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New Releases for October 2024 and Later

Browse a selection of new recordings

 

Here is our list of future releases, based on emails received between 8 October and 20 September 2024, ordered by release date.

The list has been prepared quickly. Apologies for any omissions, or if the information is not up to our usual standards, and please let us know if you find any mistakes. To get your new releases into our next list, or to find out how our review process works, look at the information here. Unfortunately we haven't been able to include any albums with a release date earlier than 1 October 2024, or, because of time constraints, from emails received earlier than 20 September 2024.

Unless otherwise specified, each item is a single CD.

Extra information about some new releases can also be found here.

 

31 JANUARY 2025

Ludovico Einaudi: The Summer Portraits
Decca UK
Release: 31 January 2025
Ludovico Einaudi returns with a brand new album, The Summer Portraits. Last summer, Einaudi rented a house on the Island of Elba, Italy, and discovered beautiful oil paintings on wood inside done over time by a woman who spent her summers there in the 1950s. This inspired him to reminisce about his own childhood summers, filled with freedom and sensory experiences, in contrast to returning to his hometown of Torino. He realized that these summer memories are a shared experience for many people. (LP, CD, digital)

29 NOVEMBER 2024

Edward Nesbit: Nativity
The Choir of King's College London / Joseph Fort
Delphian Records DCD34267
Release: 29 November 2024
The Choir of King's College London follows up on its first recording of Edward Nesbit's sacred choral music with Nativity, a programme of Christmas music written by the composer over the last ten years: a joyful celebration that places Nesbit at the heart of a thriving British choral scene. At the heart – but slightly to one side too. In a crowded field, Nesbit's voice is distinctive. Expect much more fast-paced music than is the norm, an abundance of musical references to the classical canon, and frequent touches of humour. With their young, zestful performances, Nesbit's music benefits from his close collaboration with the choir and its director Joseph Fort.

The Other Razumovsky Quartets
Eybler Quartet - Patricia Ahearn, Margaret Gay, Patrick Jordan, and Julia Wedman
Release: 29 November 2024
This album is a rare first recording of previously unknown classical works: the Franz Weiss String Quartets, Op 8 Nos 1 & 2. The unearthing of these pieces fills a historical void: like his famous colleague Ludwig van Beethoven, the virtuoso Austrian violist Franz Weiss composed a remarkable set of string quartets for the Russian diplomat Count Andrey Razumovsky. While Beethoven's 'Razumovsky' Quartets are well known and beloved by audiences, Weiss's have been all but forgotten-until now. Working in close collaboration with Mark Ferraguto from Pennsylvania State University, the Eybler Quartet consulted in the late stages of Ferraguto's new scholarly edition of the quartets to bring to life Weiss's magnificent work for modern audiences. Weiss (1784-1830) was highly regarded as a chamber music composer during his lifetime. His quartets from Op 8 onward embody many qualities associated with Beethoven's middle-period quartets, including dramatically expanded scope and scale, a high degree of virtuosity, quasi-symphonic textures, and the ingenious blending of 'serious' and 'popular' elements. Weiss also explored novel techniques, textures, and sonorities in his works, including the Op 8 Quartets. The Eybler Quartet has long been internationally recognized for its excellent, innovative and ground-breaking recordings, and The Other Razumovsky Quartets marks the Quartet's twentieth season together. It is also their first recording with violinist Patricia Ahern, who replaced founding member Aisslinn Nosky in 2022. 'The first time we sat down to play the music of Franz Weiss, we knew it was something very special. The Eybler Quartet explores a lot of unknown and forgotten music from the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and sometimes it is justly forgotten, but absolutely not in this case. Weiss was the extremely talented violinist in the string quartet that premiered many of Beethoven's quartets. Coming from an intimate member of Beethoven's musical circle in Vienna, the listener will recognize the style, but the voice is fresh and distinctive.' - Patrick Jordan, viola, Eybler Quartet. The new recording is part of a larger project that began with the modern world premiere performances of the quartets in January 2023, and includes the publication of a modern critical edition of the score from A-R Editions.

 

22 NOVEMBER 2024

Ehnes & Andrew Armtrong play Brahms & Schumann
James Ehnes, viola; Andrew Armstrong, piano
Onyx ONYX4256
Release: 29 November 2024
Onyx Classics presents another album with James Ehnes who here performs on a 1696 'Achinto' Stradivari viola provided by the Royal Academy of Music, and is accompanied by Andrew Armstrong. This is Ehnes' first recording of the two Brahms sonatas Op 120 in the composer's own arrangement for viola and piano. Also featured is Schumann's Märchenbilder, a work imbued with a potent sense of fantasy which he wrote in just a few short days.

15 NOVEMBER 2024

Kate Soper: The Romance of the Rose
The Wet Ink Ensemble
Release: 15 November 2024
Composer, performer and writer Kate Soper releases the first recording of her opera The Romance of the Rose, featuring the Wet Ink Ensemble, on New Focus Recordings. Soper blends medieval and contemporary allegory to dramatize how love, sex and music wreak havoc on our sense of self, with an original libretto inspired by medieval French poem Le Roman de La Rose by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun. Composer/librettist Soper also sings the role of 'Shame' alongside a cast including Phillip Bullock, Anna Schubert, Devony Smith, Ariadne Greif, Ty Bouque and Lucas Steele. The cover artwork and accompanying art book feature illustrated scenes from the opera created by cartoonist Julie Doucet, which combine the aesthetics of medieval woodblock prints with vivid contemporary spectacle.

Mozart: Piano Concertos K 459 & 488
Kristian Bezuidenhout, fortepiano; Freiburger Barockorchester; Gottfried von der Goltz, concertmaster
Harmonia Mundi HMM902334
Release: 15 November 2024
As with earlier volumes in this series, Kristian Bezuidenhout presents these works as historically informed performances.

American Railroad Album and Podcast
Rhiannon Giddens; Silkroad
Nonesuch Records
Release: 15 November 2024
The American Railroad album reflects the program for Silkroad's inaugural American Railroad tour in Fall 2023. Its thirteen tracks include commissioned pieces by Cécile McLorin Salvant, Suzanne Kite, and Silkroad artist Wu Man, as well as new arrangements of songs by Rhiannon Giddens and fellow Silkroad artists Haruka Fujii, Maeve Gilchrist, and Mazz Swift. Rounding out the album are original compositions and arrangements by Silkroad artists Pura Fé, Sandeep Das, Niwel Tsumbu, and Kaoru Watanabe. American Railroad was recorded live during tour stops at the Green Music Center in Sonoma, CA and Zellerbach Hall in Berkeley, CA; it is co-produced by Giddens, Watanabe, and Jody Elff. The first episode of the podcast comes out on 14 November 2024.

Fra l'ombre e gl'orrori ('Among the shadows and the horrors') -  Monteverdi, Cavalli, Sartorio, Ziani • Giannettini, Bononcini, Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Handel
Nahuel Di Pierro, bass; Ensemble Diderot / Johannes Pramsohler
Audax Records ADX 11210
Release: 15 November 2024
Argentinian opera bass Nahuel Di Pierro joins Ensemble Diderot for its debut orchestral recording, bringing the baroque operatic bass voice out of the shadows and into the light through 100 years of orchestral opera history. Fathers, gods, philosophers, emperors, sorcerers, villains ... the bass voice is typically used on the opera stage to convey nobility and authority of both good and evil. Whilst bass roles in opera are often not the most celebrated, they are often the most pivotal in any opera story with the voice's depth, power and softness illuminating the stage and storylines.
Celebrating 100 years of baroque opera bass, Nahuel Di Pierro interprets the great arias from
Seneca's death (Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di Poppea) to Polyphemus (Handel's Aci, Galatea e Polifemo, which also lends part of it's text to the title of this album) as well as a few world premieres along the way, it wouldn't Ensemble Diderot if the program didn't also include some spectacular new discoveries! Ever pioneering, this is Ensemble Diderot's debut recording in its expanded orchestral form and its first foray into recording opera. The project and programme is devised by Johannes Pramsohler, Ensemble Diderot's founder and charismatic Director, and the ensemble's harpsichordist Philippe Grisvard.

The Young Schumann - Carnaval; Papillons; Intermezzi; Abegg Variations
Charles Owen, piano
Avie AV2647
Release: 15 November 2024
British pianist Charles Owen's latest recording, The Young Schumann, is a musical narrative of German composer Robert Schumann's early career, featuring works written in the 1830s when the composer was in his twenties. The programme includes Schumann's first two published works, Abegg Variations and Papillons, paired with the six Intermezzi, Op 4 and Carnaval, Op 9. Charles Owen: 'It has been a joy to immerse myself in the fascinating world of Robert Schumann's piano music.  His youthful energy, creativity and sheer exuberance positively leap from the page, drawing listeners into a vividly imaginative realm. A true storyteller of a composer, by turns lyrical, high spirited and quirky, his unparalleled romantic spirit still burns brightly.' . The album includes booklet notes written by Misha Donat, exploring the ideas and musical themes seen in Schumann's early works. Donat also details Schumann's love of ciphers and cryptograms, including the patterns of four notes in two formations: A-S-C-H and S-C-H-A. Donat notes that 'Asch was the hometown of Ernestine von Fricken, to whom Schumann had briefly been engaged, and the same letters figured in his own name, though in a different order.' This album adds to Charles Owen's extensive recording career that has seen him release celebrated solo recordings of works by Liszt, Brahms, Bach, Poulenc, Fauré and more, in addition to duo recordings with his duo partner Katya Apekisheva, with whom he founded the annual London Piano Festival in 2016. Charles has also featured on chamber recordings with artists such as Augustin Hadelich, the Sacconi Quartet, Natalie Clein, Mary Bevan and more.

Ethan Iverson: Playfair Sonatas
Ethan Iverson, piano; Miranda Cuckson, violin; Makoto Nakura, marimba; Carol McGonnell, clarinet; Mike Lormand, trombone; Taimur Sullivan, saxophone; Tim Leopold, trumpet
Urlicht AudioVisual (2 CDs)
Release: 15 November 2024
Playfair Sonatas features six sonatas composed by Ethan Iverson for six different instruments and piano, and recorded by Iverson with some of today's most vibrant classical performers – Miranda Cuckson, violin; Makoto Nakura, marimba; Carol McGonnell, clarinet; Mike Lormand, trombone; Taimur Sullivan, saxophone; and Tim Leopold, trumpet. The album is bookended by a Fanfare and Recessional performed by the whole ensemble. Playfair Sonatas was born in 2020 during the pandemic, when Iverson met curator, producer and frequent commissioner of new work Piers Playfair for a summertime outdoor dinner. Like most musicians that year, Iverson had downsized and was concerned about making a baseline income. He had recently moved and rented a smaller, cheaper studio, and when Playfair asked if there was anything he could help with, Iverson replied, 'Yeah, I'd love to cover the studio rent for a few months.' The two agreed that in exchange for six months of rent, Iverson would write six sonatas, and that Playfair would be allowed to choose the instrumentation. Writing these Playfair Sonatas led Iverson to composing larger works, including his Piano Sonata, recently recorded as part of his album Technically Acceptable on the Blue Note label.

