Musica Fiorita / Daniela Dolci JOHANN MELCHIOR GLETLE Motetten op. 5

The Swiss Baroque composer Johann Melchior Gletle's motets are among the most notable music to survive from that era. Although Gletle's musical background and much of his biography is obscured in the mists of passing centuries, it is known that Gletle produced an extensive collection of works. The ensemble Musica Fiorita has recorded selections of the motets of Gletle previously but with "Motets, Opus 4", they've amassed the entirety of Gletle's motet oeuvre in a 4 CD box set. With multiple hues coloring the instrumental spectrum and the virtuosity of the vocal and instrumental parts, Gletle's legacy is rediscovered in this spotlight collection from one of the finer Baroque ensembles today.

Musica Fiorita / Daniela Dolci ALESSANDRO SCARLATTI Rosinda ed Emireno

"In 2009, I came across an interesting catalogue entry in the Austrian National Library. It was the opera 'Rosinda ed Emiremo' by Giacomo Perti with obbligato cornett arias. Since this instrument has always played a major role on many of our programmes, I was immediately electrified by this finding. The music turned out to be highly interesting – sweet, sonorous melodies with dialogues between the voice and cornett, a wonderful musical rarity. I soon put together a Bolognese concert programme on which the most beautiful arias from the opera were combined with instrumental sonatas from Giovanni Legrenzi’s Op. 8. The music went together very well and could be so readily combined because Legrenzi had dedicated his Op. 8 to Perti’s uncle, Lorenzo Perti. In addition, we played an aria from Giacomo Perti’s opera 'Penelope la Casta' in which the cornett has a highly virtuoso part. After the concert and the CD recording, I was contacted by the musicologist Rodolfo Zitellini, who specialises in Perti. He drew my attention to an opera by Alessandro Scarlatti entitled 'L’Emiremo ovvero il consiglio dell’ombra', based on the same libretto as Perti’s 'Rosinda ed Emiremo'. It was quite a surprise when we realised that not only were the libretti the same, but that the two operas – each aria, each recitative – were absolutely identical! I asked Rodolfo Zitellini to take on this task and, thanks to his painstaking research, we know today that Scarlatti composed the opera, not Perti. We are most delighted over the solution to this almost criminological puzzle and grateful for this new knowledge. One way or the other, it is clear that the music is magnificent, and it has been a worthwhile endeavour to wrest it from the darkness of the archive." (Daniela Dolci)

Andreas Scholl / Dorothee Oberlinger / Ensemble 1700 JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH Small Gifts

When J. S. Bach dedicated his “Brandenburg Concertos” to the margrave Christian-Ludwig, he labelled them as “small talents” given to him by the heavens. Under the title “small gifts”, Andreas Scholl together with Dorothee Oberlinger and her Ensemble 1700 present a pure Bach programme with a selection of vocal and instrumental works which gives a lively impression of Bach’s musical rhetoric. 

The acclaimed recorder player Dorothee Oberlinger and her ensemble 1700 team up with famous countertenor Andreas Scholl for this inspiring new album featuring the work of J.S. Bach. The album includes arias from Bach cantatas for alto, a concerto for harpsichord arranged for flute, the cantata BWV 170 “Vergnügte Ruh” and the famed Brandenburg concertos No. 2 and No. 4. Dorothee Oberlinger is one of the most amazing discoveries of recent years, an expressive virtuoso who - quite rightly - received numerous awards while still very young. Today she is seen as one of the world’s greatest recorder-players, earning her unanimous acclaim for solo recitals at festivals all over Europe, in America and Japan, for example at the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele, the Musikfestspiele Potsdam and the Settimane Musicale Stresa. Born in Germany, Andreas Scholl's early musical training was with the Kiedricher Chorbuben. He later studied under Richard Levitt and René Jacobs at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. A Grammy nominated artist, he has won numerous awards and prizes including the prestigious ECHO Award for his composition The Emperor's New Clothes and The Nightingale released on Deutsche Grammphon.

Albrecht Mayer / I Musici di Roma TESORI D'ITALIA

This release by Albrecht Mayer lives up to its title: the program items are truly Italian treasures, none common except for the Vivaldi Concerto for oboe, strings, and continuo, RV 450, at the beginning. There are a couple of world recorded premieres, from library manuscripts, making this a more or less essential purchase for libraries and good late Baroque collections. Those two pieces, an oboe concerto by the elusive Domenico Elmi, and the Concerto in C major for oboe, strings, and continuo, Op. 8, No. 4, of Giuseppe Sammartini, are both attractive, but among the other works, hardly better known, are some real gems (or tesori). Sample the Concerto in G minor for oboe, strings, and continuo, Op. 8, No. 5 with its unusual movement structure: two slow outer movements and a tripartite central movement that itself has a central slow section, all logically coordinated with the solo oboe part. Mayer has a clean, energetic style, but the backing by the venerable Musici di Roma lacks a bit of the contemporary crispness, and the sound from the Sala Accademica del Pontificio Istituto di Musica Sacra is vague. Nevertheless, a fine release of excellent music you almost certainly have never heard. (James Manheim)

Anton Batagov BACH

Firma Melodiya presents a recording of J.S. Bach’s Partitas performed by Anton Batagov.

Johann Sebastian Bach and Anton Batagov. Who could ever think until recently that these names would cross? A promising pianist, prize-winner and Tatiana Nikolayeva’s alumni, he refused the anticipated career in his early youth and chose to continue with quite different music. The first performer of minimalist music in this country and a composer with a distinctive style, he resumed his “classical” performances not long ago. However, he refuses to keep a beaten path again.

As a principled antagonist of “authentism,” he plays any music in a poignantly contemporary fashion, sensing the breath of today in it. There might be something that creates an affinity between him and Glenn Gould, but the great Canadian pianist sensation and reading of Bach was totally different. Batagov hears Bach in a different way, drastically changing tempos, articulation and strokes as he repeats.

“Each note, each intonation, each chord of Bach’s music carries the truth next to which all the rest is inessential, therefore it sounds uncompromising and at times even merciless despite its blinding beauty. There is no path to light that wouldn’t run over Calvary,” he assumes.

His religious rendition of Bach’s partitas (he perceives No.4 as a Christmas mystery, and No.6 as a reflection of the Holy Passion) only naturally includes an arrangement of the chorale Jesus bleibet meine Freude played by the pianist between two cycles as a connecting link and dramatic core of the recording.

