The Kolner Akademie, under the artistic direction of Michael Alexander Willens, presents J.S. Bach: Lutheran Masses BWV 233-236, a monumental exploration of the composer's four Kyrie-Gloria Masses. Written in the 1730s, during a period of profound artistic consolidation, these works reveal Bach at his most resourceful. Drawn largely from his finest cantata music, the Masses showcase his unparalleled ability to transform earlier material through refined counterpoint, enriched orchestration, and deep sensitivity to the Latin Ordinary. Long overshadowed by the Mass in B Minor, these so-called "Lutheran Masses" emerge here as brilliant creations in their own right, each shaped with architectural clarity: six movements, impeccably balanced between choral grandeur and intimate arias.In this cycle, Bach fuses theological tradition with inventive musical craft. Whether reworking festive choruses, expanding expressive arias, or integrating older settings with newly imagined timbres, he elevates the transformation of earlier material into a profound creative process - producing music that feels both familiar and entirely renewed. By gathering the four Masses into a unified artistic vision, The Kolner Akademie illuminates their shared structural features, vibrant instrumentation, and emotional breadth. UPC: 8717306265096Label: PentatoneRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
In the shadows of history, the works of Mieczyslaw Weinberg and Erich Korngold emerge as profound testaments to the resilience of the human spirit. Both composers, deeply affected by the tumultuous tides of the twentieth century, faced the harrowing realities of persecution. Their music, rich in emotion and complexity, serves not only as a reflection of their personal trials but as an enduring legacy of hope and beauty amid despair. Driven by a passion for meaningful projects, cellist Kristina Reiko Cooper gave the New York premiere of Mieczyslaw Weinberg's Fantasia for Cello and Orchestra, Op. 52, and Erich Korngold's Cello Concerto in C major in 2025. She is rejoined by her concert partner conductor Constantine Orbelian and the Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra to record these works, together with the Weinberg Concerto for Cello and Orchestra. Three extraordinary works for solo cello and orchestra by two leading composers of the twentieth century. UPC: 013491361628Label: Delos RecordsRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
With these works for accordion and orchestra, Ksenija Sidorova and Paavo Jarvi pay tribute to the music of the Baltic countries: the Latvian and the Estonian, who have been collaborating for over 10 years, recorded in Parnu with the festival orchestra created by Paavo, a luxury ensemble composed of the best musicians from the greatest European orchestras. Composed in 2007, Erkki-Sven Tuur's concerto, entitled Prophecy, explores the concept of the Seer, a person who can see the future but is often despised by the society in which they live. The concerto exploits the full power and range of the symphony orchestra, in total interconnection with the soloist: 'It's the most technically complicated work I've ever played!' says Ksenija. The concerto Dances by another Estonian composer, Tonu Korvits, was written for Sidorova and premiered in Parnu in 2024. The composer wanted to immerse himself in the accordion in order to write his work, even going so far as to learn how to play it... he drew out some unprecedented sounds from it. The Fruit of Silence is the work by Ksenija's compatriot, Peteris Vasks. He arranged one of his pieces for choir and piano, based on the words of Mother Teresa. UPC: 3701624511985Label: AlphaRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important luminaries of the 18th century as a composer and theorist, although he kept his compositional and scholarly activities so carefully separate that his pieces show no trace of the considerations of this "sonic scholar". The subject matter of his stage works is something else entirely. Les Indes galantes, for example, draws on the latest ethnological explorations of Asia and America, while the grand opera Zoroastre is based on research into the Persian religious founder Zarathustra, who after considerable trials wins the hand of his beloved and the throne of Bactria. One of the most surprising aspects of this fantastic production is how effectively yet discreetly these exotic subjects were incorporated into the established dance forms of the Baroque period, and that Rameau was even able to stage a Native American rain dance. UPC: 761203551828Label: Cpo RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Simon-Pierre Bestion immerses us in the world of Charles V and a Spain marked by Arab-Andalusian