puccini’s art is not to be missed.

-- Classical Music Daily

Their third release on Signum Classics, David Temple and Hertfordshire Chorus present Karl Jenkin’s The Armed Man. This is the first recording of the ensemble version of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace. It was conceived by the composer as an alternative where performances of the full symphonic version are not possible. The work loses none of its impact, retaining the same big sound with driving rhythms, thundering climaxes, fearful moments and tender, memorable melodies. This recording features celebrated mezzo soprano Kathryn Rudge as well as muezzin Osama Kiwan and cellist Jamal Aliyev.

Marking the quadricentenary of Byrd’s death in 2023, the Men & Boys Choir of Saint Thomas, Fifth Avenue, New York, recreates the Catholic Mass for the Feast of Corpus Christi as Byrd might have experienced it in the late 16th century. This new recording includes various Latin motets written by Byrd for the feast, along with the remarkable Mass setting in four parts.

Part of this album is a recording, originally released on LP only in 1981, of the Saint Thomas Choir under the late Gerre Hancock, singing Byrd’s complete Great Service, written in the vernacular for the reformed Anglican liturgy – the flip side of Byrd’s Latinate expression.

Continuing their Magnificat series, and the last album of Andrew Nethsingha's tenure as director, The Choir of St John's College Cambridge present Magnificat 4 with works from composers including Judith Weir, Jonathan Dove, Joanna Forbes L'Estrange and Charles Villiers Stanford. The album also features 'Magnificat & Nunc Dimittis' by Piers Connor Kennedy, commissioned for the choir.

The two towering masterpieces of the piano quintet genre on this disc were written seventy years and a thousand miles apart, but for all this, they are closely related – Marina Frolova Walker.

Signum artists Peter Donohoe and the Sacconi Quartet join forces to bring piano quintets by Sergey Taneyev and Robert Schumann in their latest album. Their performances of Taneyev’s spectacular Piano Quintet in early 2020 were received with universal acclaim. This resulting album recording felt inevitable, coupling the Taneyev with Schumann’s earlier quintet, itself of such significance to Sergey Taneyev.

For a period of the 20th Century, due to his talent and association with Benjamin Britten, Peter Pears was perhaps the world's most famous classical singer. Pears inspired Britten to create great works of art precisely because Pears was a compelling artist with an exceptional voice, an inquisitive mind, a knowledge of art, history, literature and poetry. They became a self-perpetuating duo, inspiring each other to even greater heights of artistry, technical ability, and emotional certainty. This album of works by Lennox Berkeley, Benjamin Britten, Arthur Oldham, Richard Rodney Bennett and Geoffrey Bush is performed by tenor Robin Tritschler, who is joined by cellist Philip Higham, guitarist Sean Shibe and pianist Malcolm Martineau. Praise for Robin Tritschler and Malcolm Martineau: 4 stars Performance, 4 stars Recording "Robin Tritschler's sweet-toned voice is a continual delight, as is Malcolm Martineau's sparkling, pearly, luminous piano sound" - BBC Music Magazine

Tenebrae bring their trademark passion and precision to this live performance of music by J. S. Bach and Sir James MacMillan, to be recorded live at Snape Maltings in May 2023. Renowned for their technical difficulty,

Bach’s motets are pillars of the choral repertoire, requiring minute attention to detail as well as a full emotional range. Here, Tenebrae performs the three most well-known of the set, culminating in the joyful Singet dem Herrn. Like Bach, Sir James MacMillan has written much of his music for the church, and his settings of the Tenebrae responsories paint a vivid picture of the events of Holy Week. This album also features the premiere recording of I saw Eternity the other night, which MacMillan composed for Tenebrae in 2021 to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the London Bach Society.

Speaking on Bach and MacMillan, Nigel Short says“I am sure James will be as revered in 400 years’ time as Bach is today. On so many different levels, the contrast between the music of these two great composers could not be more dramatic. What both composers have in abundance, though, is an utter devotion to their religious faiths. This total conviction displays itself in their music, leaving the listener in no doubt as to their commitment to creating music imbued with every ounce of passion and precision. I hope listeners will enjoy and feel the sense of excitement and energy we as performers always feed off in concert, and that this performance in the beautiful venue of Snape Maltings will stand the test of time and be heard by music-lovers for centuries to come.”