Anton Batagov recorded Bach’s music on the grand piano manufactured by Bösendorfer of Vienna (now a subsidiary of Yamaha) in a room of ZIL Culture Centre, a memorable location in Moscow where the necropolis of Simonov Monastery used to be.

“Batagov exploded the entire structure and texture of partitas, split them into atoms. After a ‘big bang,’ when the dance element disappears completely, a new universe is created in front of us, with Bach as its dome just the same.” – Radio Russia programme “Baroque Practice”

Musica Fiorita / Daniela Dolci GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL Ode for St Cecilia's Day

The harpsichordist and leader of the ensemble Musica Fiorita, Daniela Dolci (native of Sicily), studied early music at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel, specializing on historical keyboard instruments. Subsequently she went to Amsterdam for further training with Gustav Leonhardt. Her main focus – inspired by the work with Jesper B. Christensen—is the historical basso continuo practice, based on 17th and 18th century sources.

Well on time for St Cecilia's Day on 22 November, Pan classics presents a new recording of the impressive ode composed by Handel. The fine Basel-based orchestra Musica Fiorita, conducted by Daniela Dolci, performs this well-known work with their trademark historically informed knowledge and elegance, perfectly translating Handel's intentions in terms of underlining the text with very intentional use of musical affects. The Ode for St Cecilia's Day is joined on this CD by the Concerto grosso op. 6 no. 4, a further ocassion to appreciate the ensemble's fine playing. (Presto Classical)

Musica Fiorita / Daniela Dolci DOMENICO ZANATTA Venezia

Little is known about the life of Domenico Zanatta. He was most probably born in Venice as the title pages of his prints seem to attest. The very sparse notices on his early life indicate that he soon started a musical career, already printing his first collection of sonatas at the young age of 24. But he also had a second endeavor: His group of cantatas. Zanatta shows a great mastery of the genre and his melodic inventiveness freely flows between the structuring parts of his cantatas, continuing the tradition of his Venetian colleagues in a much worthy way. Flavio Ferri-Benedetti and Musica Fiorita, under Daniela Dolci, present some of his pieces in between works by Cavalli, Strozzi, who was a pupil of Cavalli, and Fontana, who was a pioneer of the, at the beginning of the 17th century, new stile recitativo. (Arkiv Music)

Javier Perianes FREDERIC MOMPOU Música Callada

Catalan composer Federico Mompou wrote four volumes of brief, aphoristic piano pieces called Música callada, or Music of silence, between 1959 and 1967. He seemed to inhabit a musical world of his own, indifferent or hostile to many of the conventions of western music, particularly Germanic music, which he described as "phonorrhea," with an excess of padding, ponderous development, and numbing redundancies. His aesthetic is similar in some ways to Satie's, and their works have some similarities, particularly the use of a simple, but unconventional tonal language that is not shy of dissonance. Mompou's music is notable for the simplicity and clarity of its content and its expression -- there are no wasted or unnecessary notes. It is almost all very quiet music and has a rhythmic fluidity that often obscures a sense of pulse. As a child, the composer grew up near his grandfather's bell factory, and he traced his musical aesthetic to the experience of hearing the bells. Many of the sonorities in Música callada can indeed best be described as bell-like. Spanish pianist Javier Perianes plays with an unmannered delicacy and a self-effacing directness that honor the ephemeral character of these pieces and allows their poetry to blossom. The sound is absolutely clear and captures the intimacy of the music. (Stephen Eddins)

Seong-Jin Cho DEBUSSY

In his latest recording, 23-year-old South Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho presents an all-Debussy programme. Debussy follows Cho’s two best-selling Chopin recordings.
It is entirely fitting that Seong-Jin Cho, winner of the 2015 International Chopin Piano Competition, should now turn to Debussy. Towards his life’s close, the French composer edited the piano works of Chopin, an experience that reignited his creativity, opening his heart to music he had loved since childhood. In turn, Cho’s connection to Debussy runs deep. He performed “Golliwogg’s Cake-walk” from Children’s Corner as part of his first public recital at the age of eleven, and his passion for the composer developed in parallel with his exploration of Chopin. He was therefore delighted to have the opportunity of commemorating the centenary of Debussy’s death, which falls in March 2018, with his own tribute.
Since childhood, Cho has felt many affinities with Debussy and he was keen to mark the centenary in his own style. The new album features both books of Images, each comprising three pieces of breathtaking imagination, in company with Children’s Corner and Suite Bergamasque, the latter including the hugely popular “Clair de lune”. Rounding things off in jubilant fashion is the beautiful “L’Isle joyeuse”.
“I have always loved Debussy’s music, but my feeling for it has deepened during my studies with Michel Béroff at the Paris Conservatoire,” Cho recalls. “Michel never presses me to accept his ideas on interpretation, which would be so easy for such a great master of Debussy’s music. His lessons are like meetings in which we discuss my playing, talk about music and art, and allow things to develop naturally. It’s a process of mutual understanding with Michel occasionally making suggestions about something that I might consider changing. Because he has such a profound connection to Debussy, he asks questions that can open your mind and ears to new possibilities.”

Stéphane Denève / Brussels Philharmonic PROKOFIEV Romantic Suites

On 17 November, the latest CD by the Brussels Philharmonic and music director Stéphane Denève will appear on Deutsche Grammophon. Brussels Philharmonic is the first symphony orchestra in Belgium to work with this record label. For its second recording with the more than 100-year-old Deutsche Grammophon, the orchestra opted for the ballet music of Sergei Prokofiev. Denève’s touch is clearly noticeable: he created a new musical dramaturgy, choosing from the existing suites, giving rise to new and exciting combinations.

Stéphane Denève, music director Brussels Philharmonic:
"I have always felt very close to Prokofiev's music, it is therefore an immense joy for me to be able to propose, thanks to the prestigious Deutsche Grammophon label, my own suites of two of his most marvellous ballets: Romeo and Juliet and Cinderella. The Brussels Philharmonic and myself want to offer a narrative journey, a romantic vision of those pieces, speaking to the senses and imagination. I hope that this recording will inspire reverie and evoke exalted emotions, in one word: infinite romanticism!”

In 2016, the Philharmonic recorded 'Connesson: Pour sortir au jour' for Deutsche Grammophon. That recording won a Diapason d’or of the year, a CHOC de Classica of the year and a Caecilia prize.