culture. From 1515 onwards, Spain also welcomed musicians and singers from Flanders: this Capilla flamenca had an explosive effect on Spanish music during the Renaissance, according to Bestion. He has composed an imaginary Requiem for the death of Charles V, using compositions actually intended for this service, such as Pedro de Escobar's Missa pro defunctis and Cristobal de Morales' Missa Mille regretz, based on the emperor's favourite song. As usual, the founding conductor of La Tempete takes a few liberties and breathes life into these works by arranging them with variations in timbre, tempo and expression: 'I chose to make extensive use of percussion and certain very distinctive instruments such as the shawm and sackbuts, which perfectly match the spirit of outdoor processions, such as those in the gardens of the Alhambra.' UPC: 3701624512166Label: AlphaRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
At the close of the seventeenth century, Farina, Minei, and Netti created some of the most popular pieces of their day. Their dialogues for soprano and bass offer a colorful palette of emotions. This recording presents the first modern performance of several pieces that once enchanted Neapolitan evenings. Their interplay of contrasting passions is a breathtaking musical postcard from the Bay of Naples. UPC: 0788792034389Label: Glaux RecordsRelease Date: 5.1.26Format: CD
Amongst the remarkable sacred compositions of Orlando di Lasso (1532-1594) are to be found his unique and atmospheric settings of the Propers of the Mass for the feasts of Christmas, Easter, Pentecost and Corpus Christi, first published in 1574 as Officia aliquot de praecipuis festis anni. In this recording project the Propers (polyphonic settings of the specific liturgical texts 'proper' to each feast) - Introit, Alleluia, Sequence, Communion - appear in correct chronological order and interspersed with the movements from some of the lesser-known and very beautiful mass compositions by Orlando di Lasso. UPC: 4260412810598Label: ArcantusRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
In May 2026, Metier Records presents Edward Cowie's Darkness into Light, a stunning collection of works for harp and flute, performed with superb brilliance by Alice Giles and Laura Chislett, two of the world's leading soloists on these instruments. The album features two major works for solo flute and solo harp, a duo for both instruments specially written for Alice and Laura, and the title track, a fantastic three-way improvisation for flautist, harpist, and Edward Cowie himself on piano.Edward Cowie is one of the most notable voices in contemporary music and is considered by many to be the "leading contemporary composer of music that is related to the natural world" (Fanfare). A remarkable polymath, Cowie is renowned as a composer, visual artist, and natural scientist.La Primavera is a series of 'sound portraits' for solo flute, inspired by the nine figures in Botticelli's painting, one of the most beautiful, mysterious, and cryptic of all time. The painting radiates light and movement, and this is reflected in Cowie's music, which epitomises the limpid and hugely flexible sonorities and brilliance of the flute. The series of variants follow the figures in the painting from left to right, 'blown' into the music by Zephyrus, signifying the breath of the flautist. In the painting, most of the characters are either dancing or posed in dance-like actions, linking it to Harlequin Dances for solo harp, one of the 'satellite' works inspired by characters from Cowie's opera Commedia (1977). In Harlequin Dances, Cowie fuses music of the 16th century with some of the gestures and theatrical devices of the Commedia itself. The sorrowful emotions of unrequited love lead to Harlequin's rehearsal of dancing himself to death, but also to something hopeful and luminous. Cowie skilfully uses the resonances and wide range of timbre of the harp, and the closing few minutes are some of the most beautiful and transcendental music he has ever composed.Australian Water Music for flute and harp, is inspired by the ocean and fresh water lakes of Australia, and also Handel's Water Music, this being a recurrent theme for Edward Cowie, both as a composer and a visual artist. The tremendous velocities of flute and harp capture the speed of a stream of water and it's liquid sound, as well as bringing delicious richness and expressive qualities. Each instrument plays alone, but also thematic and motivic materials are resounded and re-worked in a dynamic dialogue between them.Darkness Into Light came from a discussion with Alice and Laura about their shared experience of darkness and light. The resulting work takes the form of a transcendence into some sort of divine light from impenetrable and engulfing darkness (of mind and spirit), all done in one continuous and shared exploration. Edward Cowie said of the experience: "Working with two giants of the musical world in this process was pure and undiluted pleasure". UPC: 809730714320Label: MetierRelease Date: 5.15.26Format: CD