Anne Warthmann, soprano is accompanied by Hyowon Chi, flute, Arthur Stockel, clarinet and Naji Hakim at the historic STAHLHUTH-JANN ORGAN at St. Martin’s Church, Dudelange , Grand-Duché de Luxembourg, in a program including the following world premiere recordings of Naji Hakim’s works : Abana for soprano and organ (2019) - Assalamu for soprano and organ (2019) - Our Lady's Minstrel (Prelude for clarinet and organ, Three poems for soprano and organ, Dance for clarinet and organ) (2013) - Adoration for soprano, flute and organ (2015) - Römisches Triptychon for soprano and organ (2010).

Christopher Glynn continues his Schubert in English series by joining baritone Roderick Williams and soprano Rowan Pierce for songs of loneliness and companionship, nature and the seasons, faith and doubt, wandering and homecoming, caution and consolation - all in new English versions by Jeremy Sams.

This will be the 5th NAJI HAKIM PLAYS NAJI HAKIM organ CD released by SIGNUM Classics (visit https://signumrecords.com/product-category/artists/naji-hakim/) . It will include the following world premiere recordings of Naji Hakim's works at the historic STAHLHUTH-JANN ORGAN at St Martin’s Church, Dudelange , Grand-Duché de Luxembourg : Gregoriana (2003) - Bogurodzica (2018) – Prière (2020) - Villancico aragonés (2018) - Carnaval (2014) - Sindbad (2014) - Korean Prelude (2014) - Cantilena (2016) - Trois Paraphrases sur Ave maris stella (2003) - O sacrum convivium (2018) - Tanets (2019).

The first of its kind, this duet album is a musical journey that draws back the curtain which has obscured gay love-stories for centuries. In the 17th century, Venice offered a liberal safe haven of sorts to the gay community of greater Europe. There are accounts of outed artists escaping to Venice to live and work amongst its more permissive culture. Almost 400 years later, we reconnect with this uncommonly tolerant place and time to share a history that is yet untold. The album includes vivid and charming duets from Monteverdi’s 7th book of madrigals as well as his touching musical love letters (lettere amorose). Additionally, there are four modern-day premieres of works by the little-known composers Boretti, Melani, and Castrovillari; including a moving duet for the lovers Hercules and Theseus as they exit the underworld hand-in-hand. Solo arias by Cavalli and Stradella depict the yearning of hidden love, and the recording culminates with one of the most beautiful duets of all time, ‘Pur ti miro’ from Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea. This album is a recognition and celebration of gay love that spans the centuries.

The sublime Choir of St. John’s College, Cambridge return with the third volume in their Advent series celebrating the advent season from within the Christian tradition; a season celebrated since at least the sixth century.

This album marks the culmination of a landmark project to re-imagine new works from old for saxophone; choir and organ. Each work has been specially commissioned and boasts compositions by leading composers including Gabriel Jackson; Errollyn Wallen and Roderick Williams. Celebrated saxophonist Sam Corkin is joined by Canterbury Cathedral choir to bring a fresh perspective to some well-loved repertoire; recorded within the iconic surroundings of Canterbury Cathedral.

This album features the second half of Brescianello’s Opus 1; works 1 – 6 were released as Behind Closed Doors in 2022. La Serenissima passionately believe that Brescianello is a composer who deserves greater recognition with the result that many of his works have been included in releases dating from 2019, our first release on Signum. Solo concertos for violin alternate with Sinphonias for strings and continuo; both forms illustrate Brescianello’s talent for fusing virtuosity with the sweetest of melodies. Also included on the album is an orchestral suite in A major that finishes with a rousing Giga.

“JS Bach’s seven concertos for solo harpsichord & strings, occupy a significant place in the history of music, marking as they do the origin of the keyboard concerto genre. Collectively, they encompass the gamut of Baroque rhetorical expression; indeed, leaving aside the six ground-breaking ‘Brandenburg’ Concerts avec plusieurs instruments, it is difficult to think of a more diverse, revolutionary and technically refined set of instrumental concertos from the Baroque period” - Andrew Arthur; Their second recording on Signum Classics, The Hanover Band play-directed by Andrew Arthur present four of these revolutionary concertos, following their successful first album “BMV 1052, 1054, 1055 & 1058 Harpsichord Concertos”. The Hanover Band’s players are amongst the finest in their field and the orchestra has built an international reputation for the excellence of its performances and recordings of eighteenth and nineteenth-century music. Andrew Arthur is best-known for his work in the field of historically informed performance, he is in great demand as a conductor, keyboard soloist and continuo player, working with many of the UK’s leading period-instrument orchestras and professional choirs.