Zsófia Boros LOCAL OBJECTS

Vienna-based Hungarian guitarist Zsófia Boros brings remarkable interpretive clarity and a uniquely unifying touch to a diverse collection of pieces in her second recording for ECM, Local Objects. Phrasing in distinct ways while staying faithful to the spirit of the music, she offers new perspectives on standards of the concert repertoire such as Carlo Domeniconi’s “Koyunbaba” and Jose Cardoso’s “Milonga”, differently flavours Egberto Gismonti’s harmonically-inventive “Celebração de Núpcias”, and reveals a highly observant musical eye in the choice of contemporary guitar pieces such as Mathias Duplessy’s “Nocturne”, Alex Pinter’s “Gothenburg”, and the epic “Fantasie” by Franghiz Ali-Zadeh.

Gismonti’s “Celebração de Núpcias” appeared on the 1976 recording Dança das Cabeças (a duo with late percussionist Nana Vasconçelos), the Brazilian master’s first ECM album. Zsófia’s version highlights the trance-like qualities of Gismonti’s original: “I couldn’t stop playing it,” she says.

“I just wanted to hear those harmonies.”

On “Milonga" by Argentinian Jorge Cardoso and Brazilian Anibal Augusto Sardinha (Garoto)’s exquisite, lyrical “Inspiração”, Boros adds introductions of her own. On the latter, harmonics suggest glass stars over a distant shore, before the melody arrives. “Like a film director, you focus on a small thing and it creates a feeling before you know what the film is about. Water droplets, droplets on a flower, a flower garden … I don’t want to go straight into the room where the story takes place, I want to go first into the garden, to see the flowers.”

With Italian composer Domeniconi’s four-part “Koyunbaba op. 19”, about a thirteenth century hermit who lived in a cove by the Aegean Sea, Boros puts each of the various sections and elements of the piece in an explicit light, creating an enlarged vision of the whole. After climactic chords, soft paper placed on the guitar strings helps produce the muffled, quasi-sordino passage...

... that opens Zsófia ’s building rendition of the “volcanic” presto, as she describes it, played fast but light.

Another extended offering on the album is “Fantasie” by Azerbaijani composer Franghiz Ali-Zadeh, an open-ended instrumental and compositional showpiece (in the positive sense of the term). Inside its complexity, Zsófia says her challenge was to “find the story”. “I need to make a piece my own for it to be authentic. And I can only be authentic if I’m honest, honest if I’m free.”

Short pieces by composer-instrumentalists bookend the album. The opening “Nocturne” by Frenchman Mathias Duplessy evokes, if unconsciously perhaps, the nocturne in its original Italian denomination describing a type of serenade. “I can hear it a thousand times and it still touches me,” she says. 

“Gothenburg”, by Austrian guitarist Alex Pinter, is about the end of a relationship. “Everybody knows how when a relationship ends, you have all these questions,” says Zsófia , for whom Pinter is a friend. She plays his lament liberally, empathetically, as an “object of local insight” to borrow from the Wallace Stevens poem that lends its title to this recording and is published in the CD booklet. (ECM Records)

Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana / Dennis Russell Davies BRUNO MADERNA Now, and Then

Unlike many of his radical new music colleagues, Bruno Maderna (1920-1973) had a great affection for older music, especially that of the Italian Renaissance and Early Baroque eras. But his transcriptions had little to do with the orthodoxy of so-called ‘historically informed’ interpretation. In the belief that works of art can be removed from their original contexts, he used contemporary instrumental resources to discover new meaning and a new validity in the works of old masters. His transcriptions of Gabrieli, Frescobaldi, Legrenzi, Viadana and Wassenaer are vividly conveyed by the RSI Orchestra under Dennis Russell Davies in a programme which includes Chemins V by Maderna’s good friend Luciano Berio (1925-2003). Chemins V is itself a transcription of sorts, a chamber orchestra version of Berio’s Sequenza XI. Soloist Pablo Márquez references flamenco and the guitar’s classical heritage, while the orchestra engages with the guitar on levels of expanded harmony. Dialogue develops, as Berio said, “through multiple forms of interaction, from the most unanimous to the most conflictual and estranged.” (ECM Records)

Juliane Banse IM ARM DER LIEBE

Juliane Banse's current concept album, entitled "Love’s Embrace”, is devoted to orchestral Lieder of the early twentieth century and presents works and composers who have been very unjustly forgotten. The romantic lyrics have catchy melodies and lightweight orchestration; they are easily on a par with the well-known orchestral Lieder by Mahler or Strauss. An excellent opportunity to regain familiarity with Late Romantic orchestral Lieder by Hans Pfitzner, Joseph Marx, Walter Braunfels and Erich Wolfgang Korngold, and to experience them in exemplary interpretations.

Towards the end of the nineteenth century, the Golden Age of the orchestral piano Lied and the original orchestral Lied had begun - with Hugo Wolf and, above all, Gustav Mahler. “Away with the piano!" was the latter's fierce demand: "We moderns need a larger device to express our thoughts, whether great or small.” Richard Strauss, Hans Pfitzner, Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Max Reger thought and composed in very much the same manner as such now-forgotten and soon to be finally rediscovered masters as Joseph Marx or Walter Braunfels.

In 1903, Pfitzner, for example, wrote his song "Infidelity and Consolation", which alternated between the popular sound” and artistic contrapuntal ambitions, and then orchestrated it: a "German folk song" from the pen of an intensely cerebral composer. In contrast, the Six Simple Songs op 9, composed from 1911 onwards by Erich Wolfgang Korngold - a childhood as well as a teenage prodigy - are by no means "simple"; instead they are artificial, refined, lightweight, melodically extravagant and harmoniously dazzling. The Graz composer Joseph Marx, once the most-performed living Austrian composer, represents the aspect of modernity that usually comes under the heading of “Late Romantic”; like Hugo Wolf, he also wrote music for an "Italian songbook" after Paul Heyse. The highly delicate "Three Chinese Songs" composed in the world war year of 1914 by Walter Braunfels, who was open to all the fine arts, were written for soprano and orchestra from the outset - but not merely as a footnote to once-fashionable exoticism. Like Mahler with his "Song of the Earth," Braunfels had been inspired by Hans Bethge's "Chinese Flute".

Together with the Münchner Rundfunkorchester conducted by Sebastian Weigle, Juliane Banse recorded the orchestral Lieder in a studio production by the Bayerischer Rundfunk in March 2015.

