Tchaikovsky called his Suite No. 3 the most successful of all his works performed abroad and successfully conducted many performances of it on tours. For Dmitry Liss, the chief conductor of the Ural Philharmonic Orchestra, “this is one of the most unexpected works by Tchaikovsky and my near-favorite.

If you look at the final movement from a modern perspective, its hectic stylistic diversity looks almost postmodernist and has been created with subtle and stylish use of irony. The theme of the Suite’s finale is consonant with that of the Rococo Variations, hence our decision to include both works on this album.” The world-renowned cellist Boris Andrianov performs the Variations on this recording. He considered it “a sacred duty for a Russian cellist who is also a winner of the Tchaikovsky competition not only to record this work, but also to look at it anew.”

Ural Philharmonic Orchestra
Dmitry Liss- conductor
Boris Andrianov- cello

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Opening with Don’t Look Down (2020), a work born during the pandemic, the album blends traditional percussion with found objects and prepared piano. A Natural History of Vacant Lots (2017) explores space and sound, positioning ambient and beautiful colors against a haunting electronic backdrop. The centerpiece, Goldbeater’s Skin (2016), pairs percussion with the human voice in a stunning setting of GC Waldrep’s poetry.

The album closes with Ode to Joy (2023), a bittersweet celebration of New York City, filled with whistles, harmonicas, and stomping rhythms. Every unique sound on this album was meticulously crafted, shaped by Cerrone’s longtime collaborator and producer Mike Tierney.

A bold exploration of the endless possibilities of percussion, this album is a testament to the evolving power of music and collaboration.

All music by Christopher Cerrone

Performed by Sandbox Percussion (Jonathan Allen, Victor Caccese, Ian Rosenbaum, Terry Sweeney) with Conor Hanick, piano (“Don’t Look Down”) Elspeth Davis, mezzo-soprano (“Goldbeater’s Skin”)

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Kurtág himself is at the piano for two of the songs by Schubert and Brahms. While the German baritone’s old and trusted friends Pierre-Laurent Aimard and James Baillieu join him for the other works in this program.

All under the artistic direction of Kurtág, ending with a fascinating recorded interview with Gyuri bácsi (‘Uncle George’) by Benjamin Appl, who tells us: ‘My aim in this album is to give listeners a glimpse into the infinite universe of György Kurtág, a shy procrastinator, stern self-critic, hesitant researcher, introverted questioner, unpretentious intellectual, brilliant composer and an extraordinary human being.’

Benjamin Appl, Baritone
György Kurtág, Piano (Tracks 20, 21)
Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Piano (Tracks 16, 17, 18, 19)
James Baillieu, Piano (Tracks 2, 4, 6, 7, 14, 15)
Csaba Bencze, Trombone ( Track 10)
Gergely Lukács, Tuba (Track 10)

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Questioning the subtle difference between interpretation and creation, Tsoy weaves together this complex tapestry of versions, variants and variations. Forming the core of this gripping recital, Variations and Fugue on a theme by Handel, Op. 24, is a series of carefully crafted miniatures.

Bach’s Chaconne, brilliantly arranged for the left hand by Brahms, is another instance of a genius humbly sourcing inspiration while interpreting the masterwork of his predecessor. The rest of the recital points to Brahms’s successors Busoni and Reger, who arranged six of Brahms’s Chorale Preludes, Op. 122, and Vier Ernste Gesänge, Op. 121, respectively.

Samson Tsoy, Piano

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With the help of the Orchestre National de Lille and Quebecois conductor Jean-Marie Zeitouni, she places her sensual voice at the service of famous operatic arias featuring the amorous heroines of Gounod, Massenet, Puccini (‘O mio babbino caro’), Catalini (‘Ne andrò’ from La Wally) and Verdi (Desdemona’s poignant ‘Ave Maria’ from Otello).

The program also includes a rare but sublime aria from Franco Alfano’s Tolstoy-inspired opera Risurrezione (1904), as well as the magnificent ‘Saint-Sulpice’ duet from Massenet’s Manon, with tenor Julien Dran. Finally, Vannina Santoni pays homage to her Corsican roots with a new orchestration of the lullaby ‘O Ciucciarella’ that Corsican mothers have sung to their children for generations.

Vannina Santoni, Soprano
Albane Carrère, Mezzo-Soprano [Track 8]
Julien Dran, Tenor [Track 5]
Orchestre National de Lille
Jean-Marie Zeitouni, Conductor

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Celebrating its 25th anniversary with Grand Laps, Kartet continued to expand on its unique sound and approach, winning a coveted Choc 2014 from Jazz Magazine. French critic Stéphane Ollivier described their music as “in continuous metamorphosis as it pivots around the four players, and results in many simultaneous and complementary points of view on the same reality…a music which reconciles intellect and intuition as it combines a quasi-mathematical rigor with a sensitivity, an instrumental originality, and an attention to detail forged by the supreme exercise of total improvisation.” Popmatters’ Will Layman praised their previous release The Bay Window thus: “Kartet makes a deliberate and beautiful brand of inside-out jazz…decidedly unconventional yet not harsh or taxing on the ear…Kartet flows seamlessly in and out of improvisations, and its arranged material shows harmonic daring and imagination.”