This is an album of what might best be described as nicely funky classical and tango music of the 20th Century, performed by chamber clarinet ensembles. UPC: 044747418025Label: CentaurRelease Date: 5.15.26Format: CD
Laura Lootens's first collaboration with naive, Diabolico leads us into a world of strange tales and pacts with the devil and other ghostly apparitions which actually form the core of a magnificent journey in sound, covering an extremely varied range of styles. A soothingly tranquil introduction, the opening movement of The Devil's Trill Sonata of Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770) here serves as a prelude to the transformations of the last of Paganini's Caprices, the supreme incarnation in music of the devil, composed by George Rochberg (1918-2005). These Caprice Variations make up an intriguing musical kaleidoscope of fifty-one variations which sometimes remind one of Bach, Brahms, or indeed Paganini's own wild flashes of lightning, yet they are also founded upon more modern, even experimental ideas-a captivating play between past and present which Laura Lootens represents here with eleven of her favourite movements. Afterwards comes a work by Niccolo Paganini (1782-1840) himself, the Grand Sonata for violin and guitar, played here by guitar alone. In this piece, the fruit of an utterly devilish joke, Paganini made sure that the more difficult part was given to the guitar, with the violin in fact playing only a simple accompaniment!The second part of this journey occupies more modern terrain, with three important large scale works for guitar. With it's disjointed rhythms, it's exaggerated dynamic contrasts, and it's sudden changes of mood, the Capriccio diabolico by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968) combines scorching energy and delicately hued melodies. The Due canzoni lidie by Nuccio D'Angelo (born in 1955), with it's heady poetic sensibility, evokes two complementary aspects of some ancient, forgotten, but evidently magical world. Finally, the German guitarist, who won the Premier Prix at the Concours Andres Segovia in 2022, offers the indispensable and intoxicating Invocacion y danza by Joaquin Rodrigo (1901-1999), a diptyque inspired by the flamenco tradition, it's initial desperate supplication (Invocacion) followed by an explosion of rhythm (Danza) as intense as it is tragic. Throughout, Laura Lootens calmly asserts her style, with playing of intimacy, ease and refinement, as if the guitar had been transformed into a lyre.
Tracklist:
Violin Sonata in G Minor, B.g5 "Il trillo del diavolo"~I. Larghetto affettuoso
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation
Allegro energico
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation
Presto
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 2
Aria
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 7 after Beethoven, Op. 74 [Scherzo]. Presto
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation
Poco agitato ma con molto rubato
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 12 after Brahms, Op. 35 [Book 1, No. 12]. Andante con moto
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 44 after Mahler, Symphony No. 5 [Scherzo]. Scherzo
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 4
Andantino
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 2
Quasi cadenza
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 2
Molto espressivo e cantando
Caprice Variations for Unaccompanied Violin~Variation 5
Paganini's theme [Caprice XXIV]. Quasi presto
Grand Sonata per chitarra e violino in A Major, Op. 39, MS 3~I. Allegro risoluto
Grand Sonata per chitarra e violino in A Major, Op. 39, MS 3~II. Romanza
Grand Sonata per chitarra e violino in A Major, Op. 39, MS 3~III. Andantino variato
Capriccio diabolico, Op. 85a (Omaggio a Paganini)
Due Canzoni Lidie~I. Espressivo
Due Canzoni Lidie~II. Agitato
Invocación y danza. Homenaje a Manuel de Falla
UPC: 3700187686727Label: NaiveRelease Date: 5.15.26Format: CD
Composer Rodion Shchedrin (1932-2025) was one of the leading figures of post-war Soviet music. This album by the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Olli Mustonen brings together four of his works, including music from his ballet The Lady with the Lapdog, as well as a viola concerto, Concerto dolce, performed by Lawrence Power, one of the greatest violists of our time. Rodion Shchedrin passed away while this album, which is a monument to the unique friendship and artistic collaboration that Olli Mustonen and Rodion Shchedrin cultivated over the course of three decades, was in preparation. UPC: 761195140826Label: OndineRelease Date: 4.3.26Format: CD