Marie-Ange Nguci EN MIROIR

At the age of 18, Franco-Albanian pianist Marie-Ange Nguci has already positioned herself as an outstanding young artist of her generation. Her technical prowess and exceptional musicality has allowed her to develop a unique and poetic tonal quality, dazzling audiences in performance.

Nguci’s talents were recognized early on when she was awarded First Prize at the Lagny-sur Marne International Piano Competition in 2011. After winning the 2015 Dorothy MacKenzie Competition at the International Keyboard Institute and Festival in New York (IKIF), Nguci has been invited to give a solo recital at the French Consulate of New York in 2016. 

Performing frequently as a soloist, chamber musician and with orchestra, Nguci enjoys engaging with contemporary classical music and worked directly with composers Thierry Escaich, Graziane Finzi, Alain Abbott, and Fabien Touchard. Most recently, she recorded works by French composers César Franck, Camille Saint-Saëns, Gabriel Fauré, Olivier Messaien and Thierry Escaich, examining different historical periods and aesthetics.

Nguci received her Bachelor’s degree in Musicology at the Paris-Sorbonne University and her Master’s degree in Piano performance with highest honors at the Paris Conservatoire. She is currently enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire’s prestigious Artist Diploma course in piano while studying ondes Martenot and completing additional Master’s degrees in musical analysis and music pedagogy. She is a recipient of major grants from the Meyer and L’Or du Rhin Foundations and the French-American Piano Society in New York.

Cecilia Bartoli / Sol Gabetta DOLCE DUELLO

Cecilia Bartoli and Sol Gabetta – two of the most captivating women in classical music – are joining together for a new album ‘Dolce Duello’ to be released on Decca Classics on 10th November. It is a collection of Baroque masterpieces which showcase the stunning combination of voice and cello in a series of dazzling duels and wondrous arias. To coincide with the release, Bartoli and Gabetta will be performing on a European tour with Cappella Gabetta and conductor and violinist Andrés Gabetta.

‘Dolce Duello’ covers almost a century of music. The new album features works by Antonio Vivaldi, George Frideric Handel, Domenico Gabrielli, Tomaso Albinoni and Luigi Boccherini, as well as three world premiere recordings: Nicola Antonio Porpora’s ‘Giusto Amor, tu che m’accendi’ from the serenata Gli orti esperidi, and two compositions by Antonio Caldara – ‘Fortuna e speranza’ from his opera Nitocri and ‘Tanto, e con sì gran piena’ from Gianguir.

The composers of these works make a variety of requirements on their soloists, demanding equal commitment from both singer and instrumentalist – engaging them in a friendly duel. If the concerto is the most elaborate and extended of musical duels, the 18^th century’s obbligato aria, with its pugnacious instrumental solo part, is easily the most spectacular. From the dawn of the Baroque, the voice and cello were inseparable companions, whether they appeared together for practical reasons (the cello being part of the continuo) or for expressive purposes. The sound of the cello is often considered to be the closest to the human voice, one elegantly complimenting the other. But when they are pitted against each other something extraordinary happens – the cello pushes the voice to its physical limits, while the singer demands raw emotion from wood and strings as if it were nature’s own instrument.

Reflected in the music of ‘Dolce Duello’ is the great friendship between Bartoli and Gabetta. They have known each other for years and had long been looking for a project to collaborate on. Together with a musicologist, they unearthed some beautiful works for voice and cello – three of which had never been recorded before. There are touching laments, as in Handel’s Ode for St Cecilia’s Day, as well as more energetic arias such as ‘Di verde ulivo’ by Vivaldi. Bartoli and Gabetta sparkle when they play together.

While it maybe an album of duels, the true winner is surely the listener – who can bask in the joyous music from two wondrous women. ‘Dolce Duello’ is full of sweet treats for every taste.

Genevieve Lacey LINE DRAWINGS

Jacob’s been a friend for decades. Almost as long as I’ve been playing the recorder, I’ve been playing Jacob’s music. Perhaps because I first met and loved him when I was little, his voice feels like my instrument’s mother tongue. Jacob’s simple melodies were so sweet for my young fingers. In adolescence, his music expressed things I couldn’t, yet meant with all my being. Jacob was there in my learning-my-craft years, his music urging me through the long, solitary practice tunnel. Nowadays I’m discovering expressive sides of him I didn’t recognise earlier ... He died centuries ago, but he’s shaped me.’

Australian recorder virtuoso Genevieve Lacey returns to the music of Dutch composer Jacob van Eyck in a new album on ABC Classics.

Born blind at the end of the sixteenth century, Van Eyck came to be hailed as ‘the Orpheus of Utrecht’ in his lifetime and is now regarded as one of the most significant musicians of his generation. As well as being an expert organist, he spearheaded technical and musical developments in bell-ringing, and was appointed as Director of the Carillons of Utrecht in 1628. He is best remembered, however, for his collection of works for solo soprano recorder ‘Der Fluyten Lust-hof’ (The Flute’s Pleasure Garden) – a collection of over 140 melodies and variations, with themes sourced from popular folk songs, psalms and memorable tunes of the time. Van Eyck was famously given a pay rise to wander through Janskerkhof public gardens in the evenings, to entertain passers-by on ‘his little flute’ (as the recorder was then called). Line Drawings compiles some of Genevieve Lacey’s favourite works from this collection.

The album cover and booklet feature stunning drawings by Brook Andrew, inspired by Van Eyck’s music.

Fanny Robilliard / Paloma Kouider DEBUSSY - SZYMANOWSKI - HAHN - RAVEL

Violonist Fanny Robilliard commenced her studies at the age 16 at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Lyon with Marianne Piketty. First prize winner of Appassionato Competition 2006 in Caen, and Avignon International Competition 2007, she appeared as a soloist for several performances in France.

After getting her Diploma in the Masterclass at University of Music and Performing Arts Munich, she was admitted in the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischer Rundfunks Orchester Academy. Named by french performing rights society “Adami” as “Révélation Classique 2010”, she has been a frequent guest in many festivals, including Aix-­en-­Provence, Prades, Baden Baden Festpiele, the Nymphenburger Schloss Konzert, Lenk Sommerakademy, Traunsteiner Sommerkonzerte.