Bassist Hubert Dupont explains how the group develops new pieces: “The improvisations are very connected to the written material, which is quite dense most of the time, with rhythmic games, melodic rules, colors, etc….We enjoy playgrounds, frames, in order to spontaneously organize together tension/resolution movements, suspended colours, illusions….” Saxophonist Guillaume Orti adds: “[Our compositions] work with strict and limited harmonic-melodic material, strongly connected with the rhythmic material. But the shapes we can give to our melodic and rhythmic wanderings are unlimited.” Benoît Delbecq expands on his own process: “For myself, any new rhythmic material is worth sitting down at the piano with, or tapping or juggling with, to enter into a specific knowledge of it. Imagination is like a muscle, and if you give it new ideas it can lead you to unexpected territories, which is what I’m looking for, because that’s when the body ends up speaking first, the flow being given by the trained mind, ready to react like a spring.”

And the effect on younger musicians, and on the audience? “Usually, the people who are passionate about Kartet also dig musicians like Steve Coleman, Steve Lehman, Andy Milne, Ralph Alessi, Tyshawn Sorey, Craig Taborn, Tim Berne…to name a few greats who are constantly searching for newer shapes, a mixture of control and freedom….Our music is not docile, it doesn’t answer a market demand or anything, it is music that’s sincere in its primary direction: find a collective sound, develop our own way to play and build music in a collective way, bring the listener into a state of dream, of trance…there is some magic going on.”

Guillaume Orti- alto, C-melody and F mezzo-soprano saxophones
Benoît Delbecq- piano
Hubert Dupont- bass
Stéphane Galland- drums

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This live recording of the 2024 New Year’s concert Gershwin, Montsalvatge, Bernstein & Jenny Peña Campo is Philzuid‘s seventh album — and it’s a very different New Year’s concert with Latin rhythms and American dance in the foreground.

Chief conductor Duncan Ward takes us from Gershwin’s lively Overture from Strike Up the Band to a radiant Adriana Bignagni Lesca in Montsalvatge’s Cinco canciones negras.

The dancing continues with Bernstein’s On the Town: Three Dance Episodes and ends with a World Premiere Recording – the first recording of the swinging Cuban Suite by young composer Jenny Peña Campo.

Philzuid
Duncan Ward, Conductor
Adriana Bignagni Lesca, Mezzo-Soprano (Tracks 2-6, 10-13)

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For her OUR Recordings debut, maestra Martina Batič has chosen the works of two composers, both of whom may well come as revelations to music lovers. Opening the album is a selection of works from one of the musical heroes of her homeland, the Slovenian composer Uroš Krek. Highly regarded in his homeland, Krek’s stylistically accessible, well-crafted music is seldom heard internationally, making this musical encounter particularly valuable. A fluid pan-tonality informed the Three Autumn Songs while the other selections freely draw upon folk-influences and orthodox polyphony.

As a calling card to her new Danish friends, Maestra Batič makes an extraordinary artistic statement presenting the choral music of Else Marie Pade! Rightly celebrated as one of the pioneers of electronic music, Pade also composed an extraordinary catalogue of works for acoustic instruments and voice.

As beautifully score the pair of stunning works from the 1950s are, nothing could prepare us for the World Premiere Recording of Pade’s extraordinary Maria (1980) scored for coloratura soprano, bass baritone, speaking choir and 7 trombones, and electronic sounds. Written as spiritual self-solace to comfort her from her trauma during the war, Maria is a modernist musical Rosary, and a masterwork of contemporary religious music.

Truly, Martina Batič and the Danish National Vocal Ensemble has taken us on an amazing journey you will not want to miss!

Danish National Vocal Ensemble
Martina Batič, Conductor

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Born in 1870, the brilliant virtuoso pianist Leopold Godowsky composed twenty-four ‘free arrangements’ of music by masters of the Baroque. Among these, Roman Borisov has selected pieces based on works by Rameau, Corelli, Scarlatti and John Loeillet (whose pieces were originally mis-attributed to Lully)… In 1931, Rachmaninov composed his last original work for solo piano: a set of variations on ‘La Folia’, a 15th-century dance theme that Corelli famously used in one of his violin sonatas. The encounter between the Baroque style and the harmonic richness of the Russian composer is fascinating. The superb Prelude, Chorale and Fugue composed by César Franck in 1884, an obvious tribute to J.S. Bach, concludes Roman’s pianistic journey through time.

Roman Borisov, Piano 

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Under Daniel Reuss’ artistic direction of over thirty years, the choir has garnered numerous accolades, including an Edison Klassiek Award for In Umbra Mortis (2021). This album was followed by David Lang: the writings (2022), Schnittke: Psalms of Repentance (2023) and Tales of song and sadness (2024), a tribute to those two giants of Dutch music culture, conductor Frans Brüggen and composer Louis Andriessen.

Professional chamber choir Cappella Amsterdam brings classical choral music, independently and in collaboration with others, under the artistic direction of Daniel Reuss for over thirty years. They are very much aware that what they do touches the core of humanity, that singing is a universal language. Cappella Amsterdam keeps this language and the rich choral canon alive at the highest level and gives choral music its place in the 21st century.

Cappella Amsterdam
Daniel Reuss, Conductor

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