Following the departure (of his own accord) of it's founder Damien Guillon, Le Banquet Celeste has reinvented itself as a collective of musicians and singers, all committed to continuing to explore the Baroque repertoire with the stylistic rigour that has established the ensemble's reputation. For this first recording by the "new" Banquet, Bach is in the spotlight, with Cantatas BWV 85 and 115 featuring violoncello piccolo obbligato: 'Smaller in size, the violoncello piccolo has a truly special timbre that can be grave and passionate, but also wiry and sensitive. In the arias where it engages in concertante dialogue with the vocal soloist, it most often embodies the voice of tenderness and consolation, and the confident promise of the hereafter', writes musicologist Corinne Schneider. The Sixth Suite for Cello, BWV 1012, completes the programme: 'Radiant and joyful, it sounds like a deliverance, in perfect accord with the themes developed in these two cantatas,' she concludes. Celine Scheen, Alexander Chance, Thomas Hobbs and Benoit Arnould are the vocal soloists, and Julien Barre plays the piccolo cello. UPC: 3701624511909Label: AlphaRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
It was in 1747 that Johann Sebastian Bach received an invitation from King Frederic II of Prussia. Bach travelled with Wilhelm Friedmann - his eldest son - to Potsdam, where Carl Philipp Emanuel, his second eldest son, was accompanist to the king's court. This was the famous visit during which Johann Sebastian improvised a ricercar or fugue in three voices on a theme supplied by the monarch and later led him to compose the Musical Offering.This recording presents sections of Bach's Musical Offering, including the Trio Sonata, side by side with Trios by both Wilhelm Friedemann and Carl Philip Emanuel. The intention was to shed light on the familial character of Bach's visit to Potsdam and Berlin in 1747 and it's musical consequences. The importance of this gathering between the three most famous members of the Bach family and the impact it had on their respective lives and careers cannot be overestimated. For Johann Sebastian himself, however, this was to be brief: he died three years later in 1750. UPC: 4250128525084Label: RameeRelease Date: 6.5.26Format: CD
Herve Niquet likes to say that recording is a source of stress and sometimes tension: "None of that was the case here," he continues. He has been performing this Couperin/de Lalande programme with the female singers of Le Concert Spirituel for over ten years: "The seven singers know every nook and cranny of these highly complex scores. So it was time to record this testimony to ten years of work. (...) I like the parallel between the singers of Le Concert Spirituel and the nuns who sing these lamentations every year throughout their lives in their monastery." UPC: 3701624512104Label: AlphaRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
This recording explores the musical world of the confraternities of the laudesi - active in the Venice region around 1500 - and their rich repertoire of devotional songs in Italian. These works often celebrate the Virgin Mary and Christ's Passion and bear witness to an aesthetic deeply rooted in popular fervour, frequently combining homophonic writing with a direct expressiveness aimed at the common folk and influenced by Franco-Flemish songs. Le Miroir de Musique take their inspiration from the musicians of the Scuole Grandi of the Venetian Renaissance and recreate a sound-world that lay at the crossroads of spirituality and nascent humanism UPC: 5400439004863Label: RicercarRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
The organ works of Axel Ruoff, born in Stuttgart in 1957, constitute one of the most important contributions to the literature for the instrument by any composer since Messiaen. Stylistically, his music unites the French cathedral tradition of composers like Langlais, Dupre and Guillou with the concern with counterpoint and logic heard in Reger and later German figures. Ruoff uses the unparalleled resources of the modern symphonic organ not produce music of freewheeling energy and uncompromising power. (Volumes 1-5, TOCC 0567, 0596, 0610, 0672, 0709) UPC: 5060113447739Label: ToccataRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
