Naxos’s recordings of the charismatic Vasily Petrenko’s interpretations with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra of Shostakovich’s symphonies have gained critical acclaim both for their subtlety and revelatory power as well as for their brilliant audio quality.  Shostakovich’s  First Symphony propelled the teenage composer to international prominence, its emotional range and evocative orchestration marking him as a brave new voice on the scene. His festive, single-movement Third Symphony, ‘The First of May’, celebrates the Soviet victory over the Tsarist regime. Perhaps recalling the examples of Beethoven, Berlioz or Mahler, Shostakovich marshals his forces to reach a triumphant choral fnale. ‘Petrenko’s Shostakovich cycle goes from strength to strength’ –Gramophone

Encouraged by Brahms and Dvořák while embracing  the  innovative  infuences of Debussy, Mahler and Richard Strauss, Josef Suk ranked among the most important composers of the Romantic Czech school.  Suk’s Fantasy carries the listener to the realms of reverie and fantasy with its virtuosic solo violin and rich orchestration.  The magical story of a dashing young prince lies behind his luxuriant orchestral suite Fairy Tale, while the splendid Fantastic Scherzo is among his most blithely fanciful works. Acclaimed for their other Naxos recordings, the artists on this disc bring Suk’s colourful, characterful music vividly to life.

Drawing upon Alan Walker’s monumental three-volume biography of the composer, the outcome of many years of research into French, German, Hungarian and Italian sources, which has set a new standard of accuracy in Liszt scholarship, Malcolm Hayes presents a vivid new perspective on the life and music of Franz Liszt. ‘This was needed, given the amount of biographical misinformation, wilful or otherwise, that had bedevilled so much earlier writing on Liszt – the aberrations of which reach back to the composer’s own lifetime (sometimes, it must be said, with his misguided consent), ‘ notes Malcolm Hayes. ‘Given this background, it would have been irresponsible not to have relied on Professor Walker’s study as a central source of material on Liszt’s life. However, it has been far from my only one, and its author’s views on the music diverge quite widely from mine in certain areas, such as the consistent success-rate or otherwise of Liszt as an orchestral composer. I hope that readers will take their cue from these differences, and will feel encouraged to form their own conclusions about the composer’s life and work.’

Performing on early 19th-century pianos from the Frederick Historic Piano Collection, competition prizewinners Dmitry Rachmanov, a Juilliard graduate, and Cullan Bryant, a graduate of Manhattan School of Music, explore the interrelationships between the keyboard music of Beethoven and his principal teachers in this fascinating double-album of rarities for piano four-hands, culminating in a revelatory account of the Great Fugue in Beethoven’s own keyboard arrangement. The distinctive sonorities of these highly esteemed period instruments transport the listener back to the time when Beethoven, his teachers or his own pupils, may have performed this music themselves for the first time.

First performed at the Teatro Regio, Turin, on 5 March 1876, Lauro Rossi’s penultimate opera Cleopatra caught the public’s attention in the wake of Verdi’s Aïda (1871). Like that better-known work, it contains some wonderful arias and set pieces, including a marvellous Act 1 banquet scene, Cleopatra’s Act 2 aria, the thrilling ensemble that closes Act 3, and the confrontation between Cleopatra and Octavian in Act 4, all making for compelling viewing and listening. From the brooding opening scene in which Diomedes foretells the fall of Egypt to Cleopatra’s death scene, this gripping grand opera by one of Italy’s forgotten masters springs vividly to life in this revival flmed at the 2008 Macerata Sferisterio Festival. ‘If you like Verdi, you will almost certainly enjoy this performance of Rossi’s Cleopatra…my Discovery of the Month.’ – MusicWeb International

Musical life in late eighteenth-century America was every bit as vibrant as that in Europe, increasingly so as local composers fourished in the wake of the War of Independence. English-born Benjamin Carr and James Hewitt and Scottish-born Alexander Reinagle contributed entertaining orchestral works to a growing ‘New World’ repertoire, their overtures often comprising medleys of famous classical and popular music. The internationally renowned Sinfonia Finlandia here presents sparkling performances of these spirited pieces in accomplished reconstructions by American composer and musicologist Bertil van Boer, restoring this forgotten symphonic legacy to its rightful place in our musical heritage.

