New On Naxos

The World’s Leading Classical Music Label
March 2015

Dear UK Subscriber,

Click here to view our monthly New on Naxos brochure, featuring details of every new release of the month.

THIS MONTH’S UK HIGHLIGHTS:
8.573250
8.573344

8.572978

8.660363-66



THIS MONTH’S UK HIGHLIGHTS:
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8.573250
And the Bridge is Love
English Chamber Orchestra
Julian Lloyd Webber, Cello* and Conductor

Listen to Track 4: Goodall: And the Bridge is Love

This wide-ranging programme of English music for strings includes the world première recording of Howard Goodall’s moving And the Bridge is Love, in which Julian Lloyd Webber plays cello, and of William Lloyd Webber’s The Moon, only performed for the first time in 2014. There are also established classics such as Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro, Op. 47, as well as novelties in the case of the never-before-recorded arrangements by Elgar’s friend and biographer W.H. Reed of the two Chansons.

From the late nineteenth-century British music experienced a flourishing of compositions for strings, spearheaded by the genius of Elgar. His Introduction and Allegro, Op.4 is one of the masterpieces of the genre, but smaller pieces such as the two Chansons – heard in never-before-recorded arrangements by his friend and biography W.H. Reed - distil his lyric essence and are performed by one of the world’s leading musicians, Julian Lloyd Webber. He also plays cello in the world première recording of Howard Goodall’s moving And the Bridge is Love. He has also included the poetic Moon written by his father, William, and unperformed until 2014.

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THIS MONTH’S UK HIGHLIGHTS:
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8.573344
Georges BIZET (1838–1875)
Roma
Marche funèbre • Overture in A • Patrie • Petite suite
RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra
Jean-Luc Tingaud

Listen to Track 5: Petite Suite - No. 1.
Marche: Trompette et tambour

The success of Bizet’s opera Carmen has overshadowed the rest of his output, but this fascinating orchestral programme, which includes a number of seldom performed works, reveals more of his talent for writing colourful, atmospheric and melodic music. The Overture in A was Bizet’s first orchestral work and unperformed in his lifetime, while the Marche funèbre was originally the prelude to an opera about love and vengeance, now lost. The dramatic overture Patrie captures the mood following the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71, while the Petite suite is a set of orchestrations of movements from Jeux d’enfants (Children’s Games). Conceived in Italy as a symphony, after Bizet had won the Prix de Rome, Roma occupied the composer for 11 years before the final version heard here.

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THIS MONTH’S UK HIGHLIGHTS:
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8.572978
Francis POULENC (1899-1963)
Mass in G major
Sept Chansons • Motets
Elora Festival Singers • Noel Edison

Listen to Track 8: Mass in G Major - Kyrie

Brought up in the Roman Catholic faith, which he abandoned in 1917 following the death of his father, Poulenc returned to the Church in 1936 after the death of his close friend and fellow composer Pierre-Octave Ferroud. Together these events caused a spiritual crisis in Poulenc’s life which led to a series of important compositions for chorus. The powerful Mass in G major, dedicated to the memory of his father, is notable for its daring use of tonality, though the playfulness of Poulenc’s ‘Les Six’ period is not absent. In the Sept Chansons, set to surrealist texts, and in the two sets of Motets – both very personal and penitential – Poulenc generates a huge range of emotion.

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THIS MONTH’S UK HIGHLIGHTS:
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8.660363-66 • 4 CDs
Gioachino ROSSINI (1792–1868)
Guillaume Tell
Andrew Foster-Williams, Baritone
Alessandra Volpe, Mezzo-soprano
Tara Stafford • Judith Howarth, Sopranos
Michael Spyres • Giulio Pelligra • Artavazd Sargsyan, Tenors
Nahuel Di Pierro • Raffaele Facciolà • Marco Filippo Romano, Basses
Camerata Bach Choir, Poznań • Ania Michalak, Chorus-master
Virtuosi Brunensis • Antonino Fogliani


Listen to CD 2 - Track 3: Act II: Romance: Sombre foret (Mathilde)

Performed for the first time in its original uncut version, this production of Guillaume Tell was the jewel in the crown of the 25-year history of the ‘Rossini in Wildbad’ opera festival. Rossini’s final, great, operatic masterpiece is a story of liberation, the oppressed Swiss attaining their ideal of emancipation by hounding the tyrannical Habsburgs out of their country. Although it was composed for the complex demands of the Paris Opéra, numerous dances, choruses and arias were dropped for reasons of practicality. These are restored in the present recording which also includes the stunning finale of the shorter 1831 version of the opera (CD 4 / Track 13).

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