Christmas, more than any other holiday, is deeply rooted in a nation’s culture. This is why Christmas carols from different cultures sound so vastly different from one another. This collection of songs includes music all the way from the Middle Ages to the present day. Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols is a notable track on this release, and is built on folk carols and considered by many to be one of the best Christmas cantatas. One of the world’s best choirs, the SWR Vokalensemble, performs these works.

This extensive release is the second installment of a ten-volume tribute to conductor Michael Gielen. Some of Michael Gielen’s very first broadcast recordings made in the 1960s were of Bruckner’s symphonies. The development of the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden and Freiburg is visible in these recordings, from the very earliest recording all the way to the incredible 2013 performance of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 9. All of Bruckner’s symphonies are included on this release. Four of these performances have never been previously released.

REVIEWS:

The first two symphonies enjoy bracingly lucid, affectionate treatment. The Ninth brings a recent (2013) traversal of terrifying intensity, blazing majesty, and iron grip. Nos. 4, 6, and 7 are especially compelling in their unremitting sense of purpose, lyrical glow and affecting humanity.

-- Classical Ear

Mr. Gielen is a superb Brucknerian, and his structural expertise pays special dividends in symphonies others leave incoherent. This Third is a model of clarity.

-- New York Times (David Allen)

Centered around accordionist Vincent Peirani, the ensemble Living Being presents this new, extended album. The works on these two discs were recorded at the November 2013 SWR NEWJazz Meeting. For this meeting, Peirani expanded his core quintet to include Mathias Eick and Leila Martial. The extended group performed three concerts, in Tubingen, Mainz, and Karlsruhe.

When these recordings were taken in 1952 and 1956, Clara Haskil was still climbing to stardom. Her perceptive artistry put her in a class above other pianists, and gave her the ability to interpret Mozart’s music in such an organic, natural way that these performances are definitely timeless. This release feature’s Clara Haskil’s performances of Mozart’s Concertos Nos. 9 and 19. Carl Schuricht conducting the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR is equally perceptive in his interpretation of the score, beautifully complimenting Ms. Haskill.

Hermann Prey, like many other musicians with an extensive repertoire,had a specific piece that was a steady constant through his career - Schubert’s “Winterreise.” This wonderful song cycle was frequently performed by Prey from 1952 until his passing almost five decades later. Prey wrote of the work: “I experienced it again and again. “Winterreise” affected me so strongly that it cannot be compared with anything else I have experienced on stage.” This release is a live recording from a 1987 recital at Schwetzingen Palace, with Prey being accompanied by pianist Helmut Deutsch. This performance is sure to give the listener a moving experience.

This new release is an eclectic collection of 22 folk songs from all over the world. Cathy Berberian performs these works exceptionally well, performing in 17 different languages. Pianist Harold Lester accompanies Berberian on this recording.

For this delightful new album, German folk songs are altered by a completely new sound: jazz. For the first time, the SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart and the SWR Big Band collaborate for a recording. Conducted by Morten Schuldt-Jensen, the big band brings a rhythmic energy to the folk song melodies.

This concert, which has lay forgotten for almost fifty years, is now available on CD. This concert, recorded June 22, 1964, established Albert Mangelsdorff as Germany’s international jazz star. Along with his quintet, he performs works such as Set ‘em Up, Far Out Far East, Okaka, and more.

This release is the first of a ten-volume set of works conducted by legendary Michael Gielen. When it was announced on October 30, 2014 that Michael Gielen would no longer pursue conducting engagements because of health issues, it was decided that to honor this musician a detailed survey of his 50-year career would be made. Hence, the Michael Gielen Edition was born. Volume 1, presented here, is a 6-disc set that presents works from Bach, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and Schubert, recorded between 1967 and 2010. The remainder of this ten-volume set will be released over the course of the next three years. The orchestras featured here are the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Saarbrucken, and Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR.

More than just a collection of delightful tunes, the track list of Kings of Swing Opus 2 takes us on a journey through the golden age of swing. After the positive reception of Kings of Swing Opus 1, the SWR Big Band presents a new list of classics, including Satin Doll, Love Me or Leave Me, One O’Clock Jump, and many more. Under the direction of Pierre Paquette, the SWR Big Band is one of the most acclaimed big bands in Germany. Vocalist Fola Dada is featured on this album, and is widely recognized as one of the most versatile vocalists of our time.

Ivry Gitlis began gave his first violin concert when he was only seven years old. When he was ten, the great violinist Bronislaw Huberman heard him play, and gave him a scholarship to study in Europe. The child moved to Paris with his mother and studied under such famous violinists as George Enescu, Jacques Thibaud, and Carl Flesch. His international career launched in 1951, when the press celebrated him at the Jacque Thibaud competition. He was awarded the "Grand Prix du Disque" for his first recording, Berg's Violin Concerto. These recordings are digitally remastered from the original recital recordings, and feature the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR, and the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg.

These legendary recordings of Alicia de Larrocha performing Mozart and Beethoven have been digitally remastered from the Original SWR tapes. The Mozart was performed with the Radio-Sinfonieorchester under the direction of Garcia Navarro. The original performance in 1986 proved Larrocha’s intimate relationship with the works of Mozart.; The Beethoven recording was made in 1977 when Larrocha was 54 years old. She performs the work with aplomb, alongside the SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg, under the direction of Ernest Bour.

Tanja Becker-Bender, one of Germany's most distinguished violinists, already has a number of critically acclaimed CDs of absorbing repertoire to her credit. Her collaboration with the Hungarian pianist Peter Nagy over many years has borne musical fruits of remarkable quality, as this Bartok recording so impressively demonstrates.

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REVIEW:

These players don’t seem to be among those who conceive Bartók’s music primarily as a rigorous exploration of dissonance; and their moving it from center stage, though hardly underplaying its jagged power (as in the Solo Violin Sonata), allows it to speak naturally and, in general, cogently. Highly recommended to admirers of the composer’s paradigm-shattering synthesis.

– Fanfare

He has now been composing for nearly half a century, Wolfgang Rihm, born in Karlsruhe in 1952, where he was already learning composition from Eugen Werner Velte while still a high school student, later also from Klaus Huber in Freiburg and Karlheinz Stockhausen in Cologne, belonged to the so-called "young savages" at the famous Donaueschingen Festival for contemporary music back in the 1970s. Two Other Movements is a composition commissioned by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra that premiered under the baton of Lorin Maazel in New York in March 2005. The title is intended to signify that every new work is, as it were, a commentary on the one preceding it; the "two other movements" therefore make up the continuation of those completed beforehand. Abkehr, whose premiere was performed by the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie conducted by Gary Bertini in Zurich on April 4, 1986, was written as a supplement to a rendition of the Ninth Symphony by Gustav Mahler.

Lyle Mays became famous as the genious counterpart of Pat Metheny aspart of his Quartet in the 70s. This concert is the only legal recording of the Lyle Mays quartet. Lyle Mays (piano); Bob Sheppard (Sax); Marc Johnson (Bass); Mark Walker (drums)