On her new album pioneering Romanian vocalist Teodora Brody joins forces with one of the world’s great orchestras to explore well-known classical repertoire from an entirely fresh perspective. Rising with style and energy to realise virtuosic orchestrations by Lee Reynolds, the London Symphony Orchestra voyage with Teodora through classical, jazz and Romanian folk traditions, resulting in a multi-faceted, truly unique musical experience. Born in Romania, and now based in Germany, Teodora Brody initially trained in classical jazz and rose to prominence in the late 1990s and early 2000s singing with legendary jazz pianist Johnny Raducanu. Acclaimed for her extraordinary vocal power and creative vision, Teodora pioneered the fusion of jazz with Doina – Romania’s improvisatory folk singing tradition – and is widely credited with introducing international audiences to this extraordinary, deeply emotive music.

In 2004 the American government named Teodora a Romanian Cultural Ambassador to the USA, and in both 2007 and 2008 Teodora was awarded the prize for ‘Best International Jazz Contribution by a Romanian Artist’ by the Romanian Radio Broadcasting Company. In recent years with unique projects including ‘From Classical to Jazz’ and ‘Classical Emotion’, Teodora has explored classical repertoire with a completely fresh approach, reimagining well-known works by composers including Bach, Beethoven, Pachelbel, Vivaldi, Bartók, Pau Casals and the beloved Romanian composer George Enescu. In 2019 ‘From Classical to Jazz’ was awarded ‘Project of the Year’ at the Romanian Jazz Awards Gala, and Teodora herself was named ‘Musician of the Year’ for the second year in a row.

This is a Christmas album that has a sense of place; clearly identifying the Chorale as both American and from a border state with Mexico; and something for everyone whether they prefer serious or light festive fare. There is Mexican influence in the repertoire choices; which include Catalan folksongs as well as Hispanic Renaissance music. It includes a commission by Cecilia McDowall; written for Christmas 2021; new arrangements of all tracks and also some contemporary Christmas favourites such as Sleigh Ride and Jingle Bells.

This marks the Chorale’s return to recording following an 8-year hiatus; and their first album with Signum Records. “Festive repertoire plays an important role in the performance cycle of every choir; and it felt fitting to begin our journey with a Christmas recording that established a sense of place for the ensemble: we chose to record repertoire that is all American or Hispanic in origin; save for the newly-commissioned piece by Cecilia McDowall that was written to mark the centenary of our home in Phoenix; Trinity Cathedral. Our aim is to translate the warmth of Arizona into our sound; to convey the rhetoric of every text; and celebrate the good health of the American Choral Tradition.” - Christopher Gabbitas

Featuring 4 works receiving their world premiere recording, Signum Classics are proud to annouce the new album 'Dorothy Howell: Orchestral Works' conducted by Rebecca Miller with the BBC Concert Orchestra. Until now these works have rarely been performed, and the majority of works are unpublished and only exist in manuscript form. "I hope this album can help to revive Dorothy’s music, to help her live on, to finally have the recognition she deserved and never received, and to secure this music’s rightful place in the centre of the classical music repertoire" - Rebecca Miller

Mahler 2 is the second album from Philharmonia Records; following their first album - Santtu conducts Strauss. “[Also sprach Zarathustra] Rouvali’s conducting of both is certainly interesting and personal... impressive; an expansive reading that sees the work whole...[An Alpine Symphony] undeniably picturesque; vivid and dramatically projected...top-notch playing; and this extravagant score also enjoys notable recorded sound... lingering lyricism; invariably heartfelt and; in conclusion; cathartic”; Founded in 1945; The Philharmonia Orchestra creates thrilling performances for a global audience and has premiered works by Richard Strauss; Sir Peter Maxwell Davies; Errollyn Wallen; Kaija Saariaho and many others. The Philharmonia has an extraordinary 77-year recording legacy; and has recorded around 150 soundtracks; with film credits stretching back to 1947. In the 2021/22 season the Orchestra performs in Romania; Spain; Finland; Greece and Germany.

