Classical Music

This penultimate volume of Joaquín Turina’s complete piano works features his “programmatic” pieces: music inspired by local scenes or texts by the late-Romantic poet and author Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer (1836–70). The “tragicomedy” Recuerdos de mi rincón is a lighthearted divertissement with twelve mini-scenes that portray local characters from Turina’s Madrid neighbourhood, while La Venta de los Gatos brims with truly inspired and beautiful moments. El Cristo de la Calavera further reveals Turina’s deft touch for dramatic and picturesque style while faithfully adapting Bécquer’s story to include every detail. Originally composed for a stage drama, Navidad is filled with Christmas carols and traditional melodies.

In today's world, one often perceives a division between art and academia, and composers and musicologists generally don't have much to say to one another. But that division has not always existed. Brahms himself was surrounded by a circle of academics who for him were also a source of animated comradeship. With some of them, Brahms would go on long walks outside Vienna and even on summer holidays.+ The men enjoyed long and sometimes loud, discussions about their shared obsessions, discoveries and findings. Brahms had these very discussions to thank for his lifelong interest in "early music". He even collaborated intensively on the critical editions of Couperin, Handel and Bach's sons and received interesting and useful advice form his friends. Since adopting a new artistic profile, The Hague Philharmonic is demonstrating more than ever that symphonic music can still be meaningful to large and diverse audiences in the 21st century. The ensemble performs regularly at various major concert halls around the world. Their ambitions are spreaheaded by a proactive education policy and are the driving force behind music education in the region.

GIA Publications has produced some of the very best brass ensemble arrangements throughout the years, several of which are featured on this new release. This album offers all sorts of brass ensemble varients, such as traditional quartets, antiphonal trumpet duos, trumpets with handbell accompaniment, and others. Thematically, this release is a brilliant overview of songs for all occasions and seasons, and includes Renaissance motet transcriptions, fantasies on German hymns, and Christmas and Easter celebrations as well.

The Brigham Young University Choirs have four auditioned groups: the BYU Singers, the Concert Choir, the Men's Chorus, and the Women's Chorus, and each December they come together along with the BYU Philharmonic for the Celebration of Christmas concert, which has combined the spiritual, traditional, and international aspects of Christmas into one joyous concert, with music as timeless as Christmas itself. These concert celebrations, which have been nationally broadcast on television since 1993, are a seasonal favorite at Brigham Young University and across the United States. Carol of Joy is the 6th in a series of fantastic BYU Choirs Celebration of Christmas albums, which showcase not only the talent and artistry of these students and their directors but also their strong personal and spiritual connection to the repertoire which they are performing.

The octet music on Around the Christmas Tree, related to Christmas, New Year and midwinter, is taken from handwritten sheet music for Swedish octets from the 1860s till the early 20th c. The music takes you to midwinter outdoor and indoor activities and entertainments, from the Oscar ball on 1 December to Knut's Day on 13 January. Here is both well-known music that we usually associate with midwinter, Christmas and New Year. The Octet Ehnstedts Eftr. Has also found some old music that has fallen into oblivion but well worth recording, including several numbers that have never been recorded before.

The fourth album on Ondine by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir is dedicated to the composer’s complete works for mixed choir. The award-winning choir, one of the finest of its kind internationally, is conducted here by leading Finnish choir director Heikki Seppänen. Choral music was a genre in which Sibelius showed interest from his student days to the near close of his life. This double-disc set includes patriotic works, works closely connected to the Finnish national epic Kalevala, student works, Christmas songs, works based on Finnish poetry, works written for school (including Three Songs for American Schools) as well as works written for academic promotions, inauguration ceremonies and different official occasions. It also includes two versions of the famous Finlandia Hymn. The Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir’s first Ondine release was given an ‘Editor’s Choice’ by the Gramophone Magazine and ‘Disc of the Year’ by German weekly Die Zeit.

REVIEW:

The Finnish choral tradition was rich and active when Sibelius came of age as a composer in the late 1880s, and he wrote choral works all his life. The pieces on this rewarding recording range from folk songs suffused with Finnish character to enigmatic works with sometimes dark lyrics. There are festival and school songs, patriotic anthems, a cantata for an academic degree ceremony and, inevitably, two versions of “Finlandia.” Most of the pieces are a cappella. Many unfold in clear, block-chord settings of the texts. If you want to stump friends with a guessing game, play the beguiling, slightly strange “Glade of Tuoni” from this recording and ask them to identify the composer. You’ll win, as you will by picking up this album.

– New York Times

Before he was thirty, Olivier Messiaen had written the work that established his worldwide reputation asa visionary composer for the organ, La Nativité du Seigneur (The Birth of the Saviour). A synthesis of hisinnovatory compositional style, it is rich in colourful harmonies and precisely noted but flexible rhythms,many derived from Hindu tâlas and from the metre of Gregorian chant. This musical commentary on theChristmas story is divided into nine movements evoking timeless grace, beauty, radiance, exhilaration,and majesty. Tom Winpenny is Assistant Master of the Music at St Albans Cathedral, the oldest site ofcontinuous Christian worship in Britain.

Classical Music

The tenth volume of the recording of Heinrich Schütz’s complete works presents the Weihnachtshistorie SWV 435 (Christmas Story). + Under the direction of Hans-Christoph Rademann, the Dresdner Kammerchor and the Dresdner Barockorchester perform together with renowned soloists. + The well-known Christmas Story is supplemented with additional pieces for the Christmas season, including the Magnificat SWV 468. + Founder of the Dresdner Kammerchor, Mr. Rademann is one of the most sought-after choral conductors and widely-acknowledged choral specialists in the world.

All tracks have been digitally mastered using 24-bit technology.

Classical Music

Classical Music

This is the newest release in the popular series the Musical Advent Calendar. Featuring the best professional and amateur ensembles of the SWR, this release includes the most famous Christmas songs.

Classical Music