American Sketches
Kristin Lee, violin
First Hand Records
Release: 15 November 2024
A native of Seoul, Korea, Kristin Lee emigrated to the USA at the age of seven. During her childhood, playing the violin was a refuge from bullying and racism for Lee - she moved to the USA not speaking any English, and feels the violin became her voice. Now a highly acclaimed, internationally renowned concert soloist, Lee has become known for her virtuosic technique and expressive musicality, as well as an impressive, multifaceted career in the performing arts. She is co-founder and Artistic Director of Pacific Northwest classical presenter Emerald City Music, educator with the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music, and an esteemed member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Lee's pursuit of a wide range of creative experiences, united under the umbrella of the performing arts, resonates with the diverse but interconnected mindset she embraced when selecting and recording the music for American Sketches. As a foreign-born citizen of America, Lee felt compelled to select repertoire for this album, which would support her expression of pride in the country she now calls her own. American Sketches showcases an array of works that have a distinct and recognizable sound of American music and its rich history.  While on its own, American Sketches is a celebratory achievement as Lee's debut solo recording, the album also represents a deeply personal statement from Lee and a reflection of the wonderful creative diversity behind what we know to be American music.

Credo
Meridian Arts Ensemble
8bells
Release: 15 November 2024
This is the ensemble's fourteenth commercial album, released as the ensemble approaches its fortieth anniversary in 2027, and representing the breadth of the ensemble's repertoire and a look at the future of this exciting and ambitious quintet.

Harry Gregson-Williams: Gladiator 2
Decca Records US
Release: 15 November 2024
The highly-anticipated sequel, Gladiator 2-directed by Ridley Scott and starring Paul Mescal, Pedro Pascal, and Denzel Washington-is an epic historical action film with a blockbuster original score by Harry Gregson-Williams. (LP, CD, digital)

8 NOVEMBER 2024

Vivaldi: Sacro Furore - Stabat Mater, Nisi Dominus, Concerti
Carlo Vistoli, countertenor; Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin; Georg Kallweit, concertmaster
Harmonia Mundi HMM902383
Release: 8 November 2024
Harmonia Mundi is proud to welcome the exceptional countertenor Carlo Vistoli as a new exclusive artist. Here he joins the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin to explore some of Vivaldi's finest sacred music. Alongside the famous Nisi Dominus and Stabat Mater, the quasi-operatic motet In furore shows the extravert, theatrical side of Vivaldi's genius, for the purposes of edification, to be sure, but also for our greater delight.

Kreisler & Korngold: String Quartets from Vienna
Angeles String Quartet
Alto Records ALC 1499
Release: 8 November 2024
An acclaimed recording of two outstanding string quartets by two of the early twentieth century's greatest tunesmiths returns to international availability, played by the acclaimed Angeles String Quartet and produced by the audiophile team of Marc Aubert and Joanna Nickrenz.

Learn to Wait - Benjamin Britten: String Quartet No 1; György Ligeti: String Quartet No 1; Nils Henrik Asheim: Learn to Wait
Oslo String Quartet
OSQ OSQ01
Release: 8 November 2024
The Oslo String Quartet releases the first album on its very own label, OSQ. The album Learn to Wait features music of Britten, Ligeti and Nils Henrik Asheim, whose piece gives the album its title and context.

Gabriel Jackson: The Christmas Story
Choir of Merton College, Oxford; Girl Choristers of Merton College, Oxford; Oxford Contemporary Sinfonia / Benjamin Nicholas
Delphian Records DCD34331
Release: 8 November 2024
Long associated with the music of Gabriel Jackson, in 2020 the Choir of Merton College, Oxford and their director Benjamin Nicholas won a BBC Music Magazine Award for their recording of The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, a work which grounded its narrative of Christ's suffering and humanity's redemption in texts associated with the history of the College. The Christmas Story, again with a libretto assembled by the College's chaplain Simon Jones, takes the same approach to tell the story of Christ's birth. Spanning the period from Advent to Candlemas, it mixes biblical narrative with liturgical texts and four specially commissioned poems by members of the College. The new poems are given to the College's girl choristers (an independent part of its choral foundation since 2016), while the main body of the work is carried by the full choir and by an ensemble of flute, percussion, strings, saxophone and three trombones – the latter recalling the hieratic sonorities of the seventeenth-century works by Schütz and others which Jackson had in mind while composing The Christmas Story.

Fritz Kreisler: Encores, Arrangements, Compositions 1926-1938
Parnassus Records PACL 95015
Release: 8 November 2024
Fritz Kreisler became the early twentieth century's first world-celebrity violinist. Today he is remembered not only for the remarkable tone he achieved but also as composer, arranger and promoter of so many beloved works for violin. In the early years, he recorded his own compositions and arrangements for His Master's Voice and Victor Records, with the greatest accompanists of his days along with his cellist brother Hugo and an 'all-star' string quartet featuring legendary violist William Primrose. Parnassus Records has selected the finest of these recordings, assembling them for the first time in a program totaling nearly eighty minutes of memorable melodies remastered to the industry's highest standards.

 

1 NOVEMBER 2024

Boccherini: Cello Concertos, Sonatas & Quintets
Various Artists
Hyperion
Release: 1 November 2024
Steven Isserlis and friends collaborate on a heavenly program of Boccherini's concertos and chamber music for cello. Five bewitching works are included - one of the composer's numerous string quintets flanked by two each of his cello sonatas and concertos, plus an encore of perhaps the most famous minuet ever written - this is truly 'music of the angels'. (digital)

Dmitri Shostakovich: Complete String Quartets, Vol 1, Nos 1-5
Cuarteto Casals - Vera Martínez Mehner, violin; Abel Tomàs Realp, violin; Jonathan Brown, viola; Arnau Tomàs Realp, cello
Harmonia Mundi HMM902731.32 (2 CDs)
Release: 1 November 2024
To launch their complete Shostakovich cycle, members of the Cuarteto Casals offer deeply insightful readings of the first five quartet - works that are pivotal in the composer's oeuvre.

Music for a Christmas Night
RIAS Kammerchor Berlin / Uwe Gronostay / Hans-Christoph Rademann
Harmonia Mundi HMX2904098.99 (2 CD compilation)
Release: 1 November 2024
Mendelssohn: Frohlocket, ihr Völker auf Erden
Bruch: In der Christnacht
Brahms: O Heiland, reiß die Himmel auf
Pärt: Magnificat | Bruckner: Ave Maria
Poulenc : Quatre Motets pour le temps de Nöel
Grieg : Ave maris stella
Sweelinck: Hodie Christus natus est
Praetorius: Es ist ein Ros entsprungen
Nössler: Tröstet mein Volk
Silcher: Ehre sei Gott in der Höhe
Reger: O Jesulein süß
Mandyczeswki: Stille Nacht

Tchaikovsky: Ballet Music
Alto Records ALC 1498
Release: 1 November 2024
While Evgeny Svetlanov's repertoire was among the largest of any conductor, ranging from Baroque to modern works, he is best known for his recordings of Russian and Soviet state repertoire. His recordings of Russian romantic-era repertoire are considered by many critics and experts to be among the finest ever made. Alto returns to international availability Svetlanov's first digital recording, made originally for Melodiya: suites from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake and The Nutcracker, coupled with two relative rarities from the end of the analog tape era, two Tchaikovsky Polonaises.

L'ubomir Pipkov: Complete Piano Music, Vol 2
Dobromir Tsenov, piano
Toccata Classics TOCC 0744
Release: 1 November 2024
Ľubomir Pipkov (1904–74) is one of the leading members of the so-called 'second generation' of Bulgarian composers. On his Complete Piano Music, Volume Two, the fare is his Suite Bulgare, Op 2, Pastorale, Op 24, a dance transcribed from his opera Momchil, Op 28, two sets of Metro-rhythmical Pictures and Studies, Opp 69 and 77, and the (unfinished) suite Children's Joys, Op 82. The pianist, as in one Volume One, is Dobromir Tsenov, and here, too, he supplies the highly informative booklet text. In later life Pipkov became fascinated with the ancient heritage of Bulgarian folk-music, writing a series of what he called 'metro-rhythmical studies' – piano miniatures that combine melodic immediacy and rhythmic complexity, with a character that might be loosely characterised as sounding like 'Prokofiev meets Bartók in the Balkans'. Indeed, Pipkov saw in the irregular rhythms of Bulgarian folk-dance a parallel with the rhythmic experimentation of contemporary composers like Debussy, Ravel and Stravinsky.

Jack Stamp: Music for Brass Band
Toccata Classics TOCC 0745
Release: 1 November 2024
John Stamp, universally known as 'Jack', was  born in Maryland, USA, in 1954. He is a well-known figure, both as conductor and composer, in the symphonic wind-band movement that flourishes in US universities. But the sound of the brass band familiar in the UK has long been an enthusiasm, and his involvement with brass bands on both sides of the Atlantic – particularly the Minneapolis-based Lake Wobegon Brass Band, which takes its name from Garrison Keillor's fictional Minnesota town – has generated a number of works which bring elements of the British brass tradition to audiences in the US Mid-West, imbuing them with a catchy rhythmic swing. The composer supplies his own booklet text – and plays in the percussion section!

Richard Stöhr: Orchestral Music, Vol 3
Sinfonia Varsovia / Ian Hobson
Toccata Classics TOCC 0743
Release: 1 November 2024
Richard Stöhr (1874–1967) is an exiled late-Romantic Austrian. Toccata's third volume of his orchestral music contains three works written in 1942: two works for concert band, the 'Festival Overture' Per Aspera ad Astra, Op 79a, and the 'Musical Poem' Two Roads to Victory, Op 79b (both doubtless responses to the war he had narrowly escaped), and the Symphony No 2 in D minor, Op 81. All three works receive their first recordings here. Like so many important Austrian musicians forced into American exile by the Nazis, Stöhr suddenly found himself cast from celebrity into obscurity. The optimism and energy, even defiance, of these three works suggest that he took it in his stride, with his musical language retaining its Viennese accent in an individual amalgam of Bruckner, Mahler, Schmidt and Korngold. Indeed, the echoes of Mahler in Stöhr's Second Symphony may be a deliberate homage if, as seems possible, this 1942 version is a revision of a now-lost work first composed shortly after Mahler's death.

John Thomas: Complete Duos for Harp and Piano, Vol 5
Toccata Classics TOCC 0711
Release: 1 November 2024
This is the fifth and final volume of the complete music for harp and piano by the Welsh composer John Thomas (1826–1913), harpist to Queen Victoria. He wrote prolifically for his own instrument, both for solo harp and for duos of two harps or harp and piano – a combination where the different sounds of the two instruments enhance the clarity of the texture. Thomas' original works use the elegant Romantic style of his own day, but he often drew on Welsh folksong for his inspiration and also left a generous legacy of transcriptions, especially of operatic favourites. Although some of his music was intended for the Victorian drawing room, other pieces require a virtuoso technique – and all of it has a thoroughly engaging melodic appeal. This series that has seen the revival of music unheard for over a century and a half, and the booklet texts, by the German musicologist and pianist Cornelis Witthoefft, give the reader a feeling for the concert life of Victorian England, as well as Thomas' interaction with some of the giants of his day, including Berlioz and Liszt.

