New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 17th May 2019
Today's new releases include arias by Verdi and Donizetti from Michael Fabiano, scenes from Baroque cantatas on the theme of tragic love from Magdalena Kožená, an oboe recital from Albrecht Mayer, and the latest recording by The Jerusalem Quartet, who perform string quartets by Korngold and Schulhoff alongside settings of Yiddish texts by Leonid Desyatnikov.
Verdi & Donizetti: Opera Arias
Michael Fabiano (tenor), London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Voices, Enrique Mazzola
The American lyric tenor makes his debut on Pentatone with a collection of arias from two composers who have played a central role in his career; the programme includes excerpts from Lucia di Lammermoor, Poliuto, Maria di Rohan, Luisa Miller, Ernani, Oberto and Rigoletto, and a rarely-recorded scene from the original St Petersburg version of La forza del destino.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Also making her first appearance on Pentatone is Czech mezzo Magdalena Kožená, who returns to her baroque roots with a programme of scenes from cantatas including Gasparini’s Atalia, Leonardo Leo’s Angelica e Medoro, Handel’s Agrippina condotta a morire, and Benedetto Marcello’s Arianna abbandonata.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Il Giardino Armonico’s latest album takes its title from an anonymous sixteenth-century pavane, which Antonini believes to have been inspired by Erasmus’s In Praise of Folly, and provides the impetus for a series of depictions of madness in various forms by composers including Agricola, Christopher Tye, Josquin, Giovanni Gabrieli, Nicolas Gombert, John Dunstable and Jacob van Eyck.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
The Berliner Philharmoniker’s principal oboe presents a programme of works which explore nostalgia for a bygone age, all composed in the aftermath of war: Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin from 1919, Elgar’s Soliloquy for Oboe and Orchestra from the 1930s, and Richard Strauss’s Oboe Concerto of 1945. Eugène Goossens’s one-movement concerto of 1927 – composed for his brother Léon’s American tour – completes the album.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The Jerusalem Quartet describe their latest project as ‘an exploration of the rich world of Jewish popular music in Poland between the two world wars’, which includes Korngold’s String Quartet No. 2 and Schulhoff’s Five Pieces for String Quartet; Israeli soprano Hila Baggio joins for the world premiere recording of Russian composer Leonid Desyatnikov’s song-cycle Jiddisch, which sets five texts by Jewish poets from Warsaw.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
As well as the Romance and Suite for viola and orchestra (given here in the arrangement for viola and piano) which Vaughan Williams composed for Lionel Tertis, this album also includes Outram’s adaptation of the Fantasia on Sussex Folk Tunes (composed for Pablo Casals), a transcription of the Fantasia on Greensleeves, and the Four Hymns with tenor Mark Padmore.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
To mark the 500th anniversary of the death of Leonardo da Vinci, Doulce Mémoire’s founder-director Denis Raisin Dadre has put together a programme of ‘musical pieces which might be suggested’ by fifteen of his paintings, including The Baptism of Christ, La Gioconda, and St John the Baptist; his selection (which is explained in full detail in the accompanying booklet) includes works by Josquin, Obrecht, Heinrich Isaac, Jean Lhéritier, and Francesco Spinacino.
Available Formats: CD + Book, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The Hungarian conductor and his period-instrument ensemble present the world premiere of a ‘passion-oratorio’ by German composer Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel (1690-1749), written in 1720 and conducted by Bach on Good Friday 1734; Bach would later arrange the aria ‘Dein Kreuz, o Bräutgam meiner Seelen’ as ‘Bekennen will ich seinen Namen’ (BWV 200).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Anita Cerquetti - Recital
Anita Cerquetti (soprano), Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Gianandrea Gavazzeni
Recorded in 1956 (just five years before the Italian soprano’s early retirement), this recital includes arias from Aida, Nabucco, Ernani, I Vespri Siciliani, La forza del destino, Tosca, Norma, La Gioconda, and Spontini’s Agnese di Hohenstaufen; shortly after the original release, High Fidelity described the album as ‘a “must” for anyone interested in big, important voices’.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Newly remastered, this is the only operatic recital album by the Italian soubrette, and includes three excerpts from Alcina (in which Sciutti sang Morgana to Joan Sutherland’s eponymous sorceress), the Mozart concert-arias Nehmt meinen Dank and Chi sà, chi sà, and arias from Fidelio, Così fan tutte, Le nozze di Figaro, I Capuleti, Don Pasquale, and La figlia del reggimento.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Chris O'Reilly - Chief Executive