Between 2012 - ­2014 she was a member of the Berlin Philharmonic Karajan orchestra academy, which included regular concerts with the orchestra, as well as various chamber music performances and workshops with distinguished artists such as Simon Rattle, Christian Tetzlaff and Mitsuko Uchida.

Paloma Kouider studied with Sergueï Markarov at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris and with Elisso Virssaladze in Florence. In 2012 she joined the class of Avedis Kouyoumdijan at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, where her studies were further enriched by Claude Helffer in the field of contemporary music, and by Stéphane Béchy in early music and period performance. Paloma was named by French performing rights society ADAMI as a 'révélation classique', and was an award winner from the Groupe Banque Populaire foundation.

Invited at an early age to perform in prestigious programmes in Europe, Russia, Kazakhstan and Japan, she has never neglected her passion for literature, which she pursues in a classe préparatoire at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand.

Alongside her concert activities, and in collaboration with Alexandra Soumm and Maria Mosconi, Paloma founded the association "Esperanz'Arts", which organises artistic events for the socially disadvantaged.

Het Gelders Orkest / Antonello Manacorda CLAUDE DEBUSSY - MAURICE RAVEL

The bulk of La mer was composed during a visit to Burgundy – a long way from the nearest sea – although the work was completed in the English seaside town of Eastbourne. The composer himself argued that his inspiration was drawn from a range of ocean view paintings and from literature in which the sea played a major part. Debussy described the work as 'Three symphonic sketches for orchestra' (Trois esquisses symphoniques pour orchestre), thus avoiding the term 'symphony', which would have imposed a specific musical structure, as well as the expression 'symphonic poem', which would imply that the music was descriptive in nature. 'Sketches' was a wise choice, precisely because it neatly conveys that the music is meant to do no more than provide an impression.

Whereas Debussy occupied himself spontaneously and intuitively with looking for new sounds, Ravel placed much more emphasis on the effect that the sounds could have in the context of a musical story.

One of these dazzling impressionist tales was the suite Mother Goose (Ma mère l’Oye). Between 1908 and 1910, he wrote a simple suite of piano pieces for four hands for the children of some friends, inspired by a few fairy tales that he took in part from the Tales of Mother Goose by Charles Perrault. Albeit the music was not technically difficult, the subtlety of the sound and melodies imbued the work with extreme refinement. This became clearly evident when he subsequently arranged to work for orchestra, refining the music even further with the larger orchestral sound palette. Ravel used this orchestral version in 1912 for a ballet.

Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble AGOSTINO STEFFANI Duets of Love and Passion

The outstanding features of Steffani’s enchanting chamber duets are their contrapuntal sophistication, and the need for extremely accomplished solo singers with the sensitivity necessary for performing complex chamber music. Johann Mattheson recognized both facets in 1739, confirming that Handel had chosen his models for this genre wisely, and also that, in his estimation, Steffani’s works remained unsurpassed. Colin Timms’ 1987 essay, Steffani’s Influence on Handel’s Chamber Duets, explored the various ways in which Handel appropriated Steffani’s thematic material, contrapuntal style, and overall duet structure for his own works. An Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Birmingham (UK), Dr. Timms provided the inspiration for this extraordinary Boston Early Music Festival (BEMF) recording project and concert, and has been very generous in helping to shape it. Under the direction of BEMF Musical Directors Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, four stunning vocalists—sopranos Amanda Forsythe and Emoke Baráth, tenor Colin Balzer, and baritone Christian Immler—and a continuo team of six brilliant instrumentalists present a selection of Steffani’s gorgeous chamber duets, as well as instrumental gems from the Baroque.

Javier Perianes BLASCO DE NEBRA Piano Sonatas

Manuel Blasco de Nebra (1750-1784) was a keyboard player as well as a composer, and an assistant to his father José, who was organist at Seville Cathedral. Manuel is reckoned to have composed around 170 works in his short career, but of those only 30 pieces, all for either harpsichord or fortepiano, survive. Javier Peranes plays eight of them on this beautiful disc, six sonatas and two of the rustic, three-movement pastorelas. Perianes uses a modern concert grand, and shows that while Blasco de Nebra was influenced by the keyboard sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti, most of all – his sonatas all adopt the same two-movement, slow- fast scheme – he was well aware of what was happening musically elsewhere in Europe in the 1770s. Blasco de Nebra's expressive world is far more searching than anything in Scarlatti's 500-odd sonatas: the opening Adagio of his Sonata No 1 in C minor, for instance, sounds almost like a Chopin nocturne, and elsewhere his harmonic world can be a richly mysterious one. Perianes sometimes lards the music with a bit too much of that expressiveness, but otherwise his performances are excellent, communicating a real sense of revelation, of bringing a distinctive composer's voice to a 21st-century audience for the first time. (Andrew Clements / The Guardian)

Sueye Park PAGANINI 24 Caprices

Niccolò Paganini is possibly the only figure in the field of classical music whose name has become a household word, equivalent with an almost supernatural excellence in any kind of human endeavour: from soccer to stock market analysis or haute cuisine. In a similar way, the last of his 24 Caprices has entered popular culture in a way that few other classical pieces have, its theme reused by musicians as diverse as Benny Goodman, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Yngwie Malmsteen. 

But there is more to Paganini and his set of Caprices than the one theme, however catchy it may be. Above all, there is of course the virtuosity: throughout the collection, Paganini employs the full palette of violin technique and whereas most volumes of violin studies focus on one aspect of technique at a time, he combines them in ingenious ways. Many of the techniques he uses were of unprecedented difficulty in his own time – ricochet bowing over four strings, octave trills, endless chains of double-stops, left-hand pizzicato and artificial harmonics. But the caprices also display an unusual musical imagination and sensibility – a combination of Rossinian lightness and the sudden mood swings of the early Romantics. 

Born in 2000, the young Korean violinist Sueye Park has studied in Berlin since 2009. Her first encounter with Paganini was at the age of 11, when she performed the composer’s First Violin Concerto at the Komische Oper in Berlin, and she now makes her début on disc with this challenging programme.

Ars Nova Copenhagen / Paul Hillier FIRST DROP

Conducted by Paul Hillier since 2003, Denmark’s Ars Nova Copenhagen has built an immovable reputation as one of the world’s most versatile and inventive vocal ensembles. First Drop is testament to that spirit; it’s a wide-ranging and ambitious project that interprets the choral work of some of the giants of contemporary classical music, including Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Louis Andriessen, Michael Gordon, David Lang and more. 