‘The frst book of The Enchanted Garden was composed in 1992; the five preludes in that cycle were musical responses to dreams that I had and had eventually written about. This second book, written nearly seventeen years later in 2009, includes seven preludes that are based on true-to-life experiences and memories. The fine line between dreams and memories, between reality and fantasy has always intrigued me. The ancient Greeks believed that the “real” world was the unseen world. Each title in Book 2 refers to memories and personal experiences in my life. Some are from long ago, others refer to recent experiences.’ – Richard Danielpour

Scherzo, Viola Variations, String Quartet No 1

Charles Wuorinen’s staggeringly prolifc output has been remarkably consistent yet tremendously varied. This disc presents three recent works in their frst commercial recordings with a new recording of his String Quartet No. 1, a watershed work in the composer’s career. Wuorinen’s personal musical language is unabashedly modernist yet imbued with a love of early polyphony, and makes virtuosic demands on the performers. This spritely, sometimes elusive, often ‘maximalist’ music invites multiple interpretations and hearings to reveal the riches deep beneath its coruscating, ever-shifting surface.

Johann Christian Bach’s galant Sonatas Op. 5 of 1766 were composed for the newly-developed fortepiano but are equally suited to the more intimate yet equally expressive clavichord, on which Juilliard School graduate and internationally-renowned keyboardist Susan Alexander-Max performs them here. The young Mozart so admired ‘the London Bach’ that he adapted Sonatas Nos. 2, 3 and 4 as keyboard concertos. Yet the other three sonatas contain wonderful music where reminiscences of past musical styles co-exist with presages of future developments.

Nikolay Andreyevich Roslavets was viewed by his Russian colleagues as one of the most original, innovative and progressive composers of the 1920s, a period of extraordinary artistic experimentation between the Russian Revolution and the Soviet regime’s subsequent repression of the avant-garde. The chamber music heard here brims with optimism and vitality, underpinned by that lingering melancholy said to inhabit ‘the Russian soul’. Passion, drama, introspection, mystery, soulful lyricism and sheer beauty characterise these early works. Bulgarian cellist Lachezar Kostov and pianist Viktor Valkov, his long-time friend and chamber music collaborator, are ideal interpreters of this brilliantly-crafted music.

Alessandro Rolla enjoyed a considerable reputation as a violinist, violist, conductor and composer during his lifetime, and is now best remembered as a teacher of Paganini (with whom he performed in concert). Rolla’s contributions to the viola repertoire recommend him to our attention for their melodiousness, Italianate brio and charm. The winner of three major international competitions, and hailed by The Washington Post for the ‘opal-like beauty’ and ‘phosphorescent energy’ of her playing, young American violist Jennifer Stumm is internationally recognised as a musical innovator and dynamic advocate for her instrument.

Rimsky-Korsakov, Balakirev, Borodin, Cui, Mussorgsky

When the Russian art historian and critic Vladimir Stasov declared in 1867 ‘how much poetry, feeling, talent, and intelligence are possessed by  the small but already mighty handful of Russian musicians’, the fve nationalist composers  to whom he referred adopted the nickname with pride. Though each developed his own personal style, they remained committed to forging a truly Russian musical tradition, not least through pieces such as these songs. Russian bass Mikhail Svetlov is a winner of the Viotti International Competition and has been principal soloist of the legendary Bolshoy Theatre of Moscow for more than a decade.

After his death in 1927, Robert Fuchs all but vanished from public consciousness. Yet here is a composer whom Brahms held in the highest esteem, and who could count Mahler, Wolf and Sibelius among his many talented pupils. This selection of music for string orchestra, written between Fuchs’s late twenties and early ffties, gives us an opportunity to reassess a neglected and infuential fgure of Austrian Romanticism.  Under  young German-born conductor Christian Ludwig, the internationally renowned Cologne Chamber Orchestra revives these delightful works with characteristically polished ease.

Manuel de Falla’s favourite disciple Ernesto Halffter drew on Andalusian themes for his score to Jacques Feyder’s 1926 film Carmen, which  this  recording presents for the frst time in its  full, richly orchestrated form. Worlds away from Bizet’s beloved opera (Naxos 8.660005-07) and forgotten for almost a century, it now stands as a purely musical and highly dramatic treatment of  the story of Don José, Lucas  the  toreador and  the gypsy Carmen who fatally bewitches  them. Halffter’s flm music is an epic achievement, presenting Spanish scenes in impressionistic colours of great originality and intensity.

The eloquent, expressive music of Lithuanian neo-romantic composer Onutė Narbutaitė is noted for its aristocratic measure and strong compositional discipline; her abstract musical narrative is often reminiscent of ‘something deeply familiar’. Her Tres Dei Matris Symphoniae is not a conventional oratorio but a symphony, or three symphonies, with choir setting the Ave Maria, Gloria, Stabat Mater and Hildegard von Bingen’s O clarissima Mater like ancient gemstones within a fabric of orchestral colours and textures. The effect is of hearing something both deeply familiar and eternally new, rich material for personal contemplation.