Michael Rabin on The Bell Telephone Hour, Vol 2
Parnassus Records PACD 96093
Release: 1 November 2024
Michael Rabin's short life and career are one of the saddest stories in the history of classical music. Fortunately, he left behind enough splendid recordings - for Columbia Masterworks and Capitol/Angel/EMI - that document the extravagant praise his playing received during his all-too-brief life. Rabin made frequent appearances on the radio, in particular on a staple of American radio, 'The Bell Telephone Hour'. For several decades privately issued copies of many of his appearances have circulated among collectors - often in poor sound. For the first time, Parnassus Records is making available all of Rabin's Telephone Hour appearances in two volumes - over four hours of music - restored and remastered from the best available sources by Urlicht AudioVisual, in performances that capture not only Rabin's staggering technical powers but spontaneity not often captured in the recording studio. Rabin is accompanied by the Bell Telephone Hour Orchestra led by one of his most trusted and versatile artistic collaborators, conductor Donald Voorhees.

25 OCTOBER 2024

Sonic Wires
Katia Labèque; Marielle Labèque; David Chalmin; Bryce Dessner
Deutsche Grammophon
Release: 25 October 2024
Founded in 2018, the Dream House Quartet is bringing classical and contemporary music into completely new forms as a matter of course. The members draw on decades of expertise: the two piano sisters, Katia and Marielle Labèque, are joined by guitarist, composer, and founding member of The National Bryce Dessner, and composer, musician, and producer David Chalmin. Together they perform radical commissions from visionary composers and key contemporary works from the past half century. (LP, CD, digital)

Atar Arad: Partita Party
Sounds Better On Viola
Release: 25 October 2024
This is the result of Atar and four viola-slinging colleagues deciding to reimagine J S Bach's Partita No 2 for Solo Violin, for viola. The outcome is a party of sounds that might have startled poor Bach, but perhaps it sounds better on viola.

South American Orchestral Classics
Alto Records ALC 1497
Release: 25 October 2024
Available for the first time together – landmark recordings of Latin American and South American classics from the Golden Age of Stereo, recorded by innovative early stereo engineer Bert Whyte and originally released on Everest Records. Conductors Leopold Stokowski and Eugene Goossens conduct evocative masterworks of Villa-Lobos and Ginastera, and Mexican composer Carlos Chavez conducts his own 'Sinfónia Romantica'. Now available in High Resolution audio, remastered by Ulrich AudioVisual.

Amy Beach: Piano Music
Alto Records ALC 1481
Release: 25 October 2024
Alto Records returns a groundbreaking release – Virginia Eskin's acclaimed recording of piano works by American composer Amy Beach – to international availability. The recording featured two-piano works with pianist Kathleen Supové at the beginning of her career as a cutting-edge champion of new music and underperformed rarities.

Music from the Americas I: Venezuela!
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra / Domingo Hindoyan
Onyx ONYX4251
Release: 25 October 2024
Conductor Domingo Hindoyan introduces us to a selection of beautiful orchestral works by his fellow Venezuelan countrymen. Most, if not all the composers will be new names to many of us, but their music is extraordinary. Spanning the twentieth century, the works on this album are tonal, romantic and colourful, often evoking the rhythmic vitality of the Venezuelan countryside, towns and cities.

Vivaldi: The Four Seasons in Janoska Style
Janoska Ensemble
UMG Austria, Deutsche Grammophon
Release: 25 October 2024
A world-class ensemble of four outstanding musicians presents its fourth album: Antonio Vivaldi's four violin concertos collectively known as Le quattro stagioni may appear to be an obvious choice for a recording project, but such a project runs the danger of being merely a charming concept. (digital only)

Voices for solo piano: Ethel Smyth, Errollyn Wallen, Chen Yi, Sally Beamish
Hanni Liang, piano
Delphian Records DCD34326
Release: 25 October 2024
A pioneer of new concert formats, using music to communicate and bring people together, Hanni Liang was long sceptical about the traditional role of recording in progressing an artist's career. It was her discovery of Ethel Smyth – both as a composer and as a person and a woman, fighting without compromise – that sparked the inspiration that led to Voices. In this album she has created a programme that both champions women's voices that, without the determination of Smyth and others like her, might otherwise have been silent, and allows her to raise her own voice, reflecting both her European birth and upbringing and her Chinese roots.

William Walton: Complete Songbook
Sian Dicker, soprano; Krystal Tunnicliffe, piano; Saki Kato, guitar
Delphian Records DCD34328
Release: 25 October 2024
'These Walton songs are really terrific', wrote the great accompanist Gerald Moore; 'everything WW does is impressive – why the devil doesn't he write more songs?' From early experiments, via Edith Sitwell settings that build on the success of Façade, to music for the silver screen and two well-loved cycles heard here in their original intimate versions with piano and guitar, the complete collection fits on a single album. But what an album! Four decades after Walton's death, three imaginative young artists bring fresh voices to the feast, revelling with infectious enjoyment in the composer's endlessly beguiling inventiveness and sparkling wit.

The Heroic Ballads (Laoidhean nan Gaisgeach)
Màiri Macmillan, singer; Edinburgh Quartet
National Library of Scotland (EP)
Release: 25 October 2024
A captivating chapter of Gaelic heritage will be revived with the release of newly reinterpreted laoidhean. Entitled The Heroic Ballads, this EP release will showcase the laoidhean or lays that were central to Gaelic culture during the late Middle Ages. This ambitious project is the result of a unique collaboration between renowned South Uist traditional Gaelic singer Màiri Macmillan, the critically acclaimed Edinburgh Quartet, known for championing contemporary music, and the highly versatile composer Ned Bigham, whose works span classical to electronica. These ancient Gaelic lays, steeped in folklore and epic narratives, have been given fresh life in a series of recordings made at Castlesound Studios in Pencaitland. The reinterpretations build on a pioneering performance held at the National Library of Scotland as part of the Sgeul exhibition. The scores have been added to the Library's collections, further embedding these rare works into Scotland's rich cultural archive. The Heroic Ballads recount legendary tales of fallen heroes, monstrous foes, and grand scale battles, alongside tragic love stories and mythical creatures, including five-headed giants. In the eighteenth century, these Gaelic ballads inspired James Macpherson's Ossianic epics, which in turn ignited the Romantic movement across Europe. Despite their historical significance, the tradition of sung laoidhean has dwindled over time, making this new project vital to their preservation.

 

18 OCTOBER 2024

Neos
Cocomi: Haruma Sato, cello; Ryota Higashi, violin; Atsushi Yamanaka, piano
UMG Japan
Release: 18 October 2024
Cocomi's newest album Neos showcases a lineup of talented young artists from the classical music world; the skilled pianist and arranger Atsushi Yamanaka; Haruma Sato, the first Japanese winner in the Cello division of the Munich International Music Competition; and Ryota Higashi, a violinist gaining recognition for his performances, including dubbing for TV and anime. (digital)

Johann Grabbe: Il Primo Libro de Madrigali
Consort of Musicke, Emma Kirkby, Anthony Rooley
MDG Preziosa MDG10223322
Release: 18 October 2024
To celebrate early music pioneer Anthony Rooley's eightieth birthday, a very special jewel sparkles in MDG's 'Preziosa' series: 'Il Primo Libro de Madrigali' is Johann Grabbe's masterpiece. The Consort of Musicke's debut recording received the highest international acclaim, delighting critics and enthusiasts alike. This definitive new edition of their breathtaking interpretation also gives hilarious behind-the-scenes insights at the musical mischief of this legendary vocal ensemble. Bar one book of madrigals, Grabbe's music had almost been completely destroyed by time, war and fire. After discovering the high quality, inventiveness and skill of 'Il Primo Libro de Madrigali', Anthony Rooley and the Consort of Musicke were convinced Grabbe was 'a composer of genuine international stature', equal to Monteverdi; only his limited oeuvre prevents him from being recognized as the great master he truly is. Grabbe's Franco-Flemish vocal polyphony combined with Italian and English influences became style-defining and was greatly admired by his contemporaries, such as Heinrich Schutz. The best-known feature of madrigal composition is that of word-painting, and in this aspect Grabbe reveals immense wit and playfulness. After the opening invitation to all lovers, the texts take us through a series of amorous calamities, pleadings, tortures, anguish and occasional blissful pleasures, to the final rejection where the lady of his desires declares him 'insano'. Emma Kirkby's radiant soprano alone makes this recording a listening pleasure in a class of its own.

Ton Koopman: 80
Challenge Classics CC72998
Release: 18 October 2024
For his eightieth birthday, Ton Koopman has chosen some of his favourite tracks from the many recordings he has made for Challenge Classics / Antoine Marchand since 2002. This is a celebratory collection in four parts: music for organ, for harpsichord, chamber music and recordings with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra & Choir. 'It was, of course, an almost impossible task to draw up a selection from all of the CDs I have recorded for Challenge Records, but I have tried to choose works that are very close to my heart.' - Ton Koopman

Robert Schumann: On the Shoulders of Giants -  Fantasie in C Major Op 17 / Davidbundlertanze Op 6
Marco Mantovani
Etcetera KTC1758
Release: 18 October 2024
The motto 'dwarfs on the shoulders of giants' has been used since the Middle Ages (nani gigantum humeris insidentes) to express modern culture's dependence on the ancient. Moderns are like dwarfs compared to the great thinkers and artists of the past, but by climbing on their shoulders they can see farther.Schumann was conscious of his the indivisible part he played in German musical culture from an early age. Already in his early twenties he wrote in his diary: 'The future should be the higher echo of the past' and in the first issue of the Neue Zeitschrift fur Musik (2 Jan 1835) he published the following programmatic manifesto: 'Our intentions have been firm from the beginning, and they are quite simple: to be mindful of former times and their contributions, and to point them out as the only pure source at which present artistic endeavour can find renewed strength.' In the same years Schumann summarized the history of music into ten interrelated periods each one developing from the previous one, reaching the summit with Schubert and Beethoven. The study of their works, not forgetting those of Bach, was of fundamental importance in shaping and refining Schumann's creative talent. How could one create new music after the pinnacle had already been reached? This question long tormented the young Schumann in search of a personal voice, struggling between originality and worthy continuation of the great tradition.

