The album “Neoteric” unites two musical worlds, which seem to be not very connected externally, but still have an inner connection, which this album wants to show. The idea for this compilation came from the very personal fascination of the performer Andreas Hermanski. He has a soft spot for the Nordic-Scandinavian clarinet literature as well as for the French tradition between the end of the 19th century and the middle of the 20th century. However much may seem to separate the French and Nordic works presented on this album, the two parts of the album are linked by numerous internal references. Just as Poulenc’s sonata was written for clarinetist Benny Goodman, who was also the performer at the premiere, Rolf Martinsson worked closely with Martin Fröst in the composition of his Suite, and his newly developed playing techniques and extraordinary musical personality have a palpable and audible influence on the work. Chausson’s “Andante et Allegro” and Debussy’s “Première Rhapsodie” are, how could it be otherwise with works commissioned for a competition, written in a format typical for this: this calls for both a lyrical, singing finale and a highly virtuosic, fast finale. This structure can be found in Lindberg’s “Acequia Madre” and Martinsson’s “Suite Fantastique”. In contrast, the works of Debussy and Pärt meet in their tonally spherical language and their content that almost evaporates into the transcendent. The quasi-symmetrical internal structure of both parts, the French as well as the Nordic block, is intended to depict these analogies and inner references and make them audible.

The Demonstrations of the Ballet School are a traditional checkpoint for the institution: they consist of a performance where the audience can appreciate the beautiful and rich education of classical dance taught at the Paris Opera. Considered as one of the School’s highlights, this moment unveils the teaching methods of a traditional artistic knowledge. Led by their teachers, the students display the different skills necessary to master the codes of classical dance and the French style. The Demonstrations also invite the public to discover other artistic disciplines or choreographic styles that complete the student’s training: contemporary, folk, baroque, and character dances, mime and music class. The Ballet School of the Opéra de Paris really is the school of dreams for each and every one of its students, that all wish to became professional dancers for the Ballet de l’Opéra de Paris. This intimate documentary film allows us to discover, through interviews and sneak peeks of the classes, their schedule, their day-to-day training, their passion, their hopes, their relationships with the teachers and ballet masters, and finally their ambition to become, one day maybe, an Étoile of the Ballet...

The creation of the WindWorks label represents an expanded relationship between the North Texas Wind Symphony and GIA Publications. GIA’s generous support and ongoing dedication to wind music has made it possible for the ensemble to continue producing recordings of the highest quality that are a testament to the perseverance and work ethic of everyone involved. The present release showcases works by Philip Sparke, Paul Robert Marcel Fauchet, James M. David, and James Stephenson. Internationally acknowledged as one of the premier ensembles of its kind, the North Texas Wind Symphony is selected from the most outstanding musicians attending the College of Music. The Wind Symphony has been highly acclaimed for “wonderful and artistically rendered performances that are elegant and polished,” and complimented for “terrific ensemble skills that embody a high degree of integrity and sensitivity.” They have been praised for “stunning and inspirational recordings,” and for being an ensemble whose “enriching performances demonstrate their sheer joy of musicing.”

The New Year´s Eve Concert 1988 was one of the last concerts that Herbert von Karajan gave with the Berliner Philharmoniker in Berlin. For this concert he invited the 17 year old Evgeny Kissin to his debut with the orchestra. After the concert the press did raving reviews about Kissin´s musicality and technical skills and he proves till today that he is one of the best pianists of our time. The New Year´s Concert from the Golden Hall of the Musikverein Vienna with the Wiener Philharmoniker is always one of the best-selling classical albums each year. In 1987 Herbert von Karajan conducted his only performance of the New Year´s Concert performing famous pieces from Johann Strauss I, Johann Strauss II and Josef Strauss. As soloist in one piece you can hear the legendary soprano Kathleen Battle.

