Today's new releases include Schubert's Piano Sonata No. 20 and Moments Musicaux from Steven Osborne on Hyperion, Rachmaninoff's Variations on a Theme of Chopin and a selection of songs (played on the composer's own piano) from Alexander Melnikov and Julia Lezhneva on Harmonia Mundi, four of Handel's Chandos Anthems from Arcangelo and Jonathan Cohen on Alpha, and Mozart opera arias and songs from Ladin baritone Andrè Schuen and friends on Deutsche Grammophon.
Osborne's 2015 recording of the Four Impromptus D935, Drei Klavierstücke d946 and Hüttenbrenner Variations prompted BBC Music Magazine to hail him as 'perhaps the outstanding British pianist of his generation', whilst Gramophone described him as 'a Schubertian of the utmost seriousness and integrity'; ten years on, he presents the composer's penultimate piano sonata alongside the Six moments musicaux which were published shortly before Schubert's early death. In a recent podcast with Gramophone, Osborne described this sonata as 'the hardest one to define, a bit like these magic eye pictures people like to share...when you un-focus your eyes an image then becomes gradually apparent'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res+ FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Melnikov recorded this album on Rachmaninoff's own Steinway at Villa Senar, the summer home on the shores of Lake Lucerne where he composed the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini and Symphony No. 3 and hosted guests including Vladimir Horowitz. The programme opens with the Variations on a Theme of Chopin (which Melnikov sees as an homage of sorts to Schumann's Études symphoniques), after which Russian soprano Julia Lezhneva joins Melnikov for a selection of songs including 'Lilacs', 'Twilight', 'The night is mournful', 'How fair this spot' and 'On the death of a siskin'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Following their outstanding account of Theodora last year (which was a top choice on Radio 3's Building A Library), Arcangelo and Cohen present four of the anthems which Handel produced for James Brydges, Duke of Chandos whilst engaged as composer-in-residence at his Middlesex stately home Cannons: 'O sing unto the Lord a new song', 'Have mercy upon me, O God', 'As pants the hart', and 'Let God arise'. In a four-star review earlier this week, The Times remarked that 'even being rebuked by God sounds rather good fun when set to music by Handel and performed with the expressive vigour that always makes Jonathan Cohen’s work with Arcangelo worthwhile.'
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Mozart
Andrè Schuen (baritone), Daniel Heide (fortepiano/piano), Nikola Hillebrand (soprano), Avi Avital (mandolin), Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Roberto González-Monjas
Mozart's Count Almaviva, Guglielmo, Papageno and Don Giovanni are central to Schuen's repertoire, and all four characters feature on this recital recorded in Salzburg last December; the programme also includes 'Abendempfindung an Laura', the late cantata excerpt Die ihr des unermesslichen Weltalls Schöpfer ehrt ('You who honour the Creator of the infinite universe'), the concert aria 'Mentre ti lascio' (written at the same time as Don Giovanni), and 'Komm, liebe Zither, komm' (with Avi Avital). Schuen will sing the title-role in Robert Icke's new production of Don Giovanni, which opens tonight at the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Three pieces receive their world premiere recordings here: Adès's Aquifer (commissioned by the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks for Sir Simon Rattle's inaugural season as Chief Conductor), Oliver Leith’s Cartoon Sun, and William Marsey’s Man with Limp Wrist, which was inspired by the oil-paintings of Pakistani artist Salman Toor. The album also includes three other pieces by Adès, who is currently Artist-in-Residence of the Hallé: Dawn - Chacony for Orchestra at any Distance (written for the socially-distanced 2020 BBC Proms), Shanty - Over the Sea (described as 'captivating and evocative' by The Guardian), and Tower - for Frank Gehry.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Born in Paris in 1910, Elsa Barraine studied with Paul Dukas and won the Prix de Rome in 1929 for her composition La vierge guerrière (based on the life of Joan of Arc); her neoclassical Symphony No. 1 was written in Rome two years later. Symphony No. 2 dates from 1938 and is subtitled 'Voïna' (the Russian word for 'war'); during World War Two, Barraine became an active member of the French Resistance and was at the forefront of the Front national des musiciens. The album also includes the anti-Fascist tone-poem Pogromes from 1933 and the post-War Musique funèbre pour la mise au tombeau du Titien.
