New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 8th March 2024
Reviewing Rana's recording of Chopin's Études Op. 25 and Four Scherzi, Fanfare described her as 'a pianist who could eventually match Argerich in mastering the piano at a rare level of formidable technique, fiery temperament, and totally absorbing musicality'. Two years on, she couples his Piano Sonata No. 2 in B flat minor with one of the most technically-demanding works in the piano repertoire - Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat, in which she immersed herself deeply during the lockdowns of 2020/21.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Stravinsky: Petrushka & Debussy: Jeux & Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune
Orchestre de Paris, Klaus Mäkelä
A year after his recording of The Rite of Spring & The Firebird with the Orchestre de Paris, the young Finnish conductor continues his Ballet Russes series with two works written for Sergei Diaghilev's Paris company in the 1910s. Reviewing The Firebird last year, Fanfare pronounced that 'it would be hard to deny Mäkelä his place in the top tier', whilst Wiener Zeitung noted that 'this album has sensuality of sound, precision, rhythmic pepper, and last but not least: an original freshness that borders on a miracle in view of the existing abundance of recordings'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This programme of Marian music from the Italian Baroque includes excerpts from Porpora's Il trionfo della divina Giustizia ne' tormente e morte di Gesù Cristo, the Sinfonia from Leonardo Vinci's Maria dolorata, Pasquale Anfossi's Salve Regina, Pergolesi's Violin Concerto in B flat, Vivaldi's Stabat Mater, and Angelo Ragazzi's sonata a quattro 'Imitatio in Salve Regina Mater Misericordiæ'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Rebecca Dale: Night Seasons
Steven Isserlis (cello), Guy Johnston (cello), Philharmonia Orchestra, Michael Collins, Tenebrae, Nigel Short
The title-work here is a concerto for cello with choir, premiered in the Netherlands last April and setting poetry by Catullus as well as text from the Book of Common Prayer; written during the pandemic, the central movement is a tribute to the memory of composer Alastair Putt (1983-2022). The album also includes settings of William Wordsworth's I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, Robert Frost's I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud and WB Yeats's He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven, and Jo's Theme from the 2017 BBC adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Mozart: Piano Concertos, Vol. 9
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet (piano), Manchester Camerata, Gábor Takács-Nagy
This ninth volume of Bavouzet's Mozart series from Manchester features Piano Concertos Nos. 11, 12 and 13 - all composed in the early 1780s, shortly after Mozart had left his position as a court-musician in Salzburg to establish a freelance career in Vienna. Previous instalments of the series have been praised for the 'tremendous sense of reactivity between Bavouzet and his fellow musicians (Gramophone on Vol. 8) and for his 'mercurially imaginative and technically audacious' interpretations (BBC Music Magazine on Vol. 2).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The Russian pianist's programme comprises The Entry of the Gods into Valhalla from Das Rheingold (arranged by Louis Brassin and Lugansky), Brassin's transcription of the Magic Fire Music from Die Walküre, Lugansky's own arrangement of music from Götterdämmerung (including Siegfried's Rhine Journey & Funeral March and the Immolation Scene), the Transformation Scene from Parsifal (arr. Felix Mottl, Kocsis & Lugansky), and Liszt's transcription of the Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Felix Mendelssohn: Lieder ohne Worte
Michael Barenboim (violin), Natalia Pegarkova-Barenboim (piano)
Following recordings of piano trios by Mozart and Beethoven with his father Daniel and friend Kian Soltani, the violinist joins forces with his wife Natalia for Ferdinand David's arrangements of selections from Mendelssohn's Lieder ohne Worte. Born in the same house as Mendelssohn, David was the composer's concert-master at the Gewandhaus and gave the premiere of his Violin Concerto in 1845, having worked closely with Mendelssohn on the technical aspects of the solo part during the work's genesis.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
This album takes its title from a line in a song by Rhiannon Giddens, written after she read a nineteenth-century advertisement for the sale of a 22-year-old enslaved woman which also offered her nine-month-old baby 'at the purchaser’s option'; the song is performed here in the arrangement which Jacob Garchik made for the Kronos Quartet. The programme also includes Florence Price's String Quartet in A minor from 1935 and Dvořák's 'American' Quartet, both of which draw inspiration from African-American melodies and dance-rhythms.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
Telemann: Ino & Late Works
Christina Landshamer (soprano), Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Bernhard Forck
The central work here is the dramatic solo cantata Ino, composed when Telemann was in his mid-80s and setting a text by the German poet Karl Wilhelm Ramler; the work depicts the frantic attempts of Ino (sister of the late Semele) to save her children from the frenzy of her husband Athamas, who has been driven mad by the goddess Juno as part of her revenge on Semele's family. The album also includes the Overture (Suite) TWV 55:D21 in D, the Divertimento in E flat TWV50:21, and the Sinfonia melodica for 2 Oboes, Strings and Basso Continuo in C TWV 50:2.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Domenico Scarlatti's Stabat Mater of 1715 is scored for ten voices and continuo, whereas Dvořák's setting from 1877 employs four soloists, full orchestra and chorus. Keen to emphasise the kinship between the two works, Bestion writes: 'I have decided to ‘augment’ Scarlatti’s orchestration and ‘diminish’ Dvořák’s, so they can meet on even ground. To the Scarlatti I have added string parts sometimes doubling the vocal lines...For the Dvořák, I have transcribed the original piano part into its minimum orchestral dimension, that is, for strings.'
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
The central work in this triptych is Vítězslava Kaprálová's Piano Concerto in D minor, composed for her graduation from the Brno Conservatory in 1935; Kaprálová went on to study with Martinů, Novák and Talich before typhoid fever claimed her life at just 25. It's preceded by the sole piano concerto by Karel Kovařovic (perhaps best-known today for his edition of Janáček's Jenůfa), and followed by Josef Suk pupil Pavel Bořkovec's Piano Concerto No. 2 from 1949/50.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Stanford: Shamus O'Brien
Brendan Collins, Gemma Ni Bhriain, Rory Dunne, Ami Hewitt, Anna Brady, Andrew Gavin, Joseph Doody, Catriona Clark, Jarlath Henderson; Orchestra of Scottish Opera, Opera Bohemia Voices, David Parry
Premiered in 1896, Shamus O'Brien is set in a Cork village during the immediate aftermath of the 1796 Irish rebellion, and tells of the fugitive hero's attempts to evade capture by the British army after a jealous peasant-farmer has betrayed his whereabouts to the officers. Despite the weighty subject-matter, the opera is predominantly light-hearted in tone and features a star turn from a piper as well as a wealth of Irish folk influences; all of the Irish characters are sung by Irish singers on this world premiere recording.
Available Format: 2 CDs
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