 “Almost all the works on this CD are first recordings,” Hillier explains, referring to one source of inspiration behind the title. “Ideally we wanted the idea of First Drop to remain ambiguous, but the diligent listener will sooner or later notice that it originates with Ralph Waldo Emerson.” 

Recorded over a stretch of nearly ten years, in different locations and with different configurations of singers, the performances documented here still come across as parts of a seamless whole. From the haunting strains of Michael Gordon’s “He Saw A Skull” (composed specifically for the 12 voices of Ars Nova) to Hillier’s vocal arrangement of Steve Reich’s classic “Clapping Music,” First Drop channels a vernal energy that’s unparalleled in new vocal music.

Emmanuelle Swiercz-Lamoure CHOPIN Valses

“Waltz” comes from the German verb “walzen” meaning to revolve, and by extension to dance in a circle. And a circle is de ned by three points, just as a waltz is de ned by its three beats. So is Chopin inviting us to a round dance? Yes, in some cases, like the Grande valse brillante (op. 18); but no, most of his waltzes, unlike those of the Strauss family, are not meant to be danced to; or rather yes, they are, but in the kind of romantic party we might conjure up in our imagination, like that curious night in Le Grand Meaulnes, perhaps.

It was that aura of mysterious contrast that persuaded me to carry out this project to record the complete waltzes, albeit at the risk of adding yet another to the countless versions of the most often-played works of the most famous composer for the piano. On the other hand, the fact that Chopin published only eight waltzes in his lifetime (out of 15 known in the 19th century and at least 20 today) continues to raise questions about his intentions. For example, is the A minor waltz on track 19 of this album really his last, composed around 1848 but not published until 1955? As poignant as a rainbow seen through tears... (Emmanuelle Swiercz-Lamoure)

Pallade Musica SCHIEFERLEIN Sonates en trio

Mélisande McNabney performs keyboard music of all periods, on harpsichord, piano and fortepiano. In August 2015, she received the third prize at the International Competition Musica Antiqua in Bruges, Belgium.

Mélisande has performed hundreds of concerts, whether as a soloist or chamber musician, in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia in prestigious concert series. Currently based in Montreal, she is regularly invited to play with ensembles such as Les Violons du Roy, Arion Orchestre Baroque, Les Idées heureuses, the Theater of Early Music, and Ensemble Caprice. She is also a member of Pallade Musica and Ensemble Les Songes.

Baroque ensemble Pallade Musica offers a glimpse into the world of Otto Ernst Gregorius Schieferlein, a German Baroque composer.   Among the few works that have been attributed to Schieferlein are a wedding cantata, and the three trio sonatas that are recorded here for the first time. They have survived in an 18th-century manuscript copy from the library of the Royal Conservatory of Brussels. Pallade Musica’s second ATMA recording also includes works by G. P. Telemann and C. P. E. Bach.

Martin Fröst / Lucas Debargue / Janine Jansen / Torleif Thedéen MESSIAEN Quatuor pour la Fin du Temps

The Quartet for the End of Time is intensely personal music and it deserves an equally personal response from anyone playing it now. When Martin Fröst overheard a rehearsal through an open window as a teenager at a music camp, he was transfixed: ‘I was bewitched … and I ended up walking away from the house that day with a different view on the world.’

It was the first work he played with Janine Jansen when they met 16 years ago and the cellist on that occasion was Thorleif Thedéen. This was a transforming experience for all three musicians. Martin Fröst remembers it as ‘one of life’s rare and profound musical moments, when everything comes together and you are left with a deep sense of connection not only to the piece, but to each other – we have been trying to find the right circumstances to record the piece together ever since.’

Finally, these musicians have brought this cherished project to fruition, joined by the brilliant pianist Lucas Debargue. The deep expressive power of the Quartet was brought home to them once again – and the time was right too: ‘As the world has been marking and reflecting upon the several anniversaries of the World Wars in recent years, it felt that now was the perfect time to get this project off the ground, especially too as I feel the music, is still as relevant in today’s political climate as it was in 1941.’
 

Lucas Debargue SCHUBERT - SZYMANOWSKI

For his eagerly anticipated third Sony Classical album, Lucas Debargue continues his passionate exploration of unfamiliar and unexpected repertoire. On his new recital he recorded a monumental but rarely-performed work: Karol Szymanowski’s Sonata No. 2 (1911) and two so-called ‘little’ sonatas by Schubert: D664 in A major and D784 in A minor. “I am feeling like a very deep duty is to go as deep as possible in some pieces that are very well known by the musicians and the audience, like the Schubert sonatas – mostly the A major one – but also to give the opportunity to some audiences to get to know some pieces that they don’t have the opportunity to hear very often”, says Debargue.

Yuuko Shiokawa / András Schiff BACH - BUSONI - BEETHOVEN

Yuuko Shiokawa and András Schiff are heard here in an insightful programme of sonatas for violin and piano which begins with Bach’s Sonata No.3 in E major, ends with Beethoven’s Sonata No.10 in G major, and has at its centre Busoni’s Sonata No. 2 in E minor. As on their earlier and widely-admired recording for ECM (featuring Schubert Fantasies), Shiokawa and Schiff play the music with absolute authority and deep understanding.

Most of Johann Sebastian Bach’s chamber music was written in the period 1717-1723, when he was employed as Kappellmeister at the court of Cöthen. Bach wrote six violin sonatas, with the E major sonata standing apart from its companions, as Misha Donat notes in the CD booklet. “Of the two Adagios, the first, with its elaborate violin cantilena, is like the slow movement of a concerto…In the hauntingly beautiful c-sharp minor second slow movement, the melody is shared equally between the two players, at first alternating and then proceeding in contrapuntal dialogue.” The second allegro, meanwhile, is a “dazzling display piece unfolding in a vertiginous stream of semiquavers.”

No other 20th century composer was as deeply steeped in the music of Bach as Ferruccio Busoni, and his second sonata, composed in 1898 and published in 1901, is indebted to both Bach and Beethoven. Its form makes a number of references to Beethoven’s late sonatas, and the final movement incorporates as its variation theme Bach’s chorale “Wie wohl ist mir”. The success of the work marked a turning point for Busoni, who had hitherto invested most of his energies into his life as performer. “Repeated performances of my violin sonata have greatly encouraged me,” he wrote in 1902. “From next autumn I seriously intend to work just as hard as a composer as I have up to now as a pianist.”