Mendelssohn Project Vol 5: String Symphonies 11-13
Dogma Chamber Orchestra; Mikhail Gurewitsch, concertmaster
MDG MDG91223306 (SACD)
Release: 18 October 2024
Witness first-hand the developmental process of one of the most outstanding personalities in the history of music with Dogma Chamber Orchestra's ambitious Mendelssohn Project. In this last instalment of the series, the extremely talented and curious composer has now become a mature artist - at just fourteen years of age! With esprit and verve, the twenty-strong ensemble led by Mikhail Gurewitsch combines increasing musical demands with youthful freshness to create an impressive feast for the ears. String Symphonies Nos 11-13 show how the young genius crafted his inspirations into conscious compositional techniques. Moving between intellectual Bachian counterpoint and the graceful Viennese Classical style, he experiments with formal structure, whilst indulging his desire for originality. Sinfonia XI in F Minor is expanded into five movements around a beautifully dreamlike central Adagio with descending chromatic steps. The introductory first movement features softly muted, flowing arpeggios that oscillate, leading to a dramatic Allegro molto. The Finale is an intricate dispute between a sonata and a fugue, including dissonant and volatile passages. The unfinished Sinfonia XIII in C Minor foreshadows the dawning Romantic period with its fast-paced double fugue and emotionally intoxicating unison. After these exciting adventures on the path to artistic independence, Mendelssohn then went on to compose his outstanding masterpiece of sound-visual fantasy, 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', at just seventeen years of age.

Emil Hartmann, Niels Gade, Felix Mendelssohn: Clarinet Trios
Chimaera Trio
MDG MDG90323316 (SACD)
Release: 18 October 2024
With light-hearted ease, Chimaera Trio immerse themselves in a fairytale world of goblins, elves, ghosts and mythical creatures. Reflecting much more than just intimate friendships and family ties, these trios by Mendelssohn, his close friend and esteemed colleague Niels Wilhelm Gade and his brother-in-law Emil Hartmann expand into an almost infinite cosmos of Nordic-romantic myths and legends in which everything is interwoven with everything else. Mendelssohn's Trio Op 49 begins with a virtuosic struggle between a darkly passionate main theme and an optimistic, upwardly- striving theme. This turbulence is later transformed into a classically Mendelssohnian scherzando elf-dance with clever contrapuntal and rhythmic playfulness. A weeping and intense finale concludes this trio of symphonic proportions. In Gade's Novelletten, each movement tells a different story, as the title 'little novels' suggests - from eerie scherzandos and robust marches to intense cavatinas. Both trios by Mendelssohn and Gade have been arranged especially for Chimaera Trio by their pianist, Laurens De Man. Using references and quotations, Hartmann pays homage to three central figures of German Romanticism with Serenade Op. 24: Mendelssohn, Schubert, and Schumann. The three parts are entitled Idyll, Romance, and Rondo and evoke memories of things experienced, heard and imagined. Chimaera Trio create a special colour palette by merging sounds of the clarinet, cello and piano.

J S Bach: Sonatas for Violoncello Piccolo and Fortepiano
Federico Bracalente, Alessandro Deljavan
EPR Classic EPRC0071
Release: 18 October 2024
This recording emerged from a quest to explore new rhetorical and poetic spaces, timbres and dynamics, aiming to reveal the soul of J S Bach's splendid sonatas for viola da gamba and harpsichord. The cello piccolo, an instrument similar in size and texture to the viola da gamba, proves ideal for capturing the lyrical quality of some movements and the virtuosity of the more intricate and faster passages. The fortepiano, an English instrument beautifully restored, was chosen to emphasize the contrapuntal nature of the three trio sonatas, particularly in the continuous duetting of the right hand with the cello. Federico Bracalente is a member of influential Italian chamber music ensembles, including the Orchestra da Camera di Mantova and the Orchestra d'Archi Italiana. In 2017 he founded the Cubis Project, a string quartet with whom he opened the Radiohead concert in the Sferisterio arena in Macerata.

Frederick Paul Naftel: Orchestral, Chamber & Instrumental Works
Tubalaté brass ensemble; Haley Myles, piano; Northern Film Orchestra String Quartet / Melvin Tay; Campion Orchestra / Nick Ingman; Northern Film Orchestra
Divine Art DDX 21132
Release: 18 October 2024
Frederick Paul Naftel's new album showcases his eclectic compositional style through a diverse collection of works. New first recordings of works for piano, orchestra and tuba quartet are joined by three previously released (and deleted) tracks. Includes the Second String Quartet, Folksong Suite and several other excellent and distinctive compositions. Born in Manchester, Naftel draws inspiration from a range of sources such as landscapes, nature and historical events. His compositions span various styles and formats, creating distinct moods and atmospheres.

'Snatched by the Gods' & 'Broken Strings' - an opera double bill by Param Vir
Almeida Opera; London Sinfonietta / Markus Stenz
Métier Records MEX 77211 (2 CDs)
Release: 18 October 2024
Métier proudly presents the release of Param Vir's double opera bill, featuring 'Snatched by the Gods' and 'Broken Strings', originally broadcast on BBC Radio 3's Hear and Now show in September 1996. These compelling one-act operas, performed by Almeida Opera with the London Sinfonietta under the masterful baton of Markus Stenz, showcase Vir's exceptional talent for both vocal and instrumental composition.

James Cook: Olympus and Apollo
Kevin Bowyer, organ
Divine Art DDX 21136
Release: 18 October 2024
Divine Art presents two stunning organ symphonies by renowned composer James Cook, performed by the eminent British organist, Kevin Bowyer. Making his debut on the Divine Art label, Bowyer brings to life Cook's Symphony No 8 ('Olympian') and Symphony No 9 ('Apollonian'), both crafted in 2006 and masterfully orchestrated in 2011. This remarkable recording took place on the majestic organ of Glasgow University Memorial Chapel in 2023.

Jonathan Östlund: Rêveries
Divine Art DDX 21247 (2 CDs)
Release: 18 October 2024
'Rêveries' is the highly anticipated new album from acclaimed Swedish composer Jonathan Östlund, featuring a programme of reveries, nocturnes and fantasies. Renowned for his evocative and cinematic compositions, Östlund weaves together classical elegance with contemporary innovation.

The Noonan Trio: Inherit a Memory
Sean Noonan, Matthew Bourne, Michael Bardon
Neuma Records
Release: 18 October 2024
Maverick science meets its match with The Noonan Trio's first album, Inherit a Memory. The combo explores the outer boundaries of musical radicalism, speculatively blending new music, free improvisation and rhythmic storytelling. With influences ranging from Rupert Sheldrake's audacious Theory of Morphic Resonance and Formative Causation to the pioneering works of Conlon Nancarrow, Frank Zappa, and drummer Milford Graves, Sean Noonan's distinctive style blurs the lines between drumming and narration, offering a fresh perspective on just about everything. Featuring pianist Matthew Bourne and bassist Michael Bardon, celebrated for his 'unorthodox approach to music-making', Inherit a Memory mirrors Sheldrake's notion that patterns of activity transcend traditional concepts of space and time, where music operates more out of habits than rules. Altogether, The Noonan Trio posits a deceptively real, fun, and emotionally unrestricted new world of the highest order.

Songs from the North of Ireland: Dorothy Parke, Joan Trimble
Carolyn Dobbin, mezzo soprano; Iain Burnside, piano; Amy Ní Fhearraigh, soprano; Ingrid Sawers, piano
Delphian Records DCD34329
Release: 18 October 2024
Following the success of their partnership in Calen-O: Songs from the North of Ireland, Carolyn Dobbin and Iain Burnside return to Ulster's rich but undervalued musical heritage with a programme of songs by two twentieth-century women, all but a few of them premiere recordings. Dorothy Parke is well known for her songs for children but is revealed here as a much more wide-ranging composer, steeped in the folk melody and poetry of Ireland. Joan Trimble, an accomplished concert pianist, left behind only a handful of published songs but a small trove of manuscripts, including her opera Blind Raftery, written for BBC Television in 1957, two arias from which complete this journey of discovery.

Michael Gilbertson: Cloud Anthem
The Crossing / Donald Nally
New Focus Recordings
Release: 18 October 2024
Cloud Anthem, by Michael Gilbertson, draws its title from Richard Blanco's 2019 poem of anticipation and hope on which it is based. Gilbertson and The Crossing have a history of successful projects together. A new film by LA artist and longtime collaborator of The Crossing, Brett Snodgrass, will follow on Tuesday 29 October 2024. Donald Nally comments: 'Our new single is a work of anticipation and possibilities. A work, we hope, says, "Vote". In it, we do not attempt to solve our country's many problems; instead, we intentionally leave behind cynicism to live in a world of voices, textures, and words that some may hear as an invitation.'

Mozart: A Very Little Night Music
Deutsche Grammophon
Release: 18 October 2024
Deutsche Grammophon celebrates the rediscovery of an early Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart work by digitally releasing three world premiere recordings, each a different version of the twelve-minute composition. Referred to as A Very Little Night Music, the Serenade in C K 648 for two violins and bass is a previously unknown piece of music that was discovered by researchers of the International Mozarteum Foundation in the Carl Ferdinand Becker collection of the Municipal Music Library in Leipzig, Germany while compiling the latest edition of the Köchel catalog, the authoritative survey of Mozart's oeuvre. Composed by Mozart when he was in his early teens, the piece dates back to the mid to late 1760s and consists of seven miniature movements for a string trio. It was introduced to the public on 19 September 2024 by the International Mozarteum Foundation Salzburg which oversaw the research and authentification under the direction of Ulrich Leisinger. Deutsche Grammophon is proud to present three studio recordings of this work as world premiere releases. As the reception of Mozart's Serenade in C K 648 by the music community and audience is still at an early stage, the juxtaposition of the versions invites comparison and dialogue as well as inspiration for hundreds of interpretations that are yet to come on live concert stages and in recording studios alike. The global release date across all digital platforms will be on 11 October 2024, for the two chamber versions and on 18 October 2024 for the orchestral version. The arguably most authentic rendition has been realized in the Viennese Hall of the International Mozarteum Foundation by Leonhard Baumgartner, Margarita Pochebut (violins), Svenja Dose (double bass) and Oscar Jockel (harpsichord). Both already sought-after violinists are still in their teenage years – like Mozart when he composed and performed the work for his sister – and the ensemble decided to collaborate with bass and harpsichord in the continuo section. This project was realized with the kind support of the Stretton Society. In parallel to the high-end audio recording, Deutsche Grammophon produced a performance video which will be released on 12 October 2024, on STAGE+ as a promotional free transmission, preceding the Mozart recital broadcast of celebrated pianist Grigory Sokolov. An equally notable chamber recording was realized by Unitel with the ensemble that gave the first live performance of the rediscovered work in Salzburg on September 19, 2024, in the context of the presentation of the new Köchel catalog, featuring Haruna Shinoyama, Neža Klinar (violins), Philipp Comploi (cello) and Florian Birsak (cembalo). This version was pre-released already on 4 October 2024, on Apple Music. How quickly the adoption and evolution of Mozart's early work has progressed, is exemplified by a recording in the city of Leipzig where the manuscript of A Very Little Night Music was rediscovered. When an unprecedented wave of public interest way beyond Leipzig and Salzburg ensued, the renowned Gewandhausorchester Leipzig decided at short notice to devote a portion of their already scheduled sessions with their former music director and honorary conductor Herbert Blomstedt to recording the Serenade in C. The orchestra version mirrors the evolution of Mozart's famous Serenade in G A Little Night Music (Eine Kleine Nachtmusik) which was originally conceived for chamber ensemble as well, but is today even more commonly known in a string orchestra version.