Variation means change - a creative impulse that has driven composers for centuries. Among the great variation cycles in music history, one rises like an eight-thousander: Ludwig van Beethoven's 33 Variations on a Waltz by Anton Diabelli, op. 120. On her new recording, pianist Lei Meng places this monumental late work at the centre and invites listeners on an ascent into Beethoven's most imaginative terrain. Lei Meng pairs this towering cycle with a work from Beethoven's early years: the energetic, sharply profiled c-minor Bagatelle WoO 52 from 1795. Here we already encounter the composer who would make the key of C minor his signature - with scherzo-like wit, driving force and a softly glowing trio in C major. UPC: 4039956926016Label: Coviello ClassicsRelease Date: 5.15.26Format: CD
The CD delves into the technique known as diminution, which flourished for several decades toward the end of the 16th century, primarily in Italy. As Peter Söderberg explains in the liner notes: "Diminution consists of subdividing the long note values of a vocal model into short ones in a solo instrumental part, laying the foundation for virtuosic ornamentation. Diminutions on a solo instrument were often performed in conjunction with the vocal piece, performed by an ensemble of singers or instrumentalists (colla parte). But the vocal model-usually a chanson, madrigal, or motet-could also be adapted for a solo instrument that allowed for polyphonic playing, usually a keyboard instrument or, as in this recording, a lute." UPC: 8011570373564Label: StradivariusRelease Date: 5.1.26Format: CD
Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor, composed over an extended period and in collaboration with it's dedicatee Ferdinand David, was an instant success at it's premiere. The concerto's glorious melodic invention and innovative character have made it one of the most beloved works in the classical canon. Dramatic in mood and troubled in it's history, Robert Schumann's Violin Concerto is regarded by soloist Albrecht Menzel as revealing the composer's inner world, from the deepest anguish to the heights of exhilaration. UPC: 0730099148931Label: NaxosRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
Felix Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor, composed over an extended period and in collaboration with it's dedicatee Ferdinand David, was an instant success at it's premiere. The concerto's glorious melodic invention and innovative character have made it one of the most beloved works in the classical canon. Dramatic in mood and troubled in it's history, Robert Schumann's Violin Concerto is regarded by soloist Albrecht Menzel as revealing the composer's inner world, from the deepest anguish to the heights of exhilaration. UPC: 730099148931Label: NaxosRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
According to current knowledge, the St. Aegidius organ in Berne has the world's only surviving pipes by the Brabant organ builder Reinhard Lampeler van Mill (1596); it also possesses a significant amount of historical substance from Harmen Kroger (1643) and Christian Vater (1714). This organ is an important historical document of North German organ building prior to Arp Schnitger - an instrument full of power, intensity, tone color, and "sweet sharpness." The aim of this recording is not to invent a new instrument for Buxtehude's organ works, but rather to show how the sound of the late 16th and early 17th century Berne organ influences our hearing of Buxtehude's music - his instrument in Lubeck also had registers that dated back to this period. The use of pure meantone temperament, registrations based on 16th and 17th century sources as well as ornamentation and diminutions also play an essential role here. The meantone temperament also necessitated the transposition of some pieces, a practice also to be found in works by Johann Sebastian Bach. UPC: 4250128525053Label: RameeRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
SOMM Recordings continues it's long collaboration with pianist Leon McCawley, named "one of today's most impeccably musical pianists" by International Piano. His past recordings for SOMM include much-admired releases of piano music by Chopin; Barber (Critics' Choice in Gramophone); Brahms (Classic FM CD of the Week); Schumann; Rachmaninoff Complete Preludes; Haydn Sonatas and Variations (awarded a Diapason d'Or); Schubert; three further volumes of Haydn Sonatas; and the 2024 release Natural Connection, about which Gramophone wrote "This scintillatingly varied recital combines sensuous virtuosity, compelling charm and musical probity. Highly recommended." In this recital McCawley presents some of his old favourites by composer-pianists Liszt, Beethoven, Chopin, and Franck. While the recital focusses on 19th century composers, the programme begins and ends with a nod to J.S. Bach. Amongst Bach's works that Franz Liszt revered were his six organ preludes and fugues. In transcribing them for piano, Liszt became a major influence on later arrangers. Heard here