Here, pianist Joanne Chang performs a group of her favorite works. All are done from the perspective of Joanne as a New Yorker. Described for her captivating and poetic musical interpretations, Malaysian pianist, Joanne Chang has performed and taught internationally in Asia, North America, and Europe. Joanne has been featured on WQXR’s Young Artist Showcase (New York), WFMT’s Fiesta Latin America (Chicago), International Menuhin Music Academy (Switzerland), BFM’s Front Row Podcast (Kuala Lumpur), Indiana University’s Latin American Music Center (Bloomington), Sphinx Connect (Detroit), and the National Youth Orchestra of China (Beijing), among others. As a pedagogue, Joanne is faculty member at the Indiana University Young Pianists Academy and Camp Encore/Coda (Maine). She also held teaching positions at Indiana University and Florida State University. At IU, Joanne served as Associate Instructor in Piano and program assistant to the Secondary Piano and Accompanying Departments. Joanne is president/founder of the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) Collegiate Chapter at IU, established Fall 2019.

Jason Max Ferdinand writes: “This project was birthed in the midst of a pandemic. At such times, just the opportunity to create art is a huge gift. This cadre of singers came together with the encumbrance of travel, limited rehearsal time, having to sing in masks, and dug deep to create this body of work. I will forever be an admirer of their collective strength. The purpose of this recording is simple. It is our sincere hope that peace can be found despite all the chaos around us...COVID-19, social maladies, floods, fires, and more. We the members of the Jason Max Ferdinand Singers bring you SOLACE!”

Hilda Bronstein’s passionate dedication to Yiddish Song stems from her close connection to the language that she learned as a child. She sees these songs as a cultural storehouse of Jewish history and identity. Her early training as a singer at the Royal College of Music in London, and her later work as an academic in English Language and Literature together inform her expressive interpretation of the music and words of these evocative songs. Since 2004, when she made her tentative return to the music of her childhood, she has become one of Europe’s leading interpreters of Yiddish Song. After the success of her previous album, Yiddish Songs Old and New, she competed in the International Jewish Music Festival at Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw in 2008 and was awarded the Mira Rafalowicz Prize for the ‘Best Interpretation of Yiddish Song’. For this album, Hilda has joined forces with a group of talented instrumentalists who share her love of Yiddish song as well as the exciting sounds of klezmer and swing. The collaboration has enabled Hilda to expand her repertoire of beautiful traditional Yiddish melodies and new songs from Eastern Europe. She has also added a number of exuberant up-beat numbers from the days of New York Yiddish Theatre, and demonstrates the resilience of Yiddish song by bringing this album firmly into the twenty-first century with the cool beat of ‘Yener Langer Zumertog’. As on her previous album, Hilda uses her original Polish dialect on some tracks and the standard ‘Litvish’ or Lithuanian dialect on others. While her natural tendency is to the native Polish Yiddish of her childhood, she prefers the Litvish in those songs where the meaning and rhymes of the lyrics seem to demand it.

Son Real is one of London’s most innovative and contemporary Latin bands today. Founded in January 2006 by Latin Touch Entertainments, Son Real aim to create a fresh sound representative of the UK’s love affair with the “Latin spirit”. Musically, Son Real Orchestra is a collaboration between British and Colombian musicians. Their style is modern yet remains true to traditional tropical roots: salsa in all of its variations, traditional folk rhythms like cumbia and plena, the infectious sounds of merengue and urban Latin beats like reggaeton. Son Real’s seven- to fourteen-piece bands are comprised of a Latin Rhythms section: piano, bass and traditional Latin percussion, and the all-important brass section. Vocally they are fronted by three female singers, engaging audiences with their own unique vocal stylings and harmonies as well as vibrant and dynamic stage performances. Their presence on the scene offers a much-needed female perspective in Latin music today. Son Real’s charm lies in its enthralling rhythms which capture their audiences leaving them yearning for more.

Buzz Brass inspired dreams with this new opus, Christmas. The quintet takes the listener out of the familiar with this majestic, elegant and refined arrangements to highlight the holiday season. The male vocal quartet Quartom joins as guest artists in ‘Noël canadien’ and ‘The 12 days of Christmas.’ The ensemble's latest volume, Inspirations, has been hailed as proof of their "testament to the ensemble’s sensational embouchure" by the prestigious Gramophone magazine. Since 2002, Buzz Brass quintet has been travelling all over the globe to captivate classical music lovers. Whether its concerts consist of brass quintet alone or together with guest musicians, the original artistic propositions it presents leave nobody cold. With over 1,600 appearances to its credit, the ensemble has reached more than 350,000 music lovers throughout North America, Europe and China. The numerous awards and distinctions that Buzz Brass has earned over the years (Opus, ADISQ, and Trille Or) attest to both the quality and the relevance of its musical performances.

