This exquisite 2-CD set presents some of the best known and best loved Finnish orchestral classics by 15 composers who are renowned both in their home country and around the world. With over 2 hours playing time this delightful selection, splendidly performed, will brighten your day –wherever you live.

‘The symphony must be like the world. It must embrace everything.’ This oft-quoted statement by Mahler serves to illustrate his extraordinary artistic ambition and focus. The journey through his symphonies is rich and emotionally charged, imbued as they are with the influences of his surroundings, his suffering as well as his joy, and his unique sense of satire.

Although Vaughan Williams described himself as ‘a cheerful agnostic’, he was not only steeped in the traditions of the Anglican Church, but sensitive to the mystical significance ‘of what lies beyond sense and knowledge’. Written in 1936, his cantata Dona nobis pacem sets powerful Biblical texts alongside those by Walt Whitman and John Bright and is both a warning that mankind was sliding disastrously towards another war and a plea for a world without strife. The oratorio Sancta Civitas, one of his most original choral works, strikingly deploys vocal and orchestral forces to depict the battle between good and evil from the Book of Revelation.

The distinguished Russian composer, pianist and teacher Rodion Shchedrin writes: 'I spent my childhood in the small Russian town of Aleksin, situated on the river Oka, 300 kilometres south of Moscow. My grandfather was an Orthodox priest there. When I was growing up, purely entertaining, commercial music was not yet as ubiquitous as it is now on television, radio, in stations, sea-ports and shops… It was still possible to hear choral songs, the sound of the accordion, the strumming of the balalaika, funeral laments, the cries of shepherds at dawn, coming from beyond a river, enveloped in fog. All that distant and now extinct musical atmosphere of a Russian province is strongly etched in my childhood memories. I think, in all three compositions on this CD, it has found it own nostalgic echo.' All three works are world première recordings.

The difficulties that beset Rossini as he embarked on his second opera seria, Otello, did not prevent its successful première in 1816, the work eventually reaching its 200th performance in the 1867/68 Naples season, being staged around the world during the 19th Century, and regaining a place in the modernrepertoire. Completely different in conception and musical treatment to Verdi’s more famous opera, Rossini’s is based on Berio di Salsa’s play rather than that of Shakespeare, features no fewer than three tenors, and focuses on the character of Desdemona. With performances by Michael Spyres and Jessica Pratt, this wonderful disk is sure to delight opera fans.

Haydn composed a number of sacred works between 1766 and 1772 that showcase his facility with the various styles and traditions associated with Austrian church music, including the first Missa Cellensis (or Cäcilienmesse), the Stabat Mater (available on 8.572121). Scored for strings, oboes, bassoon, trumpets, timpani and organ in addition to soloists and choir, the Missa Cellensis may originally have consisted of the Kyrie and Gloria alone, with the other sections added in the mid-1770s. The final version, heard here, triumphantly concludes at ‘Dona nobis pacem’ with a grand fugue.

Ever the perfectionist, it was not until 1879 that Brahms completed his first violin sonata, which was aptly transcribed for viola by the Hungarian violist Csaba Erdelyi. Fifteen years later, the outstanding clarinetist Richard Mühlfeld inspired Brahms to compose several works, including two sonatas, published with an eye to marketability for either clarinet or viola, whose autumnal nuances admirably suit the dark-toned stringed instrument. In each, viola and piano enjoy the status of equal partners, reveling in Brahms’s subtle interplay of melody, rhythm and harmony in which passion becomes subsumed into serenity.

The wide-ranging output of Czech composer Erwin Schulhoff has attracted renewed interest in recent decades. The music for string quartet heard here dates from the 1920s, a productive period during which he forged a strikingly personal style that drew on the examples of Schoenberg, Bartók, Stravinsky and Hindemith, as well as jazz and even Dadaism. By turns sultry, rhythmically driven, folk-like, eloquent and headstrong, Schulhoff’s music, while often bracing and forceful, provides today’s listeners with the satisfying sense of having encountered a fascinating musical personality, whose premature death robbed the world of a major talent.

Famed in his lifetime for his large-scale choral works, but perhaps best known today for his Violin Concerto No. 1, Max Bruch also composed three symphonies. The First, dedicated to Brahms and indebted to Mendelssohn and Schumann, was well received. The weighty Second, dedicated to the violinist/composer Joseph Joachim and echoing the music of Beethoven and Brahms, features a lovely Adagio movement with lyrical solos for several instruments.

Clementi’s early piano sonatas rank among his greatest compositional achievements, greatly impressing the young Beethoven with their impulsive rhythms, dynamic extremes and octave melodies. These pioneering pieces brought Clementi recognition while laying the groundwork within the refined Classical style for the expressive possibilities of the newly developed piano which would become characteristic of the later Romantic generation. Susan Alexander-Max has been praised as ‘an excellent fortepianist with a vigorous technique…showing a lightness of touch.’ (Limelight). Volumes 1 (8555808) and 2 (8557695) are also available.

Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa, a rich, powerful man and nephew of Cardinal Alfonso Gesualdo, was also highly cultivated and ardently devoted to music. His First Book of Madrigals brims with skillful use of melodic and tonal contrasts to express the agonies and ecstasies of love. Published in 1594, a brief period of tranquility in an otherwise impetuous and turbulent life, it is the work of mature composer whom Monteverdi ranked highly. Gesualdo’s Second Book of Madrigals will also be released on Naxos: 8570549).

American composer Judith Lang Zaimont’s music is dynamic and palpably emotional. These four orchestral works employ nuanced palettes of instrumental colors and center on her lifelong engagement with memory, her artistic and personal heritage. Chroma – Northern Lights vividly displays in sound the glowing polar auroras. Ghosts evokes the congenial spirits of Scriabin, Britten, Ravel, Berg, Christopher Rouse and Laurie Anderson, while the intensely-felt Elegy, dedicated to her aunt, unfolds in a continuous arc of song for massed strings. The symphonic STILLNESS melds the mysterious stasis of Morten Feldman’s music with Delius’s ever-shifting textures into a fascinating equilibrium.

Throughout George Rochberg’s long career, piano compositions have held a prominent position. They figure among his earliest published works (Variations on an Original Theme for piano solo, 1941) and his latest (Circles of Fire for two pianos, 1996-97). With this release, we visit both extremes: the Sonata Seria and the first two Elegiac Pieces were begun in the 1940s and revised in 1998. The last of the elegies was composed in 1998, making it the last piano work which George Rochberg wrote. As with his music in general, these works run the gamut of vocabulary and expression. The Bagatelles are purely twelve-tone pieces, and the Sonata Seria is, as the composer described, ‘on the very fringe of tonality’.

The Three Elegiac Pieces progress from mid-Romantic harmony in the first, through colorful, jazz-like progressions in the second, to a near-abandonment of organized tonality in the third. This release is an overpoweringly intense tour de force.

Sergey Ivanovich Taneyev would become known as the ‘Russian Brahms’, a well-found comparison he nonetheless rejected. His Symphony No. 2, recognised by his teacher and life-long friend Tchaikovsky as exceptional, remained unfinished and is heard here in Vladimir Blok’s edition. With his Symphony No. 4, composed twenty years later, Taneyev left behind the earlier influences of Handel, Borodin and Mussorgsky to craft a monumental masterpiece much admired for its noble, heroic style and formal excellence as his finest orchestral work. Taneyev’s Symphonies Nos. 1 and 3 are also available on 8570336.

Dubbed ‘The Mexican Falla’, Silvestre Revueltas lived hard and died young in poverty. His music was revolutionary, embracing the ‘vulgarity’ of the people and rejecting colonialist cultural models. His ballet La Coronela (The Lady Colonel) follows a scenario of skeleton figures involving the overthrow of the ‘decadent bourgeois’ by the working class. This is the first recording of the only surviving version of the work, reconstructed by Eduardo Hernández Moncada and José Limantour. Itinerarios (Travel Diary), a solemn, intensely lyrical work, and the symphonic poem Colorines mark the beginning and end of his most fertile creative period.

Performer, composer and teacher, Enrique Granados stood with de Falla and Albéniz as the most outstanding Spanish musician of his time. Among his dozen or so chamber works the Piano Trio and Piano Quintet, both from 1894, exemplify Grandos’s highly expressive, Neo-romantic style, his piano writing revealing the hand of a virtuoso. Amiable touches of dance and salon music, hints of Moorish, gypsy and folkloric elements, co-exist in these beautiful, refi ned pieces. The famous Intermezzo from his opera Goyescas, an Aragonese jota, is heard here in Gaspar Cassadó’s popular arrangement.

Lennox Berkeley amassed over 100 works and contributed to almost every genre. Since he had the opportunity to write for some of the leading performers of the time – the Horn Trio was written for Dennis Brain – chamber music featuring wind and strings held a particular attraction. The Sonatina can also be performed on recorder and piano; in which guise its artless amalgam of Baroque and neo-Classical traits has ensured its popularity. The Viola Sonata is among the more sombre of Berkeley’s works and perhaps reflects something of the times – the aftermath of the Second World War – in which it was written. The Quintet for wind and piano is among the more extended chamber works from Berkeley’s later years.

