• Hungarian violinist of Orsolya Korcsolán presents three “Gold” composers, a project she's always desired to see come to fruition. • The Rubin Goldmark work, “Plaintive Air”, is a world premier recording. • Audiences around the world have been captivated since her debut in New York's Paul Hall by her technical command, warm sound combine and elegant stage presence. In addition to performing and presenting lectures, Ms. Korcsolán's also completing her PhD at the Budapest University of Jewish Studies.

The recording presented here is dedicated to the last two symphonies of Franz Schubert's earlier compositional period. Both are united by their emergence in the atmosphere of the amateur orchestra founded by Otto Hatwig, in which Franz played the viola, and his brother Ferdinand the violin. This orchestra was a stroke of luck for the young Schubert, akin to a laboratory where he could thoroughly test his compositions against the works of composing contemporaries such as Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and M�hul, and in real world conditions. Nevertheless, in their compositional intent, the symphonies are so fundamentally different that it is tempting to present these two dissimilar siblings on one album. Looking at the entire cycle of the Schubert symphonies, and the existential crisis in which Schubert found himself after 1818, this criticism seems in hindsight to be justified only to a certain extent. The creative chasm that opened up in front of Schubert is documented in his many symphonic drafts and abandoned works. In chamber music and in song composition, his productivity likewise decreased considerably. At that time, there was also the break with his father. Against this background, the Sixth seems like a charming "coming-of-age" work that demonstrated to the composer - with the utmost severity - the creative limits of youth-fuelled ardor.

Trumpet and organ has us immediately thinking of trumpet tunes and trumpet voluntaries, of majestic, bombastic music by Henry Purcell and George Frideric Handel, of mixtures and reed stops that resound so strongly as to make church walls tremble. The music on this album does not adhere to those stereotypes: it is very delicate, light, transparent, elegant. If one was to pigeon-hole it, the choice of genre would be difficult. From a musical point of view, it is located between the Baroque and the Classical eras, a period whose various art forms are given numerous labels: early Classical, sensitive style, Rococo, Sturm und Drang. In addition to numerous performances as a soloist and chamber musician, Immanuel Richter is also principal trumpet player of the Sinfonieorchester Basel. Together with Hans J�rg B�ttig on the organ, the trumpeter has slowly approached the works of this release, often playing them in concerts in order to become completely familiar with the music. There is no instrument in his eyes that fits the trumpet better than the organ. The timbres merge into each other and complement each other wonderfully.

Artistic involvement with contemporary music is of prime importance for the three musicians of the Absolut Trio, which is why they commission works at regular intervals. Eight works for piano trio (some with live electronics) have come into being in that way and they are integrated into richly evocative programs that deserve to be exposed to the light of day.

The great argentine composer Astor Piazzola changed forever the sound of Buenos Aires and brought a contemporary tango with jazz's elements to the world. The songs he wrote, represent a genuine treasure of 20th century song writing. The Argentines Marcela Arroyo (voice) and Julio Azcano (guitar) give the timeless dialogue between voice and guitar a new light. Fine and precise arrangements meet a sensual repertoire.

This recording invites listeners to stroll through Strauss’ lieder production. Groups of works from various creative periods are loosely combined. The selection based purely on musical criteria and no other design. Oelze and Schneider’s previous album, “Forbidden Songs” featuring exiled Jewish composers, received critical acclaim.

Whether as a solo instrument or as part of the orchestra, today the saxophone seldom appears in concert halls and opera houses. Nonetheless, before it found its true home, it was heard in classical music. Here, Schulte-Burnert skillfully presents three particularly brilliant and virtuosic concertos by John Williams, Michael Nyman and Andrei Eshpai.

Virtuoso brilliance and lyrical poetry- the formal structure of works for solo piano with orchestra by both Clara and Robert Schumann and Carl Reinecke captivate the listener on first hearing them. Yet the selection of works chosen by Andrea Kauten for this recording goes much further. The works by Clara and Robert Schumann may be seen as intentionally eloquent individual testimony to the biographical situation of their creators; a situation rare in itself, since the two composers made it their habit to make their spouse a dedicated gift on special personal occasions, resulting in works which feature quotations from the other's works, variations and sometimes even lessons aimed at improvement. These works reveal to us two human beings who affirm their personal and artistic self-perception from the outset, whether in the early days of their first works, or then as young lovers, sending one another intimate messages in brief pieces, rich in content. Together with the Southwest German Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Timo Handschuh, a wonderful release has been created here.