is the first in the set, Prelude and Fugue in A minor.The Piano Sonata in C major, Op. 53, "The Waldstein," by Beethoven-dedicated to his friend and patron, Count Ferdinand von Waldstein-comes from his aptly named "Heroic" period. It was written in 1804, two years after the watershed moment of his Heiligenstadt Testament, when he had contemplated suicide because of his encroaching deafness, but instead made the profound choice to channel his despair into a bold new musical style. The "Waldstein" Sonata is a vivid expression of this newfound path and of Beethoven's ability to transcend personal adversity to create ground-breaking works of deep complexity. One of the renowned "out-takes" of musical history is Beethoven's Andante favori. He originally intended it as the slow movement of his "Waldstein" Sonata, but he substituted it with a shorter adagio labelled "Introduzione." He had formed an attachment to the piece, though, and he published it as a stand-alone work, including it frequently in subsequent recitals. In an engaging piece of programming, Leon McCawley pairs it here with the "Waldstein" Sonata.Two introspective works by Chopin follow. The Berceuse is a series of continuous contemplations on a simple, nocturne-like theme. In the Barcarolle, Chopin's affinity to the bel canto operatic style is strongly apparent, especially in the beautiful, florid figurations in the right hand.Leon McCawley closes his beautifully curated recital with the Prelude, Chorale and Fugue for solo piano by Cesar Franck. Franck was trained as a pianist, but he served as an organist at Paris's Sainte-Clotilde Church from 1858 until his death in 1890. Inspired by the rich, orchestral sound of the Cavaille-Coll organ there, he developed a grandiose, improvisatory style of keyboard writing that was harmonically influenced by Bach but thoroughly romantic in expression. UPC: 748871071728Label: Somm RecordingsRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
Esquisses opens up a fascinating soundscape for horn and piano, in which rare musical miniatures engage in a new dialogue alongside familiar masterpieces. The selection brings together finely drawn sketches from late Romanticism, modernism, and contemporary music - including forgotten gems from the Russian-Ukrainian repertoire, early works by great teachers such as Glazunov and Tcherepnin, as well as pieces written especially for the performers by Swiss composers such as Daniel Schnyder and Thuring Bram. This recording shows how rich, colorful, and virtuosic the literature for horn and piano can be - beyond the beaten track. UPC: 4260052386941Label: Ars ProduktionRelease Date: 4.17.26Format: CD
The tracks of this disc contain equally as many sensitive palimpsests (elaborations on an earlier composer's style) through which other emotions vibrate. The transcriptions they present only depart from the letter to better reveal-and revere-it's spirit. Our greatest wish would be that what these admirable pieces lose in authenticity, they recover it thanks to the enthusiasm, fervor, and love that have guided us throughout our work. Because, in this field, precisely, it is less a question of proving than of experiencing. UPC: 3701174600290Label: EnphasesRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
A veritable musical fresco inspired by the cyclical course of the sun, Circa Diem - "almost a day" - invites the listener on a sonic journey following the rhythm of light. From the peaceful darkness of the deep night to the gentle dawn, from the intense brightness of the zenith to the enveloping warmth of the golden hour, to the shifting shadows of dusk, each stage of the day finds it's musical resonance here. The trio Les Heures Bleues weaves it's common thread around Tomaso Albinoni's Opus 1. A first opus for a first project: the idea of a beginning, where all the musical trajectories to come are already hinted at. The cycle of a day thus mirrors the great cycles of life: gestation, birth, maturity, tranquillity, then evanescence. Four sonatas by Albinoni have been chosen and set in dialogue with different moments in the solar cycle, revealing the expressive richness of this Baroque music in the light of passing time. To anchor this one-day journey in our present, contemporary composers were invited to create works based on the light/sonata correspondence that inspired them most: Virginie Tasset, Max Charue, Patrick Leterme, Jimmy Bonesso and Muhiddin Durruoglu. Their contemporary perspectives extend and renew Albinoni's legacy, inscribing this timeless cycle in a resolutely modern sensibility. UPC: 5412217046729Label: CypresRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