The Eye is the First Circle
Simone Dinnerstein
Supertrain Records
Release: 18 October 2024
American pianist Simone Dinnerstein releases her next album, The Eye is the First Circle featuring iconic American composer Charles Ives' Concord Sonata, on 18 October via Supertrain Records – timed to coincide with Ives' 150th birthday on 20 October 2024. The new album is a live recording of the premiere of Dinnerstein's multimedia production of the same title, at the Alexander Kasser Theater, Montclair State University, New Jersey on 17 October 2021. The recording is Dinnerstein's last to be released with her longtime recording partner, producer Adam Abeshouse, who also produced her previous thirteen albums. She says, 'The Eye is the First Circle was a deeply personal project for me, and it was very meaningful to have Adam there. It is even more meaningful that this marks our last album together.' Dinnerstein has long been drawn to the music of Charles Ives. 'There is a type of wild struggle in his music between the weighty influences of the past and the Americana of his upbringing and his quest for developing his own musical language,' she says. 'The music seems to vacillate between a kind of haunting memory of beauty and an extremely dissonant and forward-looking anticipation of the future. It's deeply human, incorporating tragedy and comedy, a striving for the spiritual and an embrace of popular culture. In our present day, when every one of us is able at the drop of the hat to curate the most esoteric of playlists, both literally and metaphorically, his music resonates deeply.' With her production The Eye is the First Circle, Simone Dinnerstein ventured into bold interdisciplinary artistic territory in collaboration with projection designer Laurie Olinder and lighting designer Davison Scandrett. Conceived and directed by Dinnerstein, the dynamic production deconstructs and collages elements from two iconic works of art – Simone's father Simon Dinnerstein's painting The Fulbright Triptych and Charles Ives' Concord Sonata – and also incorporates ambient sounds of children playing, night sounds from the pond, and birdsong. In the live, multimedia performance, Simon Dinnerstein's The Fulbright Triptych places a family portrait (including an infant Simone) within the tradition of Medieval altar paintings, against a wall teeming with art historical references, and the Concord Sonata expresses the imaginative and natural world of the Transcendentalists through an ecstatic and fractured musical lens. Olinder pulls visuals including animated elements of the painting and real-time video to all points of the stage, and Scandrett's lighting gives them breathtaking theatricality. Dinnerstein's performance sits within this disorientingly immersive visual space. The piece asks: How do our origin stories mold us? How can a sense of self come from the musical and visual fragments we remember from childhood? The Eye is the First Circle was inspired in part by a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay Circles: 'The life of man is a self-evolving circle, which, from a ring imperceptibly small, rushes on all sides outwards to new and larger circles, and that without end.'

 

11 OCTOBER 2024

A Christmas Fantasia
William Vann, Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea, Jamie Andrews, Ashley Riches
Albion Records ALBCD063
Release: 11 October 2024
A Christmas Fantasia is a collection of carols and fantasias written (mainly) by Ralph Vaughan Williams and his friends and former students The exception is a new carol composed by the album's director, William Vann, setting a poem by Ivor Gurney. The two most substantial works are Vaughan Williams's own 'Fantasia on Christmas Carols', which has never ceased to be popular since it was first produced in 1912, and Gustav Holst's 'Christmas Day', a 'choral fantasy on old carols' from 1910. There are shorter works by Holst himself and by Herbert Howells, John Ireland, Rebecca Clarke, Armstrong Gibbs, Gerald Finzi, Elizabeth Maconchy and William Vann. William Vann conducts the Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea. The choir regularly records for Albion Records and featured on two very successful earlier Christmas collections: ALBCD035 A Vaughan Williams Christmas, and ALBCD050 An Oxford Christmas. The bass-baritone Ashley Riches contributes solos for the 'Fantasia on Christmas Carols' and two other works, while other solo voices are drawn from the choir. Organ accompaniment is provided as required by Jamie Andrews. The songs in this collection present a picture of 'carols for choirs' from the early twentieth century up to 1961, when a book of that name began another revolution, and several of these carols were incorporated within it. The conductor and pianist William Vann is recognised in particular for his acclaimed revivals of neglected works of British choral music and song and is Director of Music at the Royal Hospital Chelsea. His eight recordings with the Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea have included first recordings of works by Elgar, Holst and Vaughan Williams and he has made studio recordings of Parry's Judith and Prometheus Unbound. The Royal Hospital Chelsea has been since 1692 the home of the famous Chelsea Pensioners, who are retired soldiers of the British Army. The Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital is one of the finest professional church choirs in the UK, whose primary purpose is to sing at the Sunday morning Matins service in the Wren Chapel.

Romance and Reverie: Holst and his contemporaries
Hannah Roper, Martin Jacoby, Emma Tring, Valeria Clarke
Albion Records ALBCD063
Release: 11 October 2024
This album, released by The Gustav Holst Society, with Albion Records, is in celebration of the one-hundred-and-fiftie1th anniversary of Gustav Holst's birth on 21 September 1874. The album is based on chamber works written or arranged for violin with either voice or another instrument, by Holst himself and four composers who were contemporary with him - with a focus on neglected works but including a new arrangement of one very popular piece. Distinguished violinist Hannah Roper is joined by Martin Jacoby at the piano, by soprano Emma Tring and by harpist Valeria Clarke. Gustav Holst is represented by three works, all of them in previously unrecorded arrangements. Ralph Vaughan Williams's 'The Lark Ascending' is heard in an arrangement for violin and harp by Valeria Clarke. William Hurlstone, who died at the age of thirty in 1906, was highly regarded by his teacher, Sir Charles Stanford. He is represented by the first recording of his 'Four English Sketches', and by two further previously unrecorded works for violin and piano. Rebecca Clarke was a viola player and composer whose work has become better known in recent years. Emma Tring sings her 'Three Irish Country Songs' for voice and violin. We also hear her 'Midsummer Moon' for violin and piano. Ethel Barns, from Watford was a child prodigy, who was already performing in public on both the violin and the piano before going to the Royal Academy at the age of thirteen. We hear first recordings of two pieces for violin and piano. Hannah Roper studied with Rodney Friend, Mateja Marinkovic (Royal Academy of Music) and James Clark, and was the recipient of the Martin Musical Scholarship of the Philharmonia Orchestra for three consecutive years. She received the inaugural Yehudi Menuhin Prize for string playing whilst reading Music at Cambridge University. She enjoys a varied solo career with a particular focus on English music, and also performs regularly in major venues in the UK and abroad. Her violin, previously played by Lydia Mordkovitch, is by Harris and Sheldon. Pianist Martin Jacoby has performed throughout the UK as a solo and chamber musician. Better known as a recording artist and composer, Martin has made more than a hundred recordings of classical, contemporary and original works. Notable releases include Debussy: 'Images', an album of Mozart's Piano Sonatas as well as two full-length original albums plus an EP of original works featuring the Up North Session Orchestra. Soprano Emma Tring specialises in contemporary music. John Pickard's song cycle, 'Verlaine Songs', was written for Emma and she recorded it with Martyn Brabbins and BBC National Orchestra of Wales. She is a long-term member of the BBC Singers and EXAUDI and she recently joined new vocal ensemble Vox Urbane. Valeria Clarke is a multi- award- winning harpist based in London - specialising in solo harp performances, event performances, orchestral harp and session recording. She regularly plays harp for orchestras including the LPO and the London Contemporary Orchestra and is principal harpist in the London Electronic Orchestra.

Re:Build
Slide Action
NMC Recordings NMCD289
Release: 11 October 2024
Re:Build is the debut album from the multi-award winning trombone quartet, Slide Action. As a group at the forefront of new British chamber music, Slide Action's driving aim is to develop music for trombones, working with composers and artists to push the boundaries of performance and composition. Since their formation in 2018, the quartet have had multiple competition successes, in 2021-22 they were Britten Pears Young Artists and on their first European tour enjoyed six sold-out concerts. This album of new sounds and ideas is a near- seamless experience for the listener, featuring specially commissioned music from world- renowned British composers. Sitting between these commissions are 'Interludes', arranged by Slide Action members to journey the audience from one piece to the next. The album opens with an homage. Henry Purcell's (1659-1695) March from the Music for the Funeral of Queen Mary, Z 860 pays tribute to early music written for brass. Familiarity and security do not last long, as the introduction of electronic manipulation builds to thrilling acoustic complexity. The first commission, C Exigua by Ryan Latimer, takes the listener on a rollercoaster of colours and textures inspired by a parasitic isopod. Drawing heavily on jazz and folk traditions, in Laura Jurd's Swamped the group's sound becomes more compact with less symphonic depth, as they jaunt along to the silky smooth close. Emily Hall's Close Palms is relentless yet gentle. The historically oft-comedic glissando is now used as an instrument of tension throughout the piece. Back to organised chaos, Hairy Pony Estampie is Alex Paxton's maximalist tour- de- force headliner that breaks down every single barrier of what, why and how brass chamber music 'should' be. The album concludes with Joanna Ward's Playing Frisbee May 2022, a product of a partnership with Slide Action formed at Snape Maltings. Inspired by a video of the group playing frisbee, Joanna constructed a semi-notated graphic score where each page is a new game with an increasingly complicated set of rules.

A Private Story - Chopin: Piano Works
Lestari Scholtes, piano
Challenge Classics CC72996
Release: 11 October 2024
This disc is pianist Lestari Scholtes' first solo disc. The selection is both a personal one and also a private story of Chopin, as the pieces outline a journey in time through his entire output. Lestari Scholtes comments: 'To me, this album is both a personal story and a musical narrative about one of the (piano) composers I find the most fascinating: Frederic Chopin. I chose a dozen works; twelve of his jewels that represent different stages of his life and that each hold a particular significance for me. I open up this album with the First Impromptu, the first of Chopin's works I was to learn as a young teenager. The album closes with the first piece by Chopin that I heard as a toddler: my mother often played the Waltz, Op 64 No 1, at home on our dark brown Rippen piano. My mother, who was always so closely involved and supportive from the first time I reached up to the piano as a young girl until my last concert before her untimely death last April.'

Elite Syncopations: Marco Fumo plays Scott Joplin
Marco Fumo, piano
Odradek Records ODRCD514
Release: 11 October 2024
Italian pianist Marco Fumo always brings joy and unique insight to his Odradek recordings, and this album of the music of Scott Joplin is particularly special, reflecting his specialist knowledge of ragtime, and representing his last release. Joplin was hailed the 'King of Ragtime' for his mastery of the genre, and Fumo's performances, which brim with joie de vivre, reveal his love of this repertoire. Marco Fumo is considered to be one of the best recent interpreters and champions of African American piano repertoire. After an early career in classical music, he studied early ragtime, analysing the origins of and influences on early ragtime piano. This specialism makes him the ideal performer of Joplin's spirited, rhythmically exciting music. This album represents Marco Fumo's final album and is a remastering of earlier recordings. Fumo's contribution to music, in breaking down barriers between genres, and in pioneering the works of composers such as his friends Nino Rota and Ennio Morricone, cannot be overstated.

