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In many countries, Mother’s Day is fast approaching. What music would your mum love? Naxos has a wide range of CD, DVD and digital download titles that are bound to delight mothers of all ages and musical tastes, including classical, jazz and music for relaxation. Read more
Easter Music classics and rarities are also available on Naxos, Capriccio and Dacapo. Easter Sunday fell on 12 April (Western – Catholic and Protestant Churches) and 19 April (Eastern – Orthodox Churches) this year. Naxos has several wonderful recordings of Bach’s St John & St Matthew Passions, Handel’s Messiah and other inspirational sacred works, including James MacMillan’s stunning choral masterpiece Seven Last Words from the Cross.
Read more
Or try one of the beautiful titles from Naxos’s Early Music Collection:
8.553697 Paschale Mysterium: Gregorian Chant for Easter.
Read more about the great selection of Easter rarities and other albums on Capriccio and Dacapo, labels that Naxos distributed worldwide.
And if you love the sublime sounds of Orthodox sacred music you’ll be interested in the following recordings:
Naxos 8.553123 Russian Chant for Vespers
Naxos 8.555908 Rachmaninov’s Vespers
C10597 Mystik des Osterns – Music by Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Dubenskij, Christov, Bortiansky & Hristich
Naxos continues to gain critical praise from the world’s leading music websites and publications, as our Critics Choice for April 2009 once again amply shows. Read more
This year a number of significant composer anniversaries are being commemorated, including those of Handel, Haydn, Martinu, Mendelssohn and Purcell. Naxos’s special Haydn Anniversary Box Sets present his complete concertos, oratorios, piano sonatas, string quartets and symphonies. Read more
Read more about selected titles for the other composers.
And, of course, we’re delighted to announce all of this month’s New Releases. |
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2.110266
PUCCINI La Rondine
Svetla Vassileva (Magda) • Maya Dashuk (Lisette) • Fabio Sartori (Ruggero) • Emanuele Giannino (Prunier) •
Marzio Giossi (Rambaldo) • Orchestra and Chorus of the Puccini Festival • Alberto Veronesi, conductor •
Lorenzo Amato, director
Although one of his most consistently lyrical operas, La rondine (The Swallow) remains one of Puccini’s least known. The innovative 2007 production at the Torre del Lago Giacomo Puccini Festival, presents a new version of Puccini’s sparkling score. |
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2.110268 DONIZETTI Maria Stuarda
Laura Polverelli (Elisabetta) • Maria Pia Piscitelli (Maria Stuarda) • Giovanna Lanza (Anna Kennedy)
• Roberto De Biasio (Roberto, conte di Leicester) • Simone Alberghini (Talbot) • Mario Cassi (Cecil)
• Coro Lirico Marchigiano ‘V. Bellini’ • FORM – Orchestra Filarmonica Marchigiana • Riccardo Frizza, conductor
• Pier Luigi Pizzi, director, set and costume designer • Sergio Rossi, lighting designer
‘Contributing greatly to the success of the work, the young Maestro Riccardo Frizza revealed himself as a deep and sensitive interpreter of this score, managing to capture all the nuances of Donizetti’s music… Maria Pia Piscitelli was a wonderful Maria Stuarda’ (MusiCulturA) |
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More Naxos Opera DVDs |
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Naxos/Marco Polo DVD Catalogue |
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8.570992 RAVEL Daphnis et Chloé, Shéhérazade
Leipzig MDR Radio Choir • Lyon National Orchestra • Jun Märkl, conductor
Ravel’s masterpiece, Daphnis et Chloé, was composed