Following the success of ‘Arias for Nicolino’, a musical portrait of the celebrated castrato of Handel’s era (A427), Carlo Vistoli turns his attention to Venetian opera of the seventeenth century. The Italian countertenor – ‘a voice [...] intrinsically beautiful, strong and powerful’ (Opera Magazine) – has been delving into this repertory since the beginning of his international career with specialists such as Leonardo Garcia Alarcon, William Christie and John Eliot Gardiner. In this anthology accompanied by the ensemble Sezione Aurea, the focus is on operatic scenes and chamber music by the leading composers of the time, such as Francesco Cavalli and Claudio Monteverdi, whose famous aria ‘Sì dolce e ’l tormento’ exemplifies the linking thread of the arias in this recording: disappointed lovers. They express their disillusion not only through lamenti, but also in a lighter, more humorous fashion that can include dance forms, as in the chaconne ‘Amanti, io vi so dire’ by Benedetto Ferrari, a lesser-known but historically important composer who, like Filiberto Laurenzi and Francesco Sacrati, contributed to the development of the dramma per musica as a genre.

As the symbiosis between the art of the poet and that of the composer, the French melodie became the jewel of the salons of the ‘Belle epoque’. By placing a string quartet and a piano around the singer, Chausson’s Chanson perpetuelle, Lekeu’s Nocturne and Faure’s La Bonne Chanson oscillate between chamber musical intimacy and orchestral ambition. Alongside these famous pioneering pieces, this programme devised by the Palazzetto Bru Zane champions a return to the art of transcription, so popular in the nineteenth century, with the aim of expanding the repertory for voice, strings and piano in order to unearth some forgotten treasures. Hence Hahn, Berlioz, Saint-Saens, Massenet, La Tombelle, Ropartz, Louiguy and Messager all appear in a programme whose guiding thread is the emotions of nocturnal abandonment: the charms of twilight, the trajectory of dreams, the terror of nightmare or the exhilaration of festive occasions. Alexandre Dratwicki has made these arrangements in the style of the nineteenth century. Appropriately enough, the programme ends with La Vie en rose, for this music offers a kaleidoscope of all the colors of human feeling. The texture of solo strings and piano sets Veronique Gens’s incomparable storytelling artistry in a new light.

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REVIEWS:

Soprano Véronique Gens’ last four solo albums have been for the Alpha Classics label, a collaboration which is undoubtedly bearing luscious fruit. Now with ‘Nuits’ (Nights), her new album for Alpha, Gens revisits the genre of French mélodies. Here the fourteen-work programme focuses on eleven mélodies for voice with piano and string quartet accompaniment, played by chamber ensemble I Giardini. Three mélodies have been written by the respective composers’ own hands and eight are transcriptions prepared by Alexandre Dratwicki (Palazzetto Bru Zane). Serving as interludes, the three remaining works are purely instrumental works by Liszt, La Tombelle and Widor. Essentially, the programme is designed not only to suit the qualities of Gen’s voice but to widen the mélodie repertoire with voice accompanied by chamber forces and to present well-known examples together with some rarely heard.

Created by Bru Zane, Gen’s programme has at its cornerstone the theme of ‘Nuits’ (Nights) exploring the different ways poets have described nightfall and dreams. The eleven mélodies have been categorised under four descriptive French headings which Dratwicki helpfully describes as ‘the charms of twilight’ (Lekeu, Fauré, Berlioz); ‘the path of dreams’ (Massenet, Saint-Saëns); the terror of nightmares’ (Chausson, Ropartz, Fauré) and ‘the dizziness of rejoicing’ (Louiguy/Piaf, Messager, Hahn).

Singing in her native French, Orléans-born Gens demonstrates compelling form in such frequently beguiling repertoire. Given her impeccable diction, one feels that the soprano is affording each word of the mélodie special attention. Standing out, too, are Gens’ steadfast vocal lines and purity of tone, enriched by her instinctive talent for style, composure and sincerity.