Sam Rudd-Jones: Three Sonatas
Huw Watkins, Darragh Morgan, Kate Romano, Ed Lyon, Sam Rudd-Jones
Prima Facie PFCD242
Release: 11 October 2024
'Three Sonatas' is a debut collection of chamber music recordings from young composer Sam Rudd-Jones. The majority of works on the album are in dialogue with older music, in particular classical forms (Three Sonatas, Variations) and impressionist-era 'watery' piano music (Jeux d'eau), though their actual harmonic and rhythmic language is unmistakably modern. Three Sonatas and Variations are both proudly formalistic and architectural in their design, with passages of great passion framed by those of an almost analytical detachment. By contrast, Jeux d'eau and Hardy in Love are driven purely by their own inner emotional logic, with the latter responding to the ironies and contradictions of Thomas Hardy's love poems to his late wife Emma. The performers, all of whom have interpreted and recorded a wide variety of contemporary music, give readings marked by a close understanding of the essential elements of the composers' style. The accompanying booklet contains a thoughtful, specially commissioned essay by John Fallas. Sam Rudd-Jones is a composer and pianist based in London. The rhythms of his music are characterised by the use of grooves from rap and electronic music, as well as endlessly accelerating and decelerating tempos. He studied at King's College, University of Cambridge with Richard Causton (2018-2022), privately with Julian Anderson (2023-2024), and is now commencing study towards a PhD with George Benjamin at King's College London with an LAHP scholarship. He also releases electronic music under his own name.

Miguel Angel Crozzoli: Sounding Numbers
Miguel Angel Crozzoli, Callum Builder, Jura Sedyte, Valeria Miracapillo, Ida Norby, Johannes Nastesjo
Kairos Records KAI0022047
Release: 11 October 2024
Miguel Angel Crozzoli's album 'Sounding Numbers' explores the intersection of climate data and music. This album features two compelling works: I Am the Forest and I Am the Ocean, both born from transforming scientific data on deforestation and ocean contamination into sound. Through innovative sonification techniques and a blend of electronic and acoustic instrumentation, Crozzoli creates immersive soundscapes that resonate emotionally and inspire action against climate change. Let the hauntingly beautiful compositions draw you into a narrative that speaks to our environmental crisis with poetic depth and hopeful darkness.

The Chants of the Cistercians - Gregorian Chant
Heinrich-Isaac-Ensemble; ensemble officium
Christophorus CHR77481 (3 CDs)
Release: 11 October 2024
The renunciation of the wealth and splendour of the Benedictine order led to the founding of the Cistercians in 1098. The idea of the poverty and modesty of the new order quickly spread throughout Europe and led to the founding of many monasteries. The Cistercian reform not only affected the way of life of the monks and nuns, the retreat to remote places and a new simple architecture, the liturgy and music were also freed from 'unnecessary ornamentation'. To this day, the songs of the Cistercians radiate a contemplative, meditative simplicity. This three CD box brings together three very different recordings of this music: CD1 presents a complete vespers from the monks' Liturgy of the Hours, with the chants for the feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mary. CD2 is dedicated to St Bernard of Clairvaux, the great father of the Cistercian order. CD3 presents the chants of the Cistercian nuns, who (unlike their male brothers) spent their lives in complete seclusion behind the monastery walls. Their songs were audible to outsiders in the churches, but the female singers sang in the choir room, which was separated from the church, and were not visible to the outside world.

The Huehuetenango Songbook - Music from 16th Century Guatemala
Jonatan Alvarado, tenor; Ariel Abramovich, vihuela
Glossa GCD923542
Release: 11 October 2024
In three remote mountain villages that were once not even accessible by road, a collection of eighteen small-format choir books has been preserved, which have been treasured by the communities for centuries. Today, these valuable books are kept in American university libraries and bear the
name of the department from which they originate - The Huehuetenango Manuscripts. The collection shows how music was integrated into the daily and spiritual life of these indigenous communities and became a symbol of resistance and forced adaptation to Catholicism and other external influences. It contains copies of numerous European pieces, but these European forms passed through the minds, hands and voices of the indigenous people and were transformed into original creations. The tenor Jonatan Alvarado and the vihuelist Ariel Abramovich leaf through the folios of the Huehuetenango singing manual and have selected mass movements, motets, chansons and villancicos from the more than 350 works written down between 1582 and 1635. This selection provides an insight into the intercontinental exchange of music between Europe and the missions in Mesoamerica on the eve of the Baroque.

Ex Nihilo - Polyphony Beyond the Order of Things
Graindelavoix; Bjorn Schmelzer
Glossa GCDP32119
Release: 11 October 2024
On their newest recording for Glossa, Graindelavoix and Bjorn Schmelzer present a fascinating array of Renaissance motets based on the theological concept of creatio ex nihilo, creation out of nothing, as exemplified in the mystery of the Incarnation, the idea of God becoming a man. Well-known pieces like Josquin Desprez's Praeter rerum seriem are combined with less famous works by the same composer, and very fine contributions by Obrecht, Ockeghem, Ribera and Wert. Bjorn Schmelzer bases his intriguing approach to the performance of these pieces on a 1561 quote by the Flemish Protestant pedagogue Johannes Molanus: '[Mensural polyphony] is a singing without sense or content, in which the voices are resounding emptily in so-called proses, motets, and artificial songs in foreign languages, ornamented for the delectation of the ears, which have no meaning that could be understood even by the singers themselves.' And Schmelzer himself adds: "Polyphony owes its existence to the bizarre articulation of a voidn, aarticulation that is itself void of content and meaning. [...] In no way polyphony improves intelligibility or contributes to a greater understanding of the liturgical texts, having in fact the reverse effect..." This nineteenth album of Graindelavoix on Glossa will for sure please the ensemble's ever-increasing base of followers, and again constitutes a groundbreaking contribution to intelligent and exciting performance of ancient repertory.

Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck: The Orpheus of Amsterdam
The Royal Wind Music
Pan Classics PC10462
Release: 11 October 2024
If there is one name in the history of music in the northern Netherlands that is etched in the collective memory, it is undoubtedly that of Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck - a composer of impressive vocal and instrumental works of exceptionally high quality. He is celebrated as the 'Orpheus of Amsterdam', as he was organist of the Oude Kerk between 1577 and 1621, and the Amsterdam city council knew how to patronise the popular musician in their city and help him to prosper. Sweelinck's vocal works were widely distributed thanks to the flourishing publishing industry, but his organ works also had a great influence on the North German organ school, right up to Johann Sebastian Bach. The Royal Wind Music is a flute consort of Renaissance recorders of all pitches, from soprano down to sub-contrabass flute. The ensemble is often compared to a 'walking organ' because of its even and polyphonic sound possibilities. In their choice of four programme sections, the musicians contrast a vocal work and an organ work by Sweelinck with variation pieces by Sweelinck himself or two new compositions written especially for this programme and the ensemble. Orpheus' voice thus resounds in a wonderfully cohesive sound, sometimes interrupted by the echo of new soundscapes.

Anita Cerquetti - The Verdi Soprano
Anita Cerquetti, soprano
Pan Classics PC10464
Release: 11 October 2024
The Italian soprano Anita Cerquetti (3 April 1931- 11 October 2014) was a phenomenon. Her operatic career began in 1951 in Spoleto, debuting as Aida (!), and took her to the world's great opera houses before ending in Holland in 1960. After just nine seasons, the then twenty-nine-year-old singer retired from the stage. There are only two commercial records of her (on Decca); the record companies at the time filled the major soprano roles with Callas or Tebaldi. But thanks to numerous live recordings which circulated on the black market from the very beginning, Anita Cerquetti is still held in honour today. Why? Because here is a voice that exudes pure sensuality with the most opulent femininity. Because her voice is one of the most beautiful that opera has ever heard: never aggressive, sharp or shrill, but round, soft, lyrical and emphatic. Her voice was practically made for Giuseppe Verdi's romantic heroines - perfectly suited to the softly swinging, melancholy melodic arches of Ernani and Vespri siciliani - Elvira, Amelia in Un ballo in maschera, Don Carlo's Elisabetta, and Leonora in La Forza del destino, even for the formidable octave leaps of the imperious Nabucco-Abigaille. This special priced box set, which honours Anita Cerquetti as the leading Verdi interpreter of her time, is now being released on the 10th anniversary of her death.

Srikandi: McPhee, Embut, Britten
Duo Saraswati
Challenge Classics CC72986
Release: 11 October 2024
A thoroughly original and unique disc by two brothers born from a Dutch father and a Balinese mother, presenting the influence exercised by Western music on that of Balinese, and vice versa. Music in Bali plays a vital role in society and in daily life. Apart from serving art, music is also used to support religious ceremonies. 'For us as brothers from a Dutch father and Balinese mother, music was also a daily presence in our lives. We grew up in The Netherlands and are trained classical musicians but the Balinese music always served as a great source of inspiration.' This album resembles the mutual inspiration from two different cultures that are actually closer that one would think at first hand.

Gabriel Iranyi: String Quartets Extended
Claudia Barainsky; Wu Wei; Sonar Quartett
Kairos Records KAI0022025
Release: 11 October 2024
This album presents the innovative works of Gabriel Iranyi composed between 2012 and 2022. It includes two string quartets and their unique extensions with human voice and the Chinese mouth organ sheng. Iranyi's compositions explore profound musical spaces and subjective experiences. The album features the intense String Quartet No 4, the intricate String Quartet No. 5, the emotive Four Love Poems by Paul Celan for soprano and quartet, and the captivating quintet for sheng and string quartet Three Soundscapes, blending Eastern and Western musical traditions. Each piece showcases Iranyi's meticulous skilfulness and his impressive soundscape.

Not Too Sweet
Annie Wu, flute; Markus Kaitila, piano
Etymology Classics
Release: 11 October 2024
Flautist Annie Wu's latest album Not Too Sweet - named after the cheeky Chinese phrase for the perfect dessert - presents flute music through a dessert- and diasporic- lens. With an autobiographical approach to her curation, including movie soundtracks from her childhood and vocal arrangements exploring nostalgia and memory, Wu brings a personal sound, story, and look to tunes made even sweeter by shadows of some more complicated flavours and sounds.
Working with Etymology Classics, the new classical arm of hiphop label Etymology Records, the album's sound is specifically crafted for a sense of closeness, meant to feel as though you are sitting with the musicians in the room, excavating their memories with them.

 

4 OCTOBER 2024

L‎udwig van Beethoven: Hammerklavier
Marc-André Hamelin, piano
Hyperion Records CDA68456
Release: 4 October 2024
Marc-André Hamelin brings immense authority (and, it need hardly be added, stunning pianism) to Beethoven's 'Hammerklavier'. The resulting account is a thing of wonder, destined to take its place among the great recordings of this monumental work. With the added bonus of one of Beethoven's most ambitious early piano sonatas, this release is required listening.