Ludwig van Beethoven’s G-major Sonata, written in 1812 for French violinist Pierre Rode, was the last of his violin sonatas, and perhaps the most beautiful and original of them. Misha Donat; “The sonata begins with one of Beethoven’s most magical inspirations: the quiet sound of a violin trill. The trill, and the theme it engenders, is followed by a series of arching arpeggios whose expansiveness seems to open up infinite vistas.” (ECM Records)

Mayke Rademakers / Matthijs Verschoor LA FURIA: PASSION, FURY AND MELANCHOLIA

Mayke Rademakers: All my life, I’ve played a lot of Spanish music, and so has my partner and duo-pianist Matthijs Verschoor. Both of us have worked and studied in Spain. And I spent some time immersing myself in Buenos Aires, because I wanted to see the tango with my own eyes: how people perceived it, how they danced it in the streets and on public squares. At a certain point we got this sense of wanting to do something with it. We had a number of works on our repertoire and so we investigated how we could combine them with new pieces, music we still needed to discover, to produce a great CD. We found the music we were looking for. We put together an exciting combination of Spanish and South American music. In a nutshell: flamenco and tango. 

Spanish music takes folk music as its starting point. La Furia is based on that idea. This music is about the heat, the poverty, about lifestyle and passion. La furia literally means anger or aggression. But in Latin, the word has very positive connotations. It means doing what your instincts tell you, acting with passion, giving it your all. The tango flamenco spread from Spain to South America. The tango is truly South American. Although it does show some flamenco influences, the tango definitely found its own form. Perhaps the biggest difference is that the tango is ‘urban’, because it arose in Buenos Aires. The flamenco is ‘rustic’, because it arose in the countryside.

Sharon Bezaly / Vladimir Ashkenazy FRANCK - FAURÉ - PROKOFIEV

The flautist Sharon Bezaly has, over the past 20 years, released some 40 discs on BIS, recordings which have contributed to the international recognition that she enjoys. Both on disc and in concert she has done much to champion new repertoire – she has had no less than 20 concertos dedicated to her. On her new disc, however, she turns to core repertoire, although not necessarily that of her own instrument. 

The two sonatas by César Franck and Gabriel Fauré were composed with the violin in mind, and even though Prokofiev's sonata was originally intended for the flute it is often heard in the composer's own version for violin and piano. But joined by the legendary pianist and conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sharon Bezaly now claims (and reclaims) the three works for her own instrument, in eloquent performances that make the best possible case for the flute.

Nino Gvetadze GHOSTS

Nino Gvetadze: “Chopin looked back and evoked for us the story of his life in his 24 Preludes. Through the medium of these works he revealed his deepest fears and sorrows, but also the beauty and integrity of his heart. The story of these ghosts culminates in tolling bells which are, in Cortot’s words, “of blood, of earthly pleasure, of death...” But what follows? A pause: silence, timeless solitude, in the Etude Op.10, No.6. Then, suddenly, the soul wakes up and waltzes into space. The album ends with the Scherzo No.2, “like a charnel house”, or house of the dead, as Chopin apparently described the opening – yet the finale sounds like a celebration of life. And so our ghostly journey ends with fireworks, with smiling and shining, looking far into the future...”

"..There's always a sense of a musing, meditative intelligence exploring their layers of meaning in the very act of playing, as if she is spontaneously creating the Music under her fingers." ​  (BBC Music Magazine)

Catherine Hewgill / Vladimir Ashkenazy FROM DARKNESS TO LIGHT

On two days in October 2016, Russian pianist and conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy and Australian cellist Catherine Hewgill went into the studio to make their first recording together. An all-Russian program, it features the Cello Sonatas of Shostakovich and Prokofiev with the added pendant of the Rachmaninov Vocalise in an arrangement by American cellist Leonard Rose. This is their first recording for Decca (Australia).

The recording, entitled From Darkness to Light, 'reflects the many very dark passages in each of the two sonatas, which ultimately seem to resolve themselves into the possibility of universal light and hope,' says Ms. Hewgill, Principal Cellist of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. 'I very much enjoyed working on this recording with Katie Hewgill. She is a very artistic and highly professional musician. Also, as I am Russian, it certainly feels very natural to me to identify with this great music,' says Vladimir Ashkenazy.

Prokofiev's Cello Sonata sees the composer on his very best behaviour. The astringent harmonies, the motoric rhythms, and thesardonic, sarcastic and pessimistic temperaments that characterized so much of his earlier music have been replaced with a more palatable lyricism, and an apparent willingness to please, instead of provoking.

Shostakovich's Cello Sonata was written in the wake of a spell of notoriety. It was written in 1934, the same year as the premiere of his 'shocking' opera Lady Macbeth of the MtsenskDistrictand was completed on 19 September that year, a week before he turned 28 and was his first important chamber work.

'Having the privilege of working with Maestro Ashkenazy in performing these complex twentieth-century Russian works, has been like no other experience,' says Ms. Hewgill. 'There is so much history embedded in this music, and his direct links to Russia and its music of this time have given him insights that make every note so much more meaningful. For me this journey with him has been one of pure joy and the making of this recording has been a highlight of my career. He has extraordinary pianistic dexterity, unstoppable energy and a crystal-clear view of what he wants musically. He will continue past the point of exhaustion in the pursuit of excellence. He is inspirational in every sense of the word and has become a great musical friend.'

Anna Kasyan HÄNDEL Shades of Love

Anna Kasyan is one of the most promising French sopranos of her generation. She has established herself in a wide repertoire of opera and sacred music to chamber music, from baroque to contemporary. 

Recent highlights include Neda/Pagliacci and Lola/Cavaleria Rusticana in Toulon in October 2016, Despina/Cosi fan Tutte in Toulon in November 2015, Susanna/Le nozze di Figaro in Rome in May/June 2015, I Vespri Siciliani in Copenhagen, also Anna Kasyan's debut as Musetta/La Bohème at the Opéra de Toulon where she also sang Rosina/ Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Hélène/Vêpres Siciliennes by Verdi in Nice and also Rusalka/Rusalka in Rome. She also did a series of concerts in France with the Orchestre de l'Opéra de Toulon conducted by Giuliano Carella. In June 2012, she sung the role of Clorinda/La Cenerentola and this opera film produced by Andrea Andermann was broadcasted live in more than 150 countries worldwide and will be released on DVD this year. 