Despite his love of the cello’s rich sonority and immense lyrical expressivity, Robert Schumann composed few works for the instrument, a situation frequently rectifed, as here, by effective arrangements. Unfailingly eloquent, characterful and Romantic, these works are admired by musicians and music lovers alike. Less well known, yet among her most successful compositions, are Clara Schumann’s exquisite Romances.

The Carpe Diem String Quartet’s frst volume of Sergey Ivanovich Taneyev’s string quartets (Nos. 1 & 3 - 8.570437) gained critical accolades both for the revival of this important repertoire and for the ensemble’s sensitive and assured interpretations. A gift to musicians and listeners in search of rewarding new repertoire, Taneyev’s Second and Fourth String Quartets are masterfully crafted, the former piece possessing the inner energy of Beethoven, the latter being his most dramatic quartet. Both quartets impress with their grandiosity, profundity and individual personalities.

The ultimate violin virtuoso, Niccolò Paganini also wrote more than 100 pieces for guitar, including these Ghiribizzi (‘whims’). Composed for ‘a little girl in Naples’ who must have been both talented and eager to develop her technique, these whimsical works explore a wide range of musical styles idiomatic to the guitar. Many of these 43 short movements draw on themes by Rossini, Paisiello, Süssmeyer, Mozart, Giuliani and, of course, Paganini himself.

Praised for his previous choral music albums, British composer and conductor Ronald Corp now makes his Naxos chamber music début with this disc. His First String Quartet takes its name from the world’s largest, most stately and regal bird, the bustard, whose soaring fight and dance-like gait are evoked in this fascinating piece. His Second String Quartet celebrates a baby boy’s birth with joyful and exuberant music. The composer describes his song-cycle Country Matters as ‘poignant and riotously outrageous’. The Maggini Quartet are renowned for their authoritative interpretations of English chamber music. Tenor Mark Wilde also sings on several other Naxos recordings.

‘The Virgin Queen’ Elizabeth I was the cynosure of all England; the subject, dedicatee and audience for much of the music composed and performed throughout her long and now legendary reign. The music on this album, from Deborah Mackay’s entertainment All the Queen’s Men, includes sacred and secular music by composers from Byrd to Weelkes which contributed to the Elizabethan cult and remain a much-loved legacy from the golden age of the English Renaissance. The Sarum Consort, whose performances have been hailed as ‘exhilarating’(Gramophone) and ‘magical’ (BBC Radio 3’s Record Review), here makes its Naxos début under founding musical director Andrew Mackay.

The important Ukrainian composer Alexander Shchetynsky writes music of haunting luminosity, exploring musical metaphors in each of his sublimely spiritual works. Redolent of ancient chant, the choral music of Rachmaninov, Arvo Pärt, John Tavener or Eric Whitacre, this disc will surely touch your soul. In Shchetynsky’s music the secular and the sacred mingle, voices and instruments reach towards the skies like glowing candle flames, the air becomes perfumed with the incense of sound, and an ineffable sense of unity pervades the multitude of musical resources on which the composer draws.

Explicit descriptions of sex and ‘unprintable’ words meant that D.H. Lawrence’s notorious novel could only be printed in Florence when it was published in 1928.  Lady Chatterley’s Lover was finally published openly in the United Kingdom in 1960.  Almost entitled Tenderness by the author, it tells the story of the physical relationship between the aristocratic protagonist Constance Chatterley and gamekeeper Oliver Mellors — which occurs right under the nose of her wheelchair-bound husband, Clifford. In exploring the class system of the early 20th century, the novel also touches upon the declining coal mining industry: its effect on the workers; and the politics which surrounded it. Yet possibly the most important theme in this intimate and moving novel is the individual’s need for physical as well as intellectual satisfaction in order to feel a sense of completeness.

Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon, first serialised in a magazine in 1930, is best known through the iconic Humphrey Bogart film of 1941. But it was the book that created the classic ‘noir’ genre with its tough private detective threading his cool way between the criminals and the law. Sam Spade, the private eye solving the mystery of the Maltese statuette, was the template for Philip Marlowe and a host of others… but they come no more shrewd and cunning with Hammett peppering the text with one-liners. Not even Bogart bettered the original. An idiomatic new recording from Eric Meyers.