New to me is Ropartz’s exquisite Ceux qui, parmi les morts d’amour (Those who Died from Love). This is Ropartz’s setting of his own French translation prepared in collaboration with Pierre-René Hirsch after Heinrich Heine’s original German text. There is an affecting sincerity as Gens expresses the lovesick protagonist identifying with the ultimate price paid by suicide victims. Memorable, too, is Après un rêve (After a Dream) Faure’s setting of a Romain Bussine poem. Gens provides a satisfying generosity of expression in this exquisite mélodie, a portrayal infused with tenderness. By some distance, the best-known work on this collection is La Vie en rose with a melody by Louis Guglielmi (Louiguy) to a text by legendary French singer Édith Piaf who made the song world-famous. Clearly enjoying it, Gens sings admirably but I find hers and the other cover versions unable to match the individuality of Piaf’s own recordings and her unique relationship to her signature song.

Gens is deftly accompanied by I Giardini, a chamber ensemble founded in 2012 by Pauline Buet (cello) and David Violi (piano) its joint artistic directors. Set up here as a string quartet with piano, I Giardini is impressive with its sparkling contribution, communicating compassion when needed. Violi’s playing on a lovely toned Steinway is striking throughout and in Liszt’s La Lugubre Gondole (The Funeral Gondola) Buet excels, displays a wistful, yet delightful, cello line.

Sound engineer Olivier Rosset achieves satisfying a quality, with clarity and impressive balance. Alpha Classics is to be commended for ensuring that the French sung texts with English translations are provided in the booklet. There are a couple of helpful essays too: ‘Four Variations of the Soul’ written by Alexandre Dratwicki and the other ‘Love of the Night, Love of the Exotic’ by Hélène Cao.

This new album makes a captivating prospect and one difficult to ignore.

– MusicWeb International (Michael Cookson)

It is hard to imagine a voice better suited to this repertoire. Evenness of tone between registers and seamless legato are as apparent as ever, as is careful attention to diction and a sensitivity to the changing sentiments of the poetry. Full texts and translations are provided. This is a first-class production in every way and should be heard by every lover of the French mélodie.

– The Classic Review

SOMM Recordings announces the perfect escape from Lockdown Blues with a collection of appealing piano miniatures compiled and performed by Peter Dickinson to chase all your cares away. Lockdown Blues includes soothing masterpieces by Erik Satie (Trois Gnossiennes, Trois Gymnopédies), Francis Poulenc (Bal fantôme, Pastourelle) and Edward MacDowell (To a Wild Rose), alongside Eugene Goossens' melancholic Lament for a Departed Doll and Samuel Barber's valedictory Canzonetta. There is whimsy in George Gershwin's Three-Quarter Blues (familiar to British audiences as the theme to radio and television's After Henry) and Who Cares? from the musical Of Thee I Sing. Of interest are 12 iconic jazz tunes by Duke Ellington. Heard here in their original sheet-music versions, they are pure Ellington, the product of a sophisticated composer. Among featured classic songs are Solitude, Don't Get Around Much Anymore, Mood Indigo and It Don't Mean a Thing (If it Ain't Got That Swing). In his introduction, renowned broadcaster and writer Humphrey Burton describes Lockdown Blues as 'a delightful hour of discovery', hailing the Ellington selections as 'a real find that will surely be much anthologized long after Lockdown has been forgotten'. The disc is completed by three pieces by Dickinson - the titular Lockdown Blues, Freda's Blues and Blue Rose, a take on MacDowell's To a Wild Rose - together with Constant Lambert's Elegiac Blues, Lennox Berkeley's Prelude VI and John Cage's Satie-influenced In a Landscape. Peter Dickinson's career as a pianist has largely been in recitals, broadcasts and recordings with his sister, mezzo Meriel Dickinson, and he has worked with many other performers. Dickinson's Paraphrase II is included on Nathan Williamson's 20th-century British piano music collection, Colour and Light (SOMMCD 0196) and was praised by the British Music Society as 'a Theme with six hugely contrasting variations exploring the outer edges of tonality in a brilliant, structurally refined way'.