From the Merel Quartet's inception, the music of Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy has played an important role in ou repertoire. We find it fascinating how he achieves his own musical language in his string quartet writing, even in his earliest works in that genre. Clearly he is influenced by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, nevertheless, from the very first measures of his quartet Op 12 it is his own voice, his own unique sound which we hear. You simply have to love this music: the freshness, the intelligence, the enthusiasm which is especially infectious in these works; the high virtuosity of the Scherzi - witty, light, mysterious elfin, similar to his music for A Midsummer Night's Dream"; the lyricism - often we have the feeling that even in his chamber music he has written songs without words; and finally the codas - I don't know of anything more intoxicating than the end of the octet's first movement, or when, in the Finale of Op 12, he returns to material from the first movement, closing the circle and coming to rest - wonderful! The Octet Op 20 is unique in it's genre. Mendelssohn, just 16 years old, draws on all the possibilities of the eight instruments with unsurpassed mastery. As an example: his brilliant command of counterpoint especially in the Finale, beginning with an eight-voice fugato and leading to a theme quoted from the Halleluja Choir from H�ndel's "Messiah": "And He shall reign forever and ever". We feel extremely fortunate to have met the young English foursome with whom we recorded Mendelssohn's octet: the Castalian String Quartet. It is very rare indeed to find such a close musical affinity between two ensembles and working with them was extremely rewarding. The idea for this recording was born during our performance of the octet at the chamber music festival "Zwischent�ne" in Engelberg in October 2017." (Merel Quartet)

The Giraud Ensemble Chamber Orchestra was founded in 2015 and has since performed in various formations: from the quintet to the forty-member chamber orchestra. The young ensemble cultivates a diverse repertoire ranging from the Baroque to the Modern, always placing great importance on making less known musical works heard. In 2017, the Giraud Ensemble Chamber Orchestra released the album "Primus" with works by Shostakovich, Vasks and Baum. It has been under the direction of internationally active and award-winning conductor Sergey Simakov since it's foundation. Mischa Cheung studied with Prof. Konstantin Scherbakov at the Zurich University of the Arts and has taken up a busy career bringing him to many concert stages and festivals throughout the world. He is a member of the Gershwin Piano Quartet, a highly praised ensemble which performs spectacular arrangements on four pianos and released it's newest album "Transatlantiques" with Sony Classical in 2018. He is a popular soloist at the Symphonic Game Concerts produced by the Merregnon Studios and has appeared with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra.

The outstanding pianist Anna Kavalerova's program on this release includes such masterpieces as the deeply philosophical Symphonic Etudes by Robert Schumann, Rachmaninov's highly emotional and tragic Variations on a Theme by Corelli, and brilliant Variations by Kapustin, a cycle full of charm, good humour, and virtuosity. Listening to this album we can enjoy the monumental program of three cycles of variations. Anna Kavalerova's program of Schumann, Rachmaninov and Kapustin's Variations was performed in her recitals around the world and was met with the warmest reception and a fantastic feedback everywhere. Highly professional and an incredibly gifted musician, Anna Kavalerova shows us her own approach to this immortal music and inspires the listeners to ask themselves new questions regarding life, emotions, and the purpose of our existence in this world.

Margarita H�henrieder writes of her new release: "After just a few notes on this exceptionally fine Pleyel grand piano in Kellinghusen, north of Hamburg, in a collection of Eric Feller's, I found myself plunged into a different century. This pianoforte was built in Paris in about 1855 and professionally restored using historical materials and methods. It is absolutely uniform with the instrument that Chopin possessed, and is of typically French elegance - in sound as well as in appearance. It reflects the soul of the Romantic era. Apart from that, it offers an authentic testimony to the sound of the instruments that Fryderyk Chopin and Robert and Clara Schumann played. Clara's father, Friedrich Wieck, gave his daughter a Streicher grand, built in Vienna. Personally, I saw this Pleyel as the ideal instrument on which to play the works of Robert and Clara Schumann as authentically as possible while also matching as precisely as possible the exacting demands they place on piano technique. The constant aspiration in today's music world towards ever larger and more versatile instruments and architecturally and acoustically challenging auditoria meant that I was in search of a convincingly authentic sound for compositions written in and around the 1830s, while also looking out for a suitable performance location - comparable to a mid-19th-century salon and differing from today's concert halls."

