New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 17th November 2023
A year on from his award-winning recording of Messiaen's Vingt Regards sur l'enfant-Jésus, the French pianist explores the connections between two composers who 'changed the very idea of what music must be': Erik Satie and John Cage. The recital opens with latter's All Sides of the Small Stone - for Erik Satie, which was slipped into the notes of his student James Tenney as a 'Koan' (riddle) in the late 70s and discovered nearly four decades later; Tenney's own tiny tribute to Satie, Three Pages in the Shape of a Pear, also features on the programme.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This recital of South American music takes its title from a text by Paraguayan guitarist, composer and writer Agustín Barrios Mangoré, who used to read it aloud to the audience as a 'profession of faith' before his concerts; the programme comprises his La Catedral and Julia florida, Villa-Lobos's 12 Estudos from 1953, and Ginastera's Guitar Sonata from 1976. On his first album of music originally written for acoustic guitar, Shibe plays a Hauser replica which was built for Julian Bream.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
The BBC Symphony and its Chief Conductor kick off their series of the Polish composer's orchestral music with Symphonies Nos. 3 and 4, written in 1952 and 1953 respectively; the programme is completed by the Overture which Bacewicz composed shortly before fleeing German-occupied Poland a decade earlier. In a four-star review earlier this month, The Guardian noted that 'the drive and conviction behind these performances suggest that Oramo believes passionately in the music’s worth, and the BBCSO revels in its expert orchestration'.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The soprano's 100th recording ranges far and wide, covering Lieder (Schubert, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Richard Strauss and Hugo Wolf), mélodies (Gounod, Paladilhe, Strohl, Poulenc and Franck) and English song (Parry, Gurney, Frances-Hoad, Wallen); also included is Deborah Pritchard's 'Everyone Sang', written especially for Sampson and due to receive its live premiere at Wigmore Hall in December.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This second physical instalment in Manacorda's Beethoven series from Potsdam received four stars in the latest edition of BBC Music Magazine, with Rebecca Franks enthusing that 'the Kammerakademie Potsdam bursts onto the scene with energy and vigour...the Fifth and Sixth show off the orchestra’s taut ensemble playing, rhythmic discipline and sense of drama.'
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
In anticipation of the 150th anniversary of Franz Schmidt's birth next year, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales present his four symphonies, composed between 1896 and 1933. Symphony No. 1 was released digitally in March 2021, when BBC Music Magazine remarked that 'what really makes this new recording so enticing is the sheer energy and enthusiasm with which conductor and orchestra communicate the vigour and optimism of the opening movement'.
Available Formats: 4 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Baroque repertoire makes up the lion's share of the Israeli mandolinist's new album, which features arrangements of JS Bach's Concerto in C minor BWV1060 and Vivaldi's Concerto in B minor RV580 (originally for four violins); there are also bona fide mandolin concertos from Paisiello, Hummel, and the Neapolitan violinist-composer Emanuele Barbella.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The founders of the London Piano Festival join forces for a recital of twentieth-century French music, including Milhaud's Scaramouche Suite, Poulenc's Capriccio (d'après 'Le Bal masqué'), Elégie, and Ravel's masterly transcription of Debussy's Nocturnes. Poulenc's little Sonata for Piano Four Hands and much more substantial Sonata for Two Pianos (1952/3) complete the programme.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Alessandro Scarlatti: Baroque Influencer
Dorothee Oberlinger (recorder/director), Ensemble 1700, Bruno de Sá (soprano), Helena Rasker (alto)
As well the Sinfonias Nos. 7 and 9, this programme of instrumental and vocal works by Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725) includes the Concerto No. 9 in A minor for recorder, strings and basso continuo, the sinfonias for Venere e Amore and Clori, Dorino E Amore, the serenata Il giardino d' amore (telling the story of Venus and Adonis and sung here by Brazilian male soprano Bruno de Sá) and Filen, mio caro bene (with Helena Rasker).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
A Most Marvellous Party with Noel Coward and Friends
Mary Bevan (soprano), Nicky Spence (tenor), Joseph Middleton (piano)
Bevan, Spence and Middleton mark the fiftieth anniversary of Coward's death with a witty and wonderful recital including 'Any Little Fish', 'Parisian Pierrot', 'I Went to a Marvellous Party', 'The Party's Over Now' and 'Don't Put Your Daughter on the Stage, Mrs Worthington', plus songs by Britten, Quilter, Ned Rorem, Liza Lehmann, Gershwin, Weill and Messager. Middleton contributes solo piano pieces by Poulenc, Stravinsky and Satie.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
František Tůma: Motets, Dixit Dominus & Sinfonia
Andreas Scholl (countertenor), Czech Ensemble Baroque, Roman Válek
Born in Bohemia in 1702, František Tůma spent much of his career in Vienna, where his music came to the attention of Haydn and Mozart; this album features his Dixit Dominus, a Sinfonia a quattro, and the motets 'de S. Joanne Baptista', 'de tempore', and 'per ogni Tempo'. All of the works here were composed whilst Tůma was in the employment of Empress Elisabeth Christina, widow of Emperor Charles VI and mother of Maria Theresia.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This triptych of twentieth-century works inspired by folk-music comprises Stravinsky's Les Noces (given here in its 1923 version), Janáček's Rikadla ('Nonsense Nursery Rhymes') and Bartók's Three Village Scenes for female voices and chamber orchestra, which makes use of melodies which the composer collected in the Zvolen district of present-day Slovakia. The album is a sequel of sorts to the choir's recording of Martinů cantatas, which was shortlisted for a BBC Music Magazine Award in 2018.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Sir Adrian Boult conducts Berg, Stravinsky & Vaughan Williams
Heinrich Nillius (baritone), Suzanne Danco (soprano), Parry Jones (tenor), BBC Symphony Orchestra, Noel Mewton Wood (piano), Royal Opera House Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult
To mark to fortieth anniversary of Boult's death, SOMM makes three live recordings available on CD for the first time: the 1949 account of Berg's Wozzeck (Boult had conducted the UK premiere of the work fifteen years earlier), a 1948 performance of Stravinsky's Capriccio, and Vaughan Williams's Fourth Symphony (recorded with the Royal Opera House Orchestra in 1965).
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC
To mark Serkin's 120th birthday, Deutsche Grammophon release his final Beethoven recordings: the 'Waldstein' Sonata (recorded at SUNY Purchase in March 1986) and the 'Appassionata' (recorded in Vermont in June 1989). Serkin was too ill to approve the recordings for the planned release in 1990 but the project has the blessing of his daughter Judith, who writes: 'It is not ‘perfect’. Nevertheless, I think it very much deserves to be shared, as it reflects so amazingly Beethoven’s - and his! - profound understanding of what it means to be human.'
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