Andrew Nethsingha and The Choir of St John’s, Cambridge present a tribute album to two former directors, Christopher Robinson and David Hill, who celebrate their 85th and 65th birthdays respectively. Taking the idea of new growth as a starting point, the album develops from the seed of a single treble line, gradually adding organ, then lower voices, a second choir (Yale Schola Cantorum), 150 additional singers, and eventually combining nearly 500 voices together (former members and friends of the college choir). The programme spans Hildegard of Bingen to a new commission by James Long (b.1987) and also includes works by three ex-St Johnians: Herbert Howells, Johnathan Harvey and Christopher Robinson. The Choir of St John’s College, Cambridge is one of the finest collegiate choirs in the world, known and loved by millions from its broadcasts, concert tours and recordings. Founded in the 1670s, the Choir is known for its distinctive rich, warm sound, its expressive interpretations and its breadth of repertoire.

Shortlisted for the Gramophone Awards!

Following the success of their last album, Timelapse, this new album from Orchestra of the Swan is a collection of extraordinary works connected by ideas of pilgrimage, contemplation, exploration and enlightenment through the works of composers such as Richter, Respighi, Britten, Piazzolla, Brian Eno, Nico Muhly, Joy Division and more. As with Timelapse, the joy is to be found in discovering the surprising and delightful connections between culturally disparate and musically contrasting time periods. Labyrinths have been an important part of humanity’s cultural landscape for thousands of years; from the Ancient Greek myth of Theseus and the Minotaur to the intriguing stories of Jorge Luis Borges and Umberto Eco. Our overwhelming desire to find patterns and ‘the hidden truth’ is perhaps nowhere more evident than in the subversive and complex vistas of music. Formed in 1995, Orchestra of the Swan is a British chamber orchestra which, under the artistic direction of David Le Page, is passionate about audience inclusivity and blurring the lines between genres, through its adventurous and accessible programming.

“I can’t begin to adequately express how excited I am to have our first official studio recording, THE BARI SESSION, finally released! Ever since the very first time John, Raimondo, Gianmarco and I played together back in 2008, I’ve loved this band and knew we had that “special chemistry” that truly makes a band: A BAND. However, since then, our only release thus far has been a double-album entitled LIVE UNDER ITALIAN SKIES that features performances from two live concerts in 2008 & 2012. Due to our extremely busy individual schedules, and the fact that the four of us live in three different countries on two different continents, we’ve never quite found the ideal time and opportunity to actually go into a recording studio to officially document our band’s sound, its chemistry, and some of the songs that have become part of our standard repertoire in live concerts. Well, THE BARI SESSION has now arrived and it beautifully showcases all of those things (as well as some new compositions), because in August of2019 we were able to find a small window of time to go in and record in a fantastic studio in Bari with a first-rate engineer during one of our Italian tours. I believe the result speaks for itself. We also had a really wonderful experience making this recording and the music just seemed to “play itself,” which is always a great sign that the music is “ready” and “cooked to perfection,” just like the best Italian dishes! Godetevi un buon ascolto!” (Paul Wertico)

All of the works in this programme were prize winners in the hotly contested 2018 Huang Zi International Chinese Piano Composition Competition, an event marking the 80th anniversary of the death of this influential composer and educator. Themes explored include the charm and unpredictability of China’s landscape, alongside elements of Chinese musical and theatrical aesthetics. Joint First Prize winners were Emile Naoumoff, whose Celestial Parade describes the composer’s wonderful experiences while in Shanghai, and Zhiliang Zhang, whose Qiao Ling Liu Dan portrays six widely differing ‘Dan’ or female characters in Sichuanese opera. Huang Zi (1904–1938) was the most influential composer and music educator of his generation, mentoring many distinguished Chinese musicians. To mark the 80th anniversary of the death of Huang Zi, the People’s Government of Chuansha New Town, Pudong New Area, Shanghai, and the American Pacific Musicians Association jointly launched the HUANG ZI International Chinese Piano Composition Competition from August to November 2018. 52 piano works from all over the world were submitted to the competition, and the impressive collection of works in this recording comprise the joint winners of both Third, Second and First Prizes.

This introduction to the exciting world of classical music will take you on a voyage of discovery as you experience the beauty and drama of some of the most famous music ever written. This essential collection presents something for every moment: excitement, relaxation, elation and more, with critically acclaimed recordings selected from the vast Naxos catalogue. Let your mind and emotions be transported by the greatest music from the greatest composers.