This album from Naxos’s acclaimed Wind Band Series present three highly contrasting new works. David Maslanka’s Concerto for Trombone and Wind Ensemble is a heartfelt memorial to the late Christine Nield Capote, flautist, teacher and friend of the composer and the trombonist Tim Conner. Michael Daugherty’s Ladder to the Moon, inspired by the urban landscapes of Georgia O’Keeffe, suggests the rising spirit of the American skyscraper, an inspiring flight heavenward. In Christopher Rouse’s Wolf Rounds ‘circular’ musical ideas constantly metamorphose, suggesting to the composer the wolf’s predatory rounds.

Howard Blake is a popular and prolific composer whose output includes film scores (not least the extraordinarily successful The Snowman), choral, orchestral and instrumental works, ballets and opera. This disc presents the world première recordings of Four Songs of the Nativity, commissioned by The Book Club for The Bach Choir and London Brass, and Blake’s second dramatic oratorio, The Passion of Mary, commissioned by The Summer Music Society of Dorset in association with South West Arts. ‘The Passion of Mary draws together the Stabat Mater, the Magnificat, the Salve Regina and other Marian and Nativity texts with the wisdom of Berlioz. The outcome is a splendid, highly accessible choral work.’ Roderick Dunnett (reviewing the London première for Church Times)

Pepusch’s ballad opera Polly, composed in 1729 to John Gay’s libretto as a sequel to their highly successful The Beggar’s Opera (1728), never reached the stage owing to government censorship. Some fifty years later, in 1777, with a revised libretto and renovated score, Polly helped establish Samuel Arnold’s reputation as London’s preeminent theatre composer. With its melodramatic tale reuniting Polly Peachum and Macheath in the West Indies and ending in Polly’s marriage to the ‘Indian prince’ Cawwawkee, this ‘island paradise’ opera was a huge hit and remains enormously entertaining today.

This marvellous 4-CD Set brings together Jose Serebrier’s acclaimed interpretations of Leopold Stokowski’s famous orchestral transcriptions, including works by Wagner and Mussorgsky, Bach, Purcell and Handel.

These are ‘thrilling performances, passionate and treated to orchestral sound of demonstration quality.’ - Gramophone

‘José Serebrier brings to his recordings of Stokowski transcriptions the same voluptuous orchestral sheen that the old wizard himself managed on his own numerous recordings of this repertoire. However, Serebrier also has the advantage of superb modern sonics to back him up, making these productions eloquent tributes to a beloved friend and mentor, as well as perfectly valid and compelling interpretations in their own right.’ - Classics Online

'Turkish pianist Idil Biret was giving a rare performance of Pierre Boulez’s Second Piano Sonata…This was a gripping, impressive account of a commanding score.' - The New Yorker

'Boulez’s major contribution to the sonata literature is the 2nd…Biret’s performance, reminds us of the music’s fantastic side: she’s more effective [than Pollini] in the impressionistic haze of the 2nd movement, and she manages to give the 3rd movement an almost jazzy flavor' - Fanfare

This release gives listeners a wonderful view of the great Marilyn Monroe's career and the impact that she had on Hollywood showtunes. Never more sultry, seductive and cheeky was Marilyn than when she was singing tunes full of innuendo and sass. Come hear the hits that made her a sex symbol and cultural tour de force, her brassy assurance shines through on 'Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend', or be titillated by the libidinous way she wraps her tongue around a phrase like 'post-meridian' in 'Bye, Bye Baby'. On 'Runnin Wild' is the goodtime party girl with the manic energy, the one enticing you to follow her anywhere and do anything. 'I Wanna Be Loved By You' is Monroe in little girl mode, playing the seductive Lolita card for all it’s worth. And finally, 'I’m Thru With Love' is Marilyn, the Queen of the Broken Heart, letting us all know how good it is to feel really bad. In these songs she lives on in our hearts, our minds, our fantasies. Especially when we can hear her sing in her uniquely persuasive style.

Not only is the musical On the Town the perfect reflection of just what America was like in the closing days of 1944 when, although the tide had turned in World War II, an Allied victory was still thousands of lives away, but it’s also a magic instance of a wildly disparate group of people coming together at the precisely right moment to create something unique. The present disc gives a real feel for the work as a whole, containing Bernstein conducting the show’s considerable ballet music, cabaret favourites Eadie and Rack offering a stylish period rendition of two tunes, a few selections from The Revuers original material and, to finish things off, Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra with a 1946 recording of three selections from Fancy Free, the revolutionary ballet that gave birth to an equally trend-setting musical comedy.

The fantastical novels of Haruki Murakami have earned him a dedicated international fan-base and recurring success in the bestseller charts. In Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, Murakami’s brilliant imagination seizes on the world’s most ingenious and complex invention: the human mind. Two contrasting worlds are envisaged. In ‘Hard-Boiled Wonderland’ a ‘shuffler’ is at work in Tokyo, where the minds of the people have become servant to the requirements of the governmental ‘system’. In the surreal realm of the ‘End of the World’ a ‘dreamreader’ sifts through memories, scattering them to oblivion. Gradually the alternate universes of the ‘shuffler’ and the ‘dreamreader’ are interwoven and Murakami’s ingenious conception of the mind becomes clear. A feast for the imagination - Murakami’s novel amazes, amuses and delights.