Unplayed Stories ... in 40 Fingers
M‎ultipiano Ensemble; R‎undfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin / Ivor Bolton
Hyperion Records CDA68459
Release: 4 October 2024
Various permutations of the MultiPiano Ensemble are called on in a fascinating programme of early Romantic works by Mendelssohn, Moscheles, Schubert and Liszt in hitherto unknown versions for multiple pianists and orchestra. Finishing with two of Schubert's 'Grand Marches' arranged for forty fingers, this collection will provide an hour of pure pleasure.

Bellini: Norma
Marina Rebeka; Orquesta y Coro del Teatro Real, Madrid / John Fiore
Prima Classic PRIMA022
Release: 4 October 2024
An unmissable studio recording starring Marina Rebeka, Karine Deshayes, Luciano Ganci, Marko Mimica, Anta Jankovska, and Gustavo De Gennaro, with the Orquesta y Coro del Teatro Real, Madrid, under the baton of John Fiore. New critical edition by Roger Parker for Casa Ricordi includes a musicological
essay and the full libretto in Italian and English.

Piano Library - Deutsche Grammophon Edition
Various artists
Australian Eloquence ELQ4843089
Release: 4 October 2024
Astounding debuts and legendary piano treasures on disc: newly remastered albums of twenty-one pianists from the analogue era, including many first-ever digital transfers in this limited edition (single pressing only) twenty-two CD box set. Before he became a Decca icon, Vladimir Ashkenazy appeared on DG in performances recorded live at the 1955 Chopin Competition in Warsaw Their reissue here is complemented by a Rachmaninoff sequence with Ashkenazy's teacher, Lev Oborin. At the same competition five years later, Arthur Rubinstein was so outraged at the low placing given by his fellow jurors to the Belgian pianist Michel Block that he created a special prize for him on the spot, and DG responded likewise by issuing precious recordings of his live Chopin performances from 1960.

Splendid Tears: Settings of Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Brian Thorsett, Richard Masters
EM Records EMRCD087
Release: 4 October 2024
This recording offers three firsts: the first-ever recording of the four Maude White songs, and the first recordings by a tenor of the two significant cycles by Lehmann and Somervell. The poetry is rich in imagery, playing upon the threads of grief, love, redemption, and, perhaps most important to the settings on this disc, inner turmoil. The longer poems present narratives with strongly drawn characters and narrative arcs befitting a song- cycle; it is no wonder that the three composers represented on this disc - Maude White, Arthur Somervell, and Liza Lehmann - could not resist trying their hand at setting portions of two of Tennyson's best-known works, In Memoriam and Maud. The former poem, In Memoriam, was one of Tennyson's most popular works during his lifetime, exploring the range of emotions that fan out from the central feelings of grief after the passing of a loved one. Tennyson's musings on death, eternity, light, and darkness suited the morbid obsessions of the Victorian era, particularly after the death of Prince Albert and the resulting protracted mourning modelled by Queen Victoria, who was said to adore the poem. Maud is in its own way a similarly brooding work, a tale of a young man's unhealthy obsession with his young neighbour and the ensuing death and madness that results. Maude White and Liza Lehmann had very different responses to In Memoriam. White works in a tight, perhaps more old- fashioned frame, selecting only four cantos and setting them to rather Mendelssohnian accompaniments. (One can hear echoes of the Fugue in E Minor Op 35 No 1 at the end of the fourth song, for example.) Her 'Four songs' are not a cycle, but rather four individual numbers. Lehmann, fresh off of the triumph of her major vocal quartet In A Persian Garden, was more ambitious. Portions of Tennyson's cantos that have been elided and placed next to one another, sometimes out of order, to create a flowing yet lengthy cycle, with an optional spoken epilogue that seems to speak to Lehmann's dramatic temperament. Lehmann's writing for the piano embraces thunderous octaves and rippling arpeggios, while the singer is given long, emphatic phrases that drive home Tennyson's words so that no neophyte in the audience could possibly miss them. For his part, Arthur Somervell did much cutting in arranging his musical setting of Maud, but created a successful dramatic flow that maintains the rising hysteria of the original, reaching fever pitch with a setting of 'Come into the Garden, Maud' that is much more ecstatic than the more familiar, yet staid, setting by Victorian composer Michael Balfe. The overall effect of the cycle brings to mind the viewing of a dramatization of the poem through a stereoptican; we see the narrator's father lying dead in the harsh stone hollow; pure young Maud in church; the gently twittering birds of the high hall-garden; and ultimately the departure of the narrator for the Crimean War and hopefully redemption. The music occasionally brings to mind Somervell's primary Germanic models of Schubert and Schumann, but Somervell gives the music a sweep and power that is all his own.

Max Richter Remixed
Trio Fibonacci - Maxim Shatalkin, piano; Julie-Anne Derome, violin; Gabriel Prynn, cello
Challenge Classics CC72995
Release: 4 October 2024
With their new album Max Richter Remixed, Trio Fibonacci invites us to rediscover the genius of Max Richter through their own completely new and original transcriptions for piano trio. Following the centuries-old tradition of adapting music for chamber ensembles, the Fibonacci's interpretations renew our listening of these contemporary masterpieces thanks to new instrumental colours.

Ludus
Javier Negrin, clarinet; Daniel Molina, piano
Odradek Records ODRCD452
Release: 4 October 2024
Ludus is the first album by Tenerife-born clarinettist Daniel Molina, created in collaboration with pianist and Odradek artist Javier Negrin. Together, they present a programme in which the soloist reveals the many faces of the clarinet, with recent and world-premiere recordings rubbing shoulders with works by Prokofiev and Lutoslawski. Alongside a transcription of the Sonata for flute and piano by Prokofiev, Sonata by Salvador Brotons, and the Dance Preludes by Witold Lutoslawski, the album features the World Premiere Recordings of the Sonata by Pablo Diaz Sanchez and the Pieza lirica for violin and piano by Armando Alfonso, with whose transcription for clarinet this duo contributes to the dissemination of the work of this little-known composer admired by both, and championed by Javier Negrin on a previous Odradek release. This harmonically rich piece is dedicated to the composer's great-niece who, like Javier Negrin, studied at the Royal College of Music in London. Prokofiev's sonata is as classical as it is lyrical. and brilliant in its workmanship, conveying a carefree spirit in some of its rustic, dancing moments, while Lutoslawski's Preludes de danse of 1954 are based on highly contrasting folk songs. Sanchez's two-movement sonata is versatile and wide-ranging, embracing multiphonics and other extended techniques and culminating in an ironic and animated scherzo. Brotons's sonata features a static clarinet recitative and a second movement that effectively combines two movements in one, ending with an energetic finale. Daniel Molina stands out among his generation as a soloist and chamber musician, performing in the most prestigious concert halls throughout Spain and in national and international festivals alongside pianists and chamber groups of the highest level. Molina combines his concert activity with pedagogical work, giving masterclasses in higher education centres all over Spain, and since July 2023 he has been Artistic Director of the Aguere International Chamber Music Festival.

Schubert: Piano Quinet 'The Trout'; Fantasie D 940
Regis Pasquier, violin; Pierre-Henri Xuereb, viola; Luc Tooten, cello; Ludo Joly, double bass; Stephane De May, piano; Stephanie Salmin; piano
Pavane ADW7603
Release: 4 October 2024
This CD is a unique opportunity to rediscover these masterpieces by Schubert, sublimated by the passionate and masterly interpretation of exceptional musicians.Regis Pasquier has been a leading figure in the French music world for several decades. He has also won recognition internationally, and was awarded the Victoire de la musique classique for best soloist of the year in 1991. Passionate for chamber music, he had not however recorded Schubert's Trout quintet before. The renowned Belgian pianist Stephane De May suggested to him to record this enchantingly melodic score. As a complement, the Adagio and Rondo concertante is a rarely-played work in which the piano plays a dominant, almost concertante role. Finally, Stephane De May joins forces with Stephanie Salmin to complete the programme with the Fantaisie for piano fourhands, a work of poignant emotional beauty.

Danza, Baiao e Samba
Cross Atlantic Trio
Orlando Records OR0056
Release: 4 October 2024
The Cross Atlantic Trio pays homage to the rich dance traditions of Spain and Brazil. Bridging classical and popular styles, this eclectic album includes pieces by Spanish composers Manuel de Falla and Isaac Albeniz, blending authentic flamenco with lyrical romanticism. The Brazilian half includes spirited tracks such as Zequinha de Abreu's Tico-Tico no Fuba and Laurindo Almeida's melancholy Brazilliance No 1. The trio's innovative arrangements showcase their musical skills and offer a fresh, vibrant take on these timeless rhythms, making 'Danza, Baiao e Samba' a must-listen for all music lovers.

Building Bridges
Syrene Saxophone Quartet
Fineline FL72421
Release: 4 October 2024
With Building Bridges, Syrene bridges the known and the unknown, safety
and risk. The art of building bridges, both physical and metaphorical, requires a delicate
balance. It is a dance between curiosity and caution, between the urge to explore
and the need to stay safe.Composers Jacob Ter Veldhuis (1951), Douwe Eisenga
(1961) and producer Kypski (1978) have climbed into the pen, resulting in three
solid works from Dutch soil. Ter Veldhuis' The Waves draws you into a stream of
timelessness and eternity. In Eisenga's Block Attack, ostinato rhythms and
repetitive elements form a skilful, musical edifice. Kypski's The Next Dawn is the
sonification of the beginning of a new era, marked by the rising sun. The result is
a journey of discovery in which Syrene expands her horizons and invites her
listeners to travel with her.

Joseph Haydn: String Quartets Vol 18 - Op 33 No 2 in E-flat; Op 33 No 4 in B-flat; Op 33 No 6 in D
Leipziger Streichquartett
MDG Gold MDG 307 2333-2
Release: 4 October 2024

Georges Auric: Mélodies et Chansons
Holger Falk, baritone; Steffen Schleiermacher, piano
MDG Scene MDG 613 2334-2
Release: 4 October 2024

Liszt: Années de pèlerinage
Roger Muraro, piano
Alpha Classics
Release: 4 October 2024
French pianist Roger Muraro joins Alpha Classics for several recording projects. Born in Lyon to Venetian parents, he studied with Yvonne Loriod and is regarded as the leading specialist in the music of Olivier Messiaen, to which he has devoted much of his career. But this noted pedagogue, a former professor at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris, is also renowned for his profound and sensitive approach to the music of Ravel, Chopin, Schumann – and Liszt, of whom he is particularly fond. He now presents a monumental masterwork by Liszt which is in his view a work of 'universal intimacy'.