We have always been keen to lower the barriers to classical music as much as possible, and the Naxos label has had great success with various ‘Best Of’ collections in the past. These have until now tended to focus on single composers, but with Classical Music: 30 of the Best we have brought together a stunning programme of some of the most iconic and famous movements in all music for the enjoyment and exploration of as wide a public as possible.

“Best right now!” – that’s what Swedish National Radio said when Ellas Kapell released their debut album “Longing” in 2019, which also was rewarded ”Best Album of The Year” by the readers of Swedish jazz magazine Orkesterjournalen. Now, more than one million listeners later, they’re releasing their second album “What’s It All About?” The ten songs of the album create a story about the most important moments in life; the beautiful ones, the difficult ones, the seemingly insignificant and the ones we have yet to experience – everything that comes together to constitute a life. In classic Ellas Kapell fashion the songs are carefully arranged to capture the atmosphere of each specific moment. The album also contains guest performances by internationally renowned musicians Karin Hammar on trombone and Magnus Lindgren on tenor saxophone.

It is only since the bel canto era in the 19th century that the tenor voice really took off as a leading character in operatic roles, often playing the heroic figure against a love-interest soprano and a villain baritone. This collection of some of opera’s most iconic arias takes us from the dark emotional crises of Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci and Puccini’s Tosca, to the seductive Rodolfo in La Bohème and Donizetti’s show-stopping high Cs in La Fille du régiment. Tenor showpieces that are so famous they have taken on a life of their own include ‘Nessun dorma’, made immortal by The Three Tenors at the 1990 World Cup.

The soprano voice occupies the highest-sounding line of music (in Italian ‘sopra’ means ‘over’ or ‘above’) and it is subdivided into various types. The coloratura is the virtuoso, suited for rapid ornamentation such as in Mozart’s Queen of the Night (Die Zauberflöte). Puccini’s Mimì (La Bohème) is an example of the lyric soprano, full of drama and well-rounded sound. More powerful than the lyric but retaining her softer qualities is the spinto, exemplified by Madama Butterfly, while the dramatic soprano, with her huge reserves of stamina, can be heard in works by Wagner. This quintessential collection of best-loved arias confirms that the soprano, in all her variety, sits at the very heart of the operatic experience.

Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of one of music's most historic record labels, Philadelphia International Records, with this LP release! The groundbreaking label, founded in 1971 by innovative and prolific songwriters/producers Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff, became the birthplace, incubator and launching pad for the sophisticated Philly Soul sound also known as "The Sound of Philadelphia." This compilation contains some of the most beloved and iconic songs from the label, from artists like The O'Jays, Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes, Teddy Pendergrass, Patti Labelle, MFSB, The Three Degrees and more!

There were many highlights to her musical career: the concerts she gave in the Netherlands between 1968 and 1989 feature prominently among them. This release is a faithful rendition, thanks especially to the remarkable audio quality. Dearie masterfully performed in all the instrumental formations, from solo shows to the great Metropole Orchestra. She sang repertoires of every kind, from film music – she brought a new dimension to “Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head” – to Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now”, sensitively revisited. Not to forget a masterpiece whose music she composed, “Winchesterin Apple Blossom Time”, with Marilyn Monroe-style boo-be-doops – two superb versions of which can be enjoyed here, as well as her other compositions, those mentioned, and “Bring All Your Love Along”, whose first recording, made in Laren, 1982, is featured here. Blossom, so aptly named, bids the audience adieu, and makes a graceful bow.

PHILADELPHIA LABELS HITS COLLECTION 1957-62 / VAR

Classical Music

The International Competition of Polish Music aims to popularize Polish music in the world and to consolidate the importance of the oeuvre of Polish composers - especially of those active in the 19th and 20th centuries - in the public's mind. The competition is to contribute to the presentation of newly discovered works to a wide audience and to ensure that this unjustly neglected legacy is duly elaborated and republished. No less important is the task of promoting talented musicians who decide to include in their repertoire lesser-known works by Polish composers. On July 3-9, 2023, at the headquarters of the Artur Malawski Subcarpathian Philharmonic in Rzeszow, the already third edition of the Festival took place. On the album, we present the most interesting competition performances.