2011 celebrates the bicentenary of Franz Liszt’s birth. His life was as daring and spectacular as his music. Famed throughout Europe as the greatest pianist of the 19th century, Liszt was one of the most original and prophetic composers who ever lived. Beautiful in youth, glowering in age, his high-profile love affairs were the talk of the town wherever he went and his generosity to young musicians was legendary. In this account of his epic life, actors’ readings combine with plentiful musical excerpts to paint a living portrait of a highly complex man.

Lhasa, the capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, continues to exercise a strange fascination over visitors, traditionally through its very remoteness. The Naxos China Travelogue starts with views of the Potala, the White Palace and the Red Palace, built in the 17th century on the site of a palace built a thousand years before. The Jokhang, dating  from  the 7th century, houses a  revered  image of  the Buddha. Some fve kilometres north of central Lhasa is the Sera Monastery, founded in the 15th century, with its colleges, statues and relics of former lamas. Fifty kilometres to the north-east is the Ganden Monastery, founded in the same period and holding important religious relics. The tour ends with a visit to Yumbulagang, said to be the oldest building in Tibet, consecrated to its ancient kings. The tour is accompanied by Tibetan music, the chanting of monks and other vocal and instrumental pieces matched with remarkable views of the country, its buildings and mountain scenery.

The Naxos China Travelogue tour of Shanxi starts with the ancient walled city of Pingyao, once a thriving commercial centre. The former wealth of the province is witnessed by the Courtyard Houses of the Qu and Wang families, extensive compounds dating principally from the 18th century. Shuanglin Temple, part of the Pingyao world heritage site, is seen, with its collection of 2000 painted statues  from  the Song and Yuan dynasties. There are views of Mount Wutai,  the frst of  the Four Sacred Mountains of Chinese Buddhism, with some of its many monasteries and temples, and other Buddhist monuments at the Chongsan Monastery and Jinci Temple. The most remarkable of all is the Hanging Monastery at the foot of Mount Heng, one of the Five Sacred Mountains of Taoism, apparently hanging on a sheer cliff-face. The wooden Pagoda of Fogong Temple, dating from the 11th century, is the oldest and highest in China. Still earlier are the carvings of the Yungang Grottoes, some 51,000 statues of the Buddha in 252 caverns, dating originally from the 5th and 6th centuries. The tour ends with the sight of the remarkable Hukou Waterfall, with its 50-metre descent in a gorge on the Yellow River. The journey is accompanied by traditional Chinese instruments and music.

The Naxos China Travelogue tour of Xinjiang (Sinkiang) starts in the old town of Kashgar, with its Uighur shops and alleys. Travelling to Tian Chi (Heavenly Lake) in the Tian Shan mountain range, we see Kazakh yurts and focks of sheep, and something of the varied fora and fauna of the area. In Kashgar again, the tomb of Abakh Khoja, a famous local ruler in the early Qing dynasty, makes a contrast with the busy city life of the capital, Urumqi. Some 30 kilometres take us to the geographic centre of the continent of Asia, while back at the heart of Kashgar itself is the 15th century yellow-tiled Id Kah Mosque. There are views of strange rock formations in the countryside and the colourful mountain Sayram Lake, with the alpine scenery of Kanas Lake and the fertile vineyards of Grape Valley. The tour of this varied region, with its Uighur, Mongolian, Kazakh, Tatar, Uzbek, Han and other ethnic groups, ends with the snow-capped Tian Mountain (Heaven Mountain), with its great glaciers. The tour is accompanied by traditional music and instruments.

The Naxos China Travelogue tour of Sichuan (Szechwan) takes us to a land of lakes and snow-capped mountains, with a fertile central plain. The tour starts in Chengdu in a park, where there is a replica of the thatched cottage in which the Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu (Tu Fu) took refuge for four years. Temples in the province include the elaborate Wuhou Memorial Temple, the temples on Qingcheng Mountain and the legendary Fulong Temple. Most impressive of all, however, must be the natural scenery the rivers, lakes and waterfalls, and the mountains that protected the Province from invasion for so many centuries. The tour is accompanied by music played on traditional instruments.

A region of mountains and lakes, the province of Yunnan lies to the south of Sichuan. The Naxos China Travelogue tour starts with  the old  town of Lijiang, with  its narrow cobbled streets and closely packed  traditional buildings. Later  the  tour moves to Shuhe, otherwise known as Longquan Village, which is a few kilometres north of Lijiang but boasts comparable traditional buildings as a place where the minority Naxi People have long lived. Mountains in Yunnan include Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, its name that of a legendary defender of the region, transformed with his brother into thirteen peaks. The tour visits the historic capital of Yunnan, Kunming, now home to some fve million inhabitants. Scenes of Yunnan are matched with traditional music.