Souvenirs
Johan Dalene, violin; Peter Friis Johansson, piano
BIS Records BIS-2770
Release: 4 October 2024
On this recital album from BIS Records, Johan Dalene offers us a selection of popular violin pieces that have accompanied him since his early years. Dalene is joined by pianist Peter Friis Johansson, to continue in the tradition of great violinists such as Heifetz, Perlman and Vengerov, who all made recordings of favourite encores and recital pieces. The album features works that the violinist has performed around the world, in competitions and in concerts. 'The repertoire we have chosen for this album consists mainly of pieces that have been with me since my childhood', says Dalene. To finally record these poignant works proved to be an 'inspiring and challenging project'. The programme is built around three virtuoso works, Tzigane (Ravel), Introduction and Rondo capriccioso (Saint-Saëns) and Carmen Fantasy (Waxman), alongside more reflective pieces by Massenet, Tchaikovsky, de Falla and Kreisler. Also featured is a rarely played miniature by Swedish composer Amanda Maier – a work which, according to Dalene, 'is a gem full of spirit'.  This programme celebrates the multiple sides of the violin, at times blisteringly virtuosic, at times seductive and lyrical, performed here with finesse by Johan Dalene and Peter Friis Johansson.

Brahms on Flute
Alissa Rossius Dausgaard, flute; Gerhard Vielhaber, piano
Genuin Classics GEN 24905
Release: 4 October 2024
Have you ever heard Johannes Brahms' violin sonatas played on flute and piano? Check out the new album by flautist Alissa Rossius Dausgaard. She has created her own arrangements of the Brahms sonatas Op 78, Op 100 and Op 108 for flute and piano and recorded them for the first time. Alissa Rossius Dausgaard answers the question 'Brahms played on the flute. Is that possible?' with a 'Yes!'. She herself often played Brahms' Symphony No 4 as a solo flautist in the orchestra. The desire to perform other works by Brahms, who had inspired her from an early age, was so great that she agreed to arrange the violin sonatas for flute without compromising the sound Brahms intended. Together with Gerhard Vielhaber at the piano, she now presents an interpretation that is sure to warm the hearts of many. The result is something to be heard.  

Music of Barbara Harbach Vol 18
London Philharmonic Orchestra / David Angus
MSR Classics MS1816
Release: 4 October 2024
Combining a mastery of what one might call the 'American classical idiom' with a distinct instrumental palette, Barbara Harbach composes music that can be enjoyed on multiple levels – it's fun, always lyrical and occasionally dark as it illustrates the subject matter with musical fluency. Her work is exceptional in how clearly it conveys simple humanity – and all the victory and defeat that goes along with that. Harbach's music is memorable, and beckons to be heard again and again. This is not one-and-done material – the more one listens, the more is heard; both detail and context become clearer and clearer. The London Philharmonic Orchestra under the direction of David Angus is captured to perfection by the UK's Floating Earth engineers. And yes, the recordings were made under the supervision of the composer. Harbach has an exceptionally large catalog of works, including fourteen symphonies, operas, works for string and chamber ensemble, choral anthems, ballet, musicals and film scores. She has also composed music for organ, harpsichord and piano and has arranged numerous Baroque works for brass and organ. Conductor David Angus spent his early years in Belfast and as a chorister at King's College under David Willcocks. He has appeared with the Utah Symphony and San Antonio Symphony, in Canada with the Calgary Philharmonic and in the UK with the Royal Philharmonic, Hallé Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic, Ulster Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Northern Sinfonia and others. He appears regularly with the London Philharmonic and London Mozart Players, and conducts ensembles across Europe, particularly in Denmark and in Scandinavia, where he is a regular guest with the Lahti Symphony Orchestra. On this album, first recordings of Symphony No 12 'Tempus Fugit', Symphony No 13 'The Journey' and Symphony No 14 'Pioneer Women'.

Pierre-Max Dubois: Complete Songs
Élise DesChamps, mezzo; Alan Huckleberry, piano
MSR Classics MS1817
Release: 4 October 2024
French composer Pierre-Max Dubois (1930-1995) studied at the Paris Conservatory from 1949-1953 under Jean Doyen (piano) and Darius Milhaud (composition). He was later professor of analysis at the Paris Conservatory. While he is widely known as one of the preeminent composers of the twentieth century for woodwind instruments, particularly the saxophone, he has a vast catalog of works for the stage (ballets and operas), strings, and piano. His songs, however, are relatively unknown; this CD presents the first published recordings of them. A great advocate for arts education, Dubois was a close friend of Claude DesChamps and Lorraine Prieur, parents of Élise DesChamps. Claude was founder of the Canadian Music Competition and Dubois composed works for Lorraine. The three of them traveled across Canada, judging the competition, and providing valuable educational experiences for young musicians everywhere they went. A native of Montréal, Canada, mezzo-soprano Élise DesChamps is praised for her dark, rich mezzo-soprano voice, and sensitive musicianship. DesChamps is also a highly sought after teacher and master clinician. From 2007-2019, she was a member of the voice faculty at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio, and since then has been on faculty at the University of Iowa. DesChamps appeals to audiences and critics alike as a compelling and charming artist in opera, oratorio and concert. DesChamps is an alumna of the Conservatoire de musique et d'arts dramatiques du Québec à Montréal. On this album: Six Chansons (1963, poems by Phillippe Soupault), Le Zodiaque (1962, poems by José Bruyr), Trois Chansons (1962, anonymous eighteenth century poetry), Étoiles Brulées (1959, poems by Maurice Fombeure) and Cinq Poemes Chantés (1969, poems by Jean Tardieu).

The Light of Paradise - Pieces by Paul Mealor
Zurich Chamber Singers / Christian Erny; sonic.art saxophonquartett
Berlin Classics
Release: 4 October 2024
'The Light of Paradise' was written by British composer Paul Mealor, commissioned by the Zurich Chamber Singers, and composed based on the writings of medieval mystic Margery Kempe, taken from her publication 'The Book of Margery Kempe', one of the oldest documented autobiographical texts in history - and the first of its kind written by a female author. 'The Light of Paradise' marks the first comprehensive musical examination of the sophisticated and challenging literary works by this exceptional woman. Conceptualized as a choral opera, the piece was written in chamber musical instrumentation for choir and saxophone quartet. This scoring is a true rarity, yet one which is worth discovering, especially in this present iteration which unites the excellent Zurich Chamber Singers, the sonic.art saxophone quartet and conductor Christian Erny – all of them top-class ensembles and musicians who bring Mealor's visionary music to life.

My American Story: North
Daniil Trifonov; The Philadelphia Orchestra / Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Deutsche Grammophon
Release: 4 October 2024
(LP, CD, digital)

Snorri Hallgrímsson: Longer shadows, softer stones
Deutsche Grammophon
Release: 4 October 2024
(LP, digital)

Polyglot - music by Iván Enrique Rodríguez, Johanny Navarro, Chia-Yu Hsu,  Gabriel Bouche Caro and
Johannes Brahms
Eric Schultz, clarinet; Han Chen, piano; Clare Monfredo, cello
Navona Records NV6655 (digital only)
Release: 4 October 2024
Eric Schultz's masterful clarinet playing speaks in new and known tongues on Polyglot, a concept album celebrating music as a language of cultural identity and the self. A strong advocate of living composers, Schultz opens with an engrossing performance of Iván Enrique Rodríguez's Sonata Santera, exploring the development and evolution of three Caribbean Santeria rituals. Schultz captures the enchanting, mystical nature of the rituals between the rhythmic, driving movements, occasionally accompanied by percussive elements. To Schultz, music is a hallmark of metamorphosis that drives cultural change across history, the performer and composer working in tandem to create something inspired and new - speaking each other's language, you might say.

Johan de Meij: Casanova - The complete works for cello and wind orchestra
Yuki Ito, cello; Megumi Nakamura, harp; Kyushu Wind Orchestra / Johan de Meij
Navona Records NV6663 (digital only)
Release: 4 October 2024
At this point, it would only be fair to call Dutch composer and conductor Johan de Meij 'the Dutch King of program music.' Widely known to audiences for his 1988 Symphony No. 1 The Lord of the Rings, De Meij now presents Casanova, the complete recording of his compositions and transcriptions for cello and wind orchestra. Like the majority of De Meij's oeuvre, the works on CASANOVA are committed to a late Romantic aesthetic: frequently citing Rachmaninoff, Debussy, or Puccini, and intended to conjure specific imagery. The resulting music is soothing, colorful, and pleasing to the ear.

Ink Traces
Julia Glenn, violin; Konstantinos Valianatos, piano
Navona Records NV6670 (digital only)
Release: 4 October 2024
Inspiring curiosity, cultural interaction, and deep listening, Ink Traces reflects violinist Julia Glenn's fifteen-year journey exploring Chinese culture and interactions between Chinese language and music, fueled by frequent trips and three years living in China. This Navona Records release reflects a greater interdisciplinary approach seen in Chinese arts - one that blends poetry, dance, painting, calligraphy, and music and shows fascinating interchanges between gesture and sound. The title, inspired in part by Pan Kai's Ink Traces of Sigh for solo violin, is a nod to such interplay. The album explores three threads: probing the musical-linguistic play possible in the music of Chinese speakers, broadening perspectives on Chinese music, and fostering cultural dialogue between China and the United States. It features works by Chinese and Chinese-speaking composers, stretching traditional Western musical boundaries to create rich, imaginative soundscapes and processes.

American Woman - Mary Howe, Amy Beach, Margaret Bonds, Helen Crane, Dorothy Rudd Moore, Florence Price
Juliana Soltis, cello; Ruoting Li, piano
Navona Records NV6659 (digital only)
Release: 4 October 2024
The cello-piano duo is justly hailed for its tremendous expressiveness. Cellist Juliana Soltis and pianist Ruoting Li remarkably demonstrate this setup's emotive power on American Woman while championing a noble cause - highlighting underrepresented women composers. Featuring works by Mary Howe, Amy Beach, Margaret Bonds, Helen Crane, Dorothy Rudd Moore, and Florence Price, American Woman sheds light on a treasure trove of rarely heard gems of cello-piano literature. The general tone is sweeping, romantic, expressive, at times fierce and energetic, then again tender and delicate. Soltis and Li show extraordinary ability not only in bringing out the unique style of each composer, but also in uniting them all in a great artistic effort.

Alexander Yee: Homage - works for piano
Alexander Yee, piano
Big Round Records BR8987 (digital only)
Release: 4 October 2024
Alexander Yee makes his recording debut with Homage, an album of works he composed throughout 2023. Following his recovery from a fractured right hand, Yee experienced a newfound appreciation for his art, and so endeavoured to compose one solo piano composition per month until he produced an album's worth of material. Each of the nine compositions communicate three simultaneous narratives: the first being a musical representation of a Biblical story, or a story about God; the second being a narrative of a secular nature; and the third being a narrative taking place in the fantasy world constructed by Yee. Concurrent to his composition of his musical works, Yee would embark on an ambitious world building project in which to fill with his music.  Taking inspiration from both the western-classical and jazz traditions, Yee worked to create a synthesized homage to composers such as: Frederic Chopin, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Claude Debussy, Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Michael Nyman, Karl Jenkins, George Gershwin, Igor Stravinsky and Francisco Tarrega.

Posted 9 October 2024 by Keith Bramich

 

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