Santtu-Matias Rouvali is a Finnish conductor and percussionist; and is currently principal conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra. Rouvali continues his relationships with orchestras across Europe; including with the Berlin Philharmonic; New York Philharmonic; Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra; Munich Phillharmonic and the the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France.

REVIEW:

In the first movement Rouvali is animated and engaged, using a lighter hand than most other conductors. Such a natural lyrical bent would seem to run counter to music that Mahler originally conceived as a funeral rite (Totenfeier), and it’s certainly unusual for a conductor to have such a relaxed grip on the drama and still make the first movement work.

The point is underscored in the minuet-like second movement, usually a throwaway, which is captivating in Rouvali’s hands, a nostalgic poem. The Scherzo is taken at quite a clip, divorcing the music from the gently satiric song in Des Knaben Wunderhorn about St. Anthony preaching to a school of transfixed fish. Rouvali sharpens the edges and makes the movement rambunctiously exciting—I can’t remember any other conductor leading this music one beat to a bar.

As the soloist in the raptly reverent “Urlicht,” mezzo Jennifer Johnston is sensitive and sincere, but Rouvali leads such an eloquent orchestral part that one wishes he had a singer of the highest caliber. Johnston’s German is more than a shade too basic for the poetry. The thunder and brass that open the fifth movement display excellent balance, bringing forward this conductor’s ability to extract beautiful playing for which the word “burnished” was invented. The many solos and ensemble passages in the final half hour of the “Resurrection” Symphony come off with unforced gorgeousness, needing no shred of rhetoric to make an impact.

Rouvali has held his fire to some extent, making it all the more thrilling when he unleashes the full power of the finale in moments of blazing climax. He must have had the audience on the edge of their seats. Against this tumult, the sudden whispered quiet of the chorus is doubly effective. Soprano Mari Eriksmoen emerges with melting lyricism, and yet you are aware that Rouvali milks nothing for effect—his eye is fixed on the musicality of every measure. You also notice how even the softest passages retain a restrained intensity that keeps the moving line tensile and alive. This is particularly helpful in the duets for mezzo and soprano, where the momentum is most likely to sag. Here, not a single transition is awkward or faltering.

The final apotheosis is so magnificently handled that I can’t blame the producers for including a minute of excited applause from the audience in Royal Festival Hall. For anyone who has harbored doubts about Rouvali’s meteoric rise, a performance as imaginative and beautifully shaped as this one should dispel them. I’m convinced that he has a special gift. I cannot wait to see how it will unfold in the coming years.

-- Fanfare (Huntley Dent)

Pastoral Reflections is a contemporary exploration on what the concept of ‘Pastoral’ means to us in this time of climate crisis. It features classical string sextet alongside field recordings, electronic bass & angular beats, centered around Gabriel Prokofiev’s contemporary response to Beethoven's 250 year old Pastoral Symphony.

The Album opens with the original first movement of Beethoven’s famous symphony (arranged for sextet) - reminding listeners of our less troubled relationship with nature 250 years ago - before moving on to the modern beats of Prokofiev’s recent composition Breaking Screens, which explores ideas of consumerism, digital life and impending crisis. The programme climaxes with 5 movement 'Pastoral Reflections' which echoes Beethoven’s symphonic narrative, but from a contemporary perspective.

2023 marks 25 years since the death of British composer Paul Reade. He is remembered for his delightful Victorian Kitchen Garden music (Ivor Novello Award) and television themes such as Antiques Road-show. However, he also wrote a huge range of equally wonderful but less well-known pieces, full of melodic invention, wit and fabulous energy. They are previously unpublished and unrecorded works that deserve to be heard.

These are premiere recordings (except for the Chants du Roussillon) and show Paul’s music at its best: tender, poignant, humorous and uplifting, full of wonderful melodic and dramatic invention. Philippa Davies has been hailed as a ‘first-rate virtuoso’, with ’winning charm’, ’exceptional eloquence’ and an ‘almost electrical response to technique’. Since her celebrated performance of Mozart’s Concerto in D major at the BBC Proms in 1988, she has gained an international reputation as one of the finest flautists currently performing.