The 2009 Naxos AudioBooks recording of Sylvester met with resounding approval and clamours for more Georgette Heyer audiobooks. Here is Venetia, a clear favourite from among Heyer’s novels. In her trademark buoyant and exuberant style, Heyer tells the story of an unconventional romance, which is full of riveting dialogue and loveable, very human characters. Quick-witted, self-assured, funny and beautiful, Venetia is one of Georgette Heyer’s most popular heroines. When the dashing Lord Demerel intrudes upon a quiet provincial community in the North of England, news of his scandalous past soon sets tongues wagging. In spite her of sheltered upbringing, though, Venetia is singularly unfazed by the rakish Demerel, and proves to be more than a match for him.

Here is some of Oscar Wilde’s finest short fiction: Lord Arthur Savile’s Crime, The Canterville Ghost, The Model Millionaire, The Sphinx Without a Secret, The Birthday of the Infanta and The Portrait of Mr W. H. The range of Wilde’s talent and wit is fully evident in this diverse mix of stories. Within the collection there is an unconventional ghost story about a bungling and inept ghost, a twist on the conventional murder mystery formula and a whimsical fantasy on the provenance of Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

This lively history of the world's greatest sporting event outside the Olympics is told by veteran football journalist and historian Brian Glanville and read by the former Arsenal goalkeeper Bob Wilson. There is a full account of each of the Finals since the first event in 1922 - the goals, the controversies, the rivalries - with the national anthems of each host country setting the scene all the way to the 2006 event in Germany. A spectacular addition is the personal view of one of the great heroes of the game, Sir Bobby Charlton, who speaks eloquently of his passion for the event and the game itself.

The History of Science offers a fascinating overview of the major leaps forward in science across the ages. From the mathematical and medical advances of the ancient world, to the Scientific Revolution in the Renaissance, to the groundbreaking developments of the 20th century, a precise chronological account of progress is given. In charting the course of the endeavours to understand, explain and harness the mysterious forces at work in our universe, Whitfield creates an accessible and lucid narrative which brings the novice up-to-speed. The writer’s excitement about the vast potential of science is infectious, making this enjoyable, as well as informative, listening.

Virginia Woolf’s masterwork Mrs Dalloway was at the vanguard of experimental, modernist novel-writing, and remains one of the supreme examples today.  As Clarissa Dalloway prepares for a party in the evening, seemingly trivial incidents prompt her to undertake a searching reconnaissance into her memory, where she dwells on missed opportunities and aborted relationships. Set during the course of 24 hours, the novel draws subtle parallels between Clarissa, a polished high-society lady, and the shell-shocked war veteran, Septimus Smith; both are similarly transfixed by their pasts. Woolf’s trademark, stream of consciousness prose masterfully captures the complex architecture of the inner life and the mind-set of inter-war society. This beautifully articulated novel is read by Juliet Stevenson whose reading of To the Lighthouse has become a Naxos AudioBooks bestseller.

Naxos AudioBooks adds Martin Chuzzlewit to its acclaimed Dickens collection. This novel was Dickens’s personal favourite. Greed, suspicion and hypocrisy flourish as family and other hangers-on compete to be shown preference in the inheritance of the ageing Martin Chuzzlewit. Dickens explores the theme of selfishness, but also its converse – generosity, friendship and loyalty – in this funny and richly-plotted novel. It features some of the most notorious Dickens villains, Seth Pecksniff and Jonas Chuzzlewit, as well as one of his most endearing characters, Tom Pinch. This captivating reading is by Sean Barrett, who was last heard in Barnaby Rudge. Also available unabridged on 26 CDs (ISBN-13: 9789626349830)

Wives and Daughters is a sensitive coming-of-age tale set within a provincial town in Victorian England. Having lost her mother at a young age, Molly Gibson’s entrée into womanhood and navigation of the adult world of attraction and relationships is stilted. By contrast, her stepsister Cynthia emanates self-confidence and is bolstered by her conniving, opportunistic mother. By unhappy mischance, Molly falls for the very man that the vivacious Cynthia has set her sights on. However, as events unfold, the deceptive nature of appearances becomes apparent, and a dramatic reversal of fortunes occurs. In the tradition of Jane Austen, Wives and Daughters is a captivating novel of social observation, humour and touching romance. Patience Tomlinson is an experienced audiobook reader and presents this novel with a steady, comfortable assurance.