The tradition of bringing out New Year publications on January 2, “Berchtold’s Day”, goes back as far as the 17th century. Societies andguilds provided printed books, illustrations or music to the young people of the city in return for a financial contribution, which went towards the heating of the society rooms. A 2005 CD of piano music by the Winterthur composer Johann Carl Eschmann, whose documents are held in the Zentralbibliothek Zürich, marked the revival of the old tradition in a new guise.
The New Year release CD 2024 brings together works by six composers, male and female, all of whom except one were born and trained in French-speaking countries. Even Paul Juon had Romanic roots, since his grandfather had emigrated around 1830 from the Swiss canton of Grisons to Russia. Short pieces have been grouped around César Franck’s Sonata in A major: composed between 1880 and 1924, all – except Ernest Bloch’s three lieder movements From Jewish Life (1924), whose Judaistic timbre became Bloch’s trademark – conform to our present-day perception of a rhapsodic fin-de-siècle sound.
The cellist Isabel Gehweiler is a prizewinner of the European Bursary for Young Artists, the Art Prize of the Art Foundation of Baden-Württemberg, the Art Prize of the Markgräfler region; she is also a recipient of grants from the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service), the Juilliard School of Music, the Rotary Foundation, the arteMusica Foundation, the Cultural Foundation of the Saarland region, the Richard Wagner Association, the Covid-19 Grant of the City of Zurich, the Notenstein La Roche Privatbank and the Vontobel Bank. As a composer, Isabel Gehweiler has produced a body of work encompassing chamber music and orchestral compositions, which are regularly performed at international festivals.

In the Bruckner Year 2024, St. Florian Abbey, with the master's burial place, the famous organ and the world-famous St. Florian Boys' Choir, will become even more of a focus for the international Bruckner fan community than it already is. A special prelude to this was the intermission film of this year's New Year's Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, in which two Florian Boys' Choir led an audience of millions through all the Bruckner memorials and in which the choir performed the single release of the moth "Locus iste". Almost every concert of the St. Florian Boys' Choir, which was founded in 1071, includes a work by Anton Bruckner, as the choir is proud to have the "most famous member" in it's history. The "Locus iste" has long since become the secret anthem of the choirboys, and the other great motets such as "Ave Maria", "Os justi" and "Tota pulchra es" are also part of the regular repertoire of the Florian Boys' Choir. All of these works have now been re-recorded under the direction of Markus Stumpner and will be released on CD and digitally on March 1 for the Bruckner Year 2024 under the title "Remembrance". However, not only the master's best-known choral works will be presented, but also rarities: the recently restored Bruckner grand piano, a Bosendorfer built in 1846, which accompanied Bruckner's creative output from 1848 to 1896, will play a special role. Franz Farnberger will play Bruckner's best-known piano piece, "Erinnerung", and accompany another former choirboy, the now internationally renowned countertenor Alois Muhlbacher, in two Bruckner songs. The boys perform the "22nd Psalm" together with the pianist, while an ensemble of former choirboys perform the two male choruses "Um Mitternacht" and "Herbstlied". Franz Farnberger rearranged "Der Lehrerstand", a men's choir whose text is difficult to understand today, into a humorous alternating song by teachers and pupils. This Bruckner CD recorded in St. Florian naturally also features the famous Bruckner organ - masterfully played by the monastery organist Klaus Sonnleitner.

In his groundbreaking Lieder cycle Winterreise, Franz Schubert brought to the fore the dark side of the yearning for happiness that channels into obsessions, fears, a sense of danger, feelings of forlornness, bleakness and exposure in hitherto unknown dimensions and with a sense of urgency. His songs for instruments can be viewed as the dissolution of Classical genre boundaries. Something that initially one can barely imagine soon develops into an addictive nature: we begin to understand this aural picture even without the singing – a true work of art. A kind of intellectual sorrow pervades the richly varied treatment. The Voyager Quartet was founded in 2014. Its members can all look back on successful careers in famous string quartets such as the Cherubini Quartet and Modern String Quartet, and in world-class orchestras such as the Symphony Orchestra of Bavarian Radio. The members of the Voyager Quartet thus combine a wealth of experience in numerous concerts worldwide at renowned music festivals and in famous concert venues, which they have successfully fed into all manner of high-quality concert programmes over recent years.