New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 23rd August 2024
This all-American programme includes Charles Ives's Violin Sonata No. 4 'Children's Day at the Camp Meeting', Stephen Hartke's Netsuke, John Adams's Road Movies, Amy Beach's Romance, Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson's Louisiana Blues Strut, Hadelich's own arrangement of Howdy Forrester's Wild Fiddler's Rag, and Heifetz's transcription of Manuel Ponce's Estrellita.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Downes's new album also explores America in all its diversity, taking its cue from Gershwin's description of the United States as a 'musical kaleidoscope'. Edmar Colón's new version of Rhapsody in Blue for piano, orchestra and percussion ensemble sits at the heart of a programme which also includes Jeremy Siskind's arrangements of 900 Miles and William Benton Overstreet's There'll Be Some Changes Made, Jake Heggie's Facing Forward, Arturo O'Fariill's Kaleidoscope, Kian Ravaei's Variations on 'This Land is Your Land', and Michael Begay's Adéihozhdílzi - Know Who You Are.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
This quartet of works by the Kennedy Center's Composer-in-Residence comprises The Block (which draws inspiration from the visual art of Romare Bearden), Tales - A Folklore Symphony, the Songs of Separation (written during the lockdowns and setting poetry by Rūmī), and the concerto for orchestra Wake Up! - the latter work was inspired by a poem by Rajendra Bhandari, which Simon describes as a warning of 'the danger of being obliviously asleep in a social world'.
(Simon's Hellfighters’ Blues will receive its world premiere at the Last Night of the Proms on 14th September).
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res+ FLAC/ALAC/WAV
This recording project grew out of a semi-staged performance which these artists gave in 2020, incorporating spoken excerpts from Wilhelm Müller's diary. Bezuidenhout plays a modern copy of a Conrad Graf fortepiano from 1825, noting that 'what the Graf lacks in sonic density, carrying power and real sustain, it more than makes up for in delicacy, litheness, sweetness and subtlety, coaxing one into a decidedly more declamatory style of playing.'
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Described in The Guardian last week as 'pure delight from first note to last', this recital from long-standing friends Daniel and Drake includes just one work which was originally written for oboe and piano: Robert's Three Romances Op. 94. The programme also includes arrangements of his Fantasiestücke Op. 73, three of the Stücke im Volkston Op. 102, 'Mondnacht' from Liederkreis Op. 39, the Adagio and Allegro Op. 70, and Clara's Three Romances Op. 22.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
George Walker: Complete Piano Works, Vol. 2
Alexandre Dossin (piano), University of Oregon Philharmonia, David M. Jacobs
This second volume of the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer's piano music features the Piano Concerto from 1975 (the slow movement of which is inspired by Duke Ellington's In My Solitude) alongside the Piano Sonatas No. 4 & 5 from 1984 & 2003, and Guido's Hand: Five Pieces for Piano. (The title of the latter work refers to the eleventh-century monk and music theorist Guido d’Arezzo, who developed an early solfège method). It was the Piano Sonata No. 5 which prompted Dossin to fall in love with Walker's music: the Brazilian-born pianist recounts that 'something strong called to me and demanded more'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
The Belgian orchestra and its Chief Conductor present the Faust Symphony in its original, purely instrumental version from 1854; Liszt would go on to revise the work three years later, augmenting the brass writing and adding a tenor soloist and male chorus in the final movement. It's coupled with the first of the Mephisto Waltzes, inspired by Nikolaus Lenau’s vision of the Faust myth rather than Goethe's interpretation.
Available Formats: SACD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Anna Clyne: SHORTHAND
The Knights, Yo-Yo Ma (cello), Eric Jacobsen, Avi Avital (mandolin), Colin Jacobsen, Pekka Kuusisto (violin)
Written for Karen Ouzounian and The Knights in 2020, the title-work was inspired by Tolstoy's description of music as 'the shorthand of emotion'; this is the world premiere of the version for solo cello and string orchestra, which Clyne describes as 'essentially the same piece, just with a richer, rounder sound-world.' The album also includes Within Her Arms (an elegy for Clyne's mother), the double violin concerto Prince of Clouds, and the Hindemith Prize-winning mandolin concerto Three Sisters.
Read our interview with Anna Clyne about SHORTHAND here.
Available Formats: MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Three years on from his debut recording on Alpha with Brahms's Piano Sonata No. 3 (made shortly after his victory at the Queen Elisabeth Competition), the French pianist's second solo project for the label couples Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 3 with Szymanowski's Variations on a Polish Folk Theme. Reviewing his Brahms recording in 2021, Gramophone's Jed Distler remarked that 'it is clear that Fournel’s striking mind works in tandem with his fingers. I look forward to hearing this pianist again.'
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
The American composer and guitarist makes his debut on Sony with a collection of solo instrumental works written for friends and regular collaborators over the past few years, including Ornament and Crime (for violinist Pekka Kuusisto), Tuusula and Song for Ainola (for cellist Anastasia Kobekina), Tromp Miniature (for percussionist Colin Currie), On a Wire (for harpist Lavinia Meijer), and Song for Octave (for pianist Katia Labèque).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Fauré: Requiem - Gounod: Messe de Clovis
Emőke Baráth (soprano), Philippe Estèphe, Le Concert Spirituel, Hervé Niquet
Niquet and Le Concert Spirituel present Fauré's Requiem in the 1893 version which uses neither violins nor woodwind, coupled with a far less well-known sacred work from the early 1890s: Gounod's Messe de Clovis, dedicated to the sixth-century King of the Franks who had become an iconic figure after the defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. The album also includes Louis Aubert's O salutaris and an Adagio for violin and organ by André Caplet.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