Jewels of the 17th century, the Tours and Deslauriers manuscripts form a corpus of three hundred works born in the fervour of the provinces of the Kingdom. This journey to the very heart of French cathedrals reveals the striking theatricality of sacred stories, ranging from fascinating anonymous pieces to flashes of genius by Bouzignac and Moulinie. Under the direction of Fabien Armengaud, the Pages and Chantres of the Centre de musique baroque de Versailles make these scores blossom into a garden of delights, like a bouquet of myrrh. UPC: 3760385430812Label: Chateau VersaillesRelease Date: 4.24.26Format: CD
During our 2022 Continuo Foundation-supported tour of music from the manuscripts of Margaret of Austria (1480-1530), which we entitled Epitaph for a Green Lover, it became clear that there was keen demand for the programme. After every performance of this beautiful and unrepresented music, the audience asked if we had made a recording; in the end, we took heed. Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy, Governor of the Habsburg Netherlands, was a great patron of the arts who loved to dance and sing. But, above all, she loved her green parrot. Our programme's title comes from the remarkable chanson Soubz ce tumbel with it's tragic text by Margaret's court poet, Jean Lemaire de Belges. In this song, we find a text drawn from de Belges's Epitaphe de l'Amant Vert, in which the amant vert ('green lover') refers to the beloved green parrot. This chanson, along with all the songs featured on this album, come from the two extant songbooks, or chansonniers, of Margaret of Austria, which are now housed in the Brussels Royal Library. Alongside the songbooks, Margaret's library consisted of over 350 treasures, including the Très Riches Heures de duc de Berry, the Sforza Hours, and an exquisitely decorated book of basse dances on black-stained vellum with silver and gold calligraphy. Such a collection gives a sense of how Margaret was a linchpin in Renaissance culture. Our aim is to transport the modern-day listener to Margaret of Austria's court through music. Our programme even allows us to give insight into her character, since some of her own poetry was set to music by her favourite musicians; we have featured a selection on this album. We have had such pleasure exploring this music and sharing it with audiences in concert, and are thrilled to now bring this stunning repertoire to listeners through this recording. c The Linarol Consort UPC: 0708093356126Label: CrdRelease Date: 5.1.26Format: CD
Stradivari Classics - The World's Great Music, Captured at it's Finest.
Tracklist:
Adagio Cantabile; Vivace Assai
Andante
Menuetto: Allegro Molto
Allegro Di Molto
Molto Allegro
Andante
Menuetto: Allegretto
Allegro Assai
Allegro Moderato
Andante Con Moto
UPC: 699246656647Label: Hindsight RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Stradivari Classics - The World's Great Music, Captured at it's Finest.
Tracklist:
Magic Flute Overture, K. 620
Adagio - Allegro
Allegretto
Menuetto - Moderato
Finale - Presto
Allegro non troppo
Adagio
Allegro giocoso ma non troppo - Vivace
UPC: 699246656661Label: Hindsight RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Stradivari Classics - The World's Great Music, Captured at it's Finest
Tracklist:
Allegro
Scherzo: Prestissimo
Andante
Finale: Allegro
In the Steppes of Central Asia
Capriccio Italien, Op. 45
812 Overture, Op. 49
UPC: 699246656715Label: Hindsight RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Stradivari Classics - The World's Great Music, Captured at it's Finest.
Tracklist:
Allegro
Adagio Un Poco Mosso
Rondo Allegro
Suite From The Opera "Der Rosenkavalier"
UPC: 699246656678Label: Hindsight RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Stradivari Classics - The World's Great Music, Captured at it's Finest.
Tracklist:
Langsam Schleppend Wie Ein Naturlaut
Kräftig Bewegt Doch Nicht Zu Schnell
Feierlich Und Gemessen Ohne Zu Schleppen
Stürmisch Bewegt Energisch
Der Freischütz Overture
Light Cavalry Overture
UPC: 699246656685Label: Hindsight RecordsRelease Date: 5.22.26Format: CD
Lei Liang crafts multi-disciplinary works that bridge scientific research, electroacoustic composition, and contemporary improvisation to create a cohesive message of holistic symbiosis. Partnering with musicians from Ensemble Dal Niente, Mivos Quartet, loadbang, [nec]shivaree, and pianist Stephen Drury, Lei Liang's newest release is am ambitious snapshot of his current aesthetic direction. UPC: 613527013356Label: New FocusRelease Date: 4.10.26Format: CD
Composer, flautist, and producer Allison Loggins-Hull's genre-defying style is vibrantly brought to life on Patchwork, an album of six new chamber works celebrating the culmination of her three seasons as a Composing Fellow with the Cleveland Orchestra. UPC: 822252284720Label: AvieRelease Date: 5.1.26Format: CD