Like the first two releases in The Mozartists’ ongoing ‘Sturm und Drang’ series, this record- ing comprises three highly dramatic and turbulent orchestral works interspersed with similarly highly-charged vocal items. The repertoire dates from between 1771 and 1788, and again includes one of Haydn’s great minor-key symphonies – this time arguably the greatest of them all, the ‘Trauer’. For the first time in the series Mozart is also represented, in the form of his extraordinarily visceral and darkly chromatic Adagio and Fugue in C minor, and the disc opens with an outstanding G minor symphony by the Czech com- poser Leopold Kozeluch, whose quality, sweep and lyricism will surprise many listeners. The two vocal works are genuine rarities. Schweitzer’s Alceste was one of the earliest attempts to create German tragic opera in the vernacular, and it launches with an aria of searing intensity. The scene from Paisiello’s Annibale in Torino – the twenty-third of his eighty-seven operas –features an exquisite but brief arioso before leading into a stormy G minor aria. The soloist is the exciting young American soprano Emily Pogorelc, and Ian Page again conducts his award-winning period-instrument ensemble.

Recorded during the 2020 lockdown, Richard Boothby explores the solo and duo Viol music of Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger. The lyra viol and its music is one of the last undiscovered gems of music, and Alfonso Ferrabosco is its greatest exponent. It is in the category of ‘hard to define, easy to recognise’: it is at once an instrument, a style of playing and a genre of instrumental music, and, while not exclusively English, by far the largest part of its repertory is from these isles. A composer favoured by Queen Elizabeth I and James I, Ferrabosco also wrote music for stage works by playwright Ben Jonson, some of which would by heard in performance at Shakespeare's Globe. Added to this he was a renowned player of the viol – a visiting court musician declaring that there was no player of ‘La lyre’ in Italy: “who was fit to be compared with the great ‘Farabosco d’Angleterre'."

Richard Boothby has been playing the viol ever since David Fallows handed him a tenor viol in 1977. After further study with Nikolaus Harnoncourt in Salzburg, he helped to found The Purcell Quartet in 1984 and Fretwork in 1985. He has endeavoured to enrich the viol-consort repertory with new music from today’s finest composers, from Elvis Costello to George Benjamin, from Alexander Goehr to Nico Muhly. With the Purcell Quartet, he recorded nearly 50 albums for Hyperion and Chandos; and with Fretwork over 40 albums for Virgin Classics, Harmonia Mundi USA and most recently, Signum Classics.

REVIEW:

These are intimate performances of intimate music, yes; but the writing and the playing are such that chordal and contrapuntal textures, beefy bass lines and flute-like cantabiles just about do the job of an entire consort of viols.

-- BBC Music Magazine

His 15th album with Signum Classics, the Welsh pianist, Llŷr Williams, brings a profound musical intelligence to his work as soloist, accompanist and chamber musician. His new album of Robert Schumann works explores a selection of works that span a substantial part of Schumann’s life, including Papillons Op. 2 (written while he studied law at Leipzig University) all the way up to Faschingsschwank aus Wien published in 1841. Llŷr Williams’ long and successful collaboration with Signum Records includes the 8-disc box-set ‘A Schubert Journey’ (2020), the 12-volume ‘Beethoven Unbound’ (2018), a ‘Wagner Without Words’ double album (2014) and highlights from Liszt’s ‘Années de pèlerinage‘ (2012).

Their second Christmas album on Signum Records, Armonico Consort and Christopher Monks return with a new album featuring a collection of carols both old and new. They have created the perfect soundtrack for those who love an atmosphere at Christmas. Featuring world premiere recordings by Composer Toby Young and the first ever recording of ‘Star Song’ by Jonathan Dove on a Christmas album, there are also exquisitely sublime versions from ‘Silent Night’ to ‘Away in a Manger’.

"It is ten years since our last carols recording, and we have collected some incredible works we have been so keen to record, including several commissioned from our composer in residence. Christmas somehow manages to inspire composers to write the most imaginative, both in terms of creativity and melodiousness, and Toby is an expert at making Christmas music sound just as we want it to be!" -- Christopher Monks