Future highlights include Rosina/Il Barbiere di Siviglia at Copenhagen Royal Opera in season 17/18.

Gaëlle Arquez / Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine / Paul Daniel ARDENTE FLAMME

French mezzo-soprano Gaëlle Arquez is one of the rising stars of the opera world. Nominated “Révélation Lyrique” at the “Victoires de la Musique 2011”, she made a noted debut in the title role of the new production La Belle Helene at the the Théâtre du Châtelet and is scheduled to sing the title roles of Carmen, Xerses, Pelleas et Mélisande and Armide.

For her first album with Deutsche Grammophon, Ardente Flamme, rising star Gaëlle Arquez shows the extent of her talent through a program that pays homage to the French repertoire from Baroque to Romantic music. 

Accompanied by the National Orchestra Bordeaux Aquitaine under the direction of Paul Daniel, the mezzo-soprano embodies the female characters in opera who are the most torn between Duty and Love. From Gluck to Massenet, via Berlioz, "Ardente flamme" travels thourgh the history of French opera in a selection of both famous and lesser known tunes, including excerpts from Bizet's Carmen, which Ms. Arquez is currently performing  in the most beautiful European venues, including the Royal Opera House, Frankfurt Opera and Teatro Real de Madrid.

Anne-Sophie Mutter / Daniil Trifonov FRANZ SCHUBERT Trout Quintet

Mutter and Trifonov were drawn together by a strong artistic attraction. “It was a spontaneous idea to work together,” the violinist recalls. “But I was stalking Daniil for several years,” she adds with a laugh. Mutter found time earlier this year to follow the Russian pianist’s Rachmaninov concerto cycle with the Munich Philharmonic and Valery Gergiev. “I was also in Moscow when he won the Tchaikovsky Competition in 2011 and heard him play in the prize winners’ concert there.”

Anne-Sophie Mutter’s long-established recital partnership with Lambert Orkis is set to continue, yet she notes how she has often performed chamber music with other pianists, Alexis Weissenberg, André Previn and Yefim Bronfman among them. The opportunity to make her first recording of the “Trout” Quintet with Daniil Trifonov, she says, was too good to miss; the pianist, likewise, embraced the project with wholehearted enthusiasm. He sees Schubert, one of the great Classical composers, as an inventor of the purest melodies and a master of formal structure.

“The sincerity of his musical expression captivates audiences and performers alike,” notes Trifonov. “When I first learned that Anne-Sophie wanted to record this music, I was incredibly happy. I’ve only recorded Schubert in Liszt’s transcriptions of his songs before, so it was a great joy to work on one of the composer’s greatest works with four fantastic colleagues. The more we played together, the more possibilities opened up. Something different happened every time and that always expands your awareness of what is possible. And then you become more comfortable with an interpretation which reveals itself in the moment.”

Roberta Mameli / Luca Pianca ANIME AMANTI

A voice, a lute, a sigh. Nothing could be simpler and more immemorial. This expression of sentiments and emotions, of the intermittencies of the heart and the shadows of the soul, is of course as old as the world. Yet it was truly a reconquest of the Renaissance. With Caccini, the ‘new music’ at once found a miraculous melodist. He composed a Euridice, performed in 1602, two years after Jacopo Peri’s setting and five years before Monteverdi’s Orfeo. The Renaissance did not know opera, but long secreted that genre soon to be born. And it is brand-new opera that opens and closes this recording, through the voice of its first visionary, Claudio Monteverdi. His Lamento d’Arianna, the centrepiece of a lost work, expresses sorrow, regrets, revolt through the very music of the Italian language, here brought to white heat. The ‘new music’ spread throughout Italy: Merula in Cremona, Falconieri in Naples, and Barbara Strozzi, the most famous woman composer of the age, in Venice.

The Italian soprano Roberta Mameli is a great lover of this music, which she performs with an outstanding feeling for words and drama. Luca Pianca offers her his artistry and his great experience. Roberta Mameli is joining Alpha for several recordings, which will guide us towards other rarities and other periods. (LQM)

Javier Perianes / BBC Symphony Orchestra / Sakari Oramo EDVARD GRIEG Piano Concerto - Lyric Pieces

Javier Perianes’s account of Grieg’s Piano Concerto was recorded live at London’s Barbican last October, at the end of a BBCSO tour. And it is an interpretation into which soloist and orchestra seem, gratifyingly, to have grown together. In the first movement, Sakari Oramo leads the orchestra off at a tempo that seems rather steady, but which leaves space for some careful phrasing: once the main theme gets to Perianes, it sounds almost like a statement and then a comment, rather than a single entity. Somehow, Oramo and Perianes make this sound interesting rather than fussy, and the romantic expansiveness that marks their interpretation overall is tempered by playing from both pianist and orchestra that is as crisp and highly charged as one could want. Paired with this is a selection of 12 of the solo Lyric Pieces, recorded in the studio, all individually characterised but reaffirming Perianes’s warm, spacious approach to Grieg’s music. (Erica Jeal / The Guardian)

Sunhae Im / Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin ORFEO[S] ITALIAN & FRENCH CANTATAS

This might seem a specialist release with its unknown Baroque repertory, its rather specific concept, and a soprano who has done good work mostly in Germany, but is not widely known outside of that country and perhaps her native South Korea. But it's something of a sleeper that combines a program offering insights into the Baroque mind with a fine, graceful voice that makes a nice break from the hyper-athletic sopranos and countertenors who dominate the scene. The program draws several contrasts, and one of them is that between the melodic Italian and more ornate French secular cantata styles. Im is pleasant in both, but perhaps most effective in the cantatas by Rameau and Louis-Nicolas Clérambault, where her agility in the ornamentation is worth the price of admission by itself. The cantatas are also interesting in their approaches to the Orpheus story, which continued to exert a fascination all the way down to 20th century Brazil. Each librettist and composer takes up a different part of the story as representative of the whole, and the treatments range from lyrical with a hint of tragedy (Pergolesi, whose version should now receive more frequent performances) to intricately philosophical (Rameau). The questions raised here were the ones composers of the early 18th century wrestled with, and this release puts them across in a vivid way. Not a generalist release, certainly, but not a specialist one, either. The historical-instrument Akademie für alte Musik, Berlin stays largely out of Im's way, which is all to the good here. (James Manheim)