Barraine's Symphony No. 2 will be performed at the BBC Proms on 31st July, with Joshua Weilerstein conducting the BBC Philharmonic.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
This is the first-ever album to be exclusively devoted to music for strings by Welsh composers, with all of the works receiving their premiere recordings; highlights include Paul Mealor's O Sacred Heart, Morfydd Owen’s Romance, William Mathias's Music for Strings from 1961, Grace Williams's Elegy for Cynddylan, and Christopher Wood's musical memorial to the victims of the Aberfan disaster of 1966 (commissioned for the Last Night of the Welsh Proms in 2016).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Inspired in part by the flautist's childhood memories of her father Rodney performing under Leonard Bernstein as concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic, Friend's all-American programme includes Copland's Duo for Flute and Piano, Eldin Burton's Flute Sonatina, Florence Price's Adoration, Amy Beach's Invocation and Berceuse, and Jascha Heifetz's version of Stephen Foster's Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair. Charles Tomlinson Griffes's one-movement concerto Poem is given in an arrangement by Georges Barrère and is dedicated to Friend's teacher Renée Siebert, a former member of the New York Philharmonic.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Although Brahms and Wolf intensely disliked one another on a personal and musical level, they make congenial bedfellows on this lovely recital featuring the former's Vier ernste Gesänge and the latter's Three Songs on Poems by Michelangelo Buonarroti and Prometheus. Boesch and Martineau have worked together regularly for over a decade, winning a BBC Music Magazine Award for their 2017 recording of Schumann's Liederkreis Op. 39 and Mahler's Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, and producing fine accounts of Schubert's three great song-cycles on Onyx.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV
The singers of the London Oratory School's liturgical choir have an average age of just fourteen, with duties including the weekly Saturday vigil at Brompton Oratory, school masses and services and a busy schedule of external engagements and recordings; previous instalments in their 'Sacred Treasures' series have been welcomed for their 'impressively mature' singing (Gramophone on the Spanish volume) and 'haunting and crystalline' sound (The Times on the Venetian chapter). This Roman programme includes music by Palestrina, Marenzio, Anerio, Giovannelli and Allegri, and was recorded at the Church of Notre Dame de France in Soho.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res+ FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Grace Williams: The Parlour
Edith Coates, Noreen Berry, Edward Byles, Janet Hughes, Anne Pashley, Marian Evans, John Gibbs; City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Welsh National Opera Chorus, Brian Balkwill
Based on Guy de Maupassant’s short story En Famille, Williams's one-act opera The Parlour bears a certain resemblance to Puccini's Gianni Schicchi in its depiction of a greedy family's response to the apparent death of an elderly relative; Williams transports the action from the banks of the Seine to a seaside town in Victorian Britain. Commissioned by the Arts Council’s Welsh Committee in 1959, the opera was premiered seven years later in Cardiff; this live recording was made at a later performance in Llandudno, when the BBC praised Williams's 'confident professionalism and theatrical awareness'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen (Blu-ray)
Tomasz Konieczny (Wotan/Der Wanderer), Camilla Nylund (Brünnhilde), Klaus Florian Vogt (Siegfried), Daniela Köhler (Sieglinde), Eric Cutler (Siegmund), Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke (Mime), Christopher Purves (Alberich); Philharmonia Zürich, Gianandrea Noseda, Andreas Homok
This production by Andreas Homoki was the Opernhaus Zürich's first complete staging of The Ring in over twenty years. Wagner composed significant portions of the cycle whilst staying in Switzerland under the patronage of Ludwig II of Bavaria, and Homoki spoke of a desire to 'return [the work' to its origins' - The Guardian applauded his 'clear and compelling' vision and noted that 'Homoki trusts Wagner more than some modern directors do: he has staged a storyteller’s Ring.'
Available Format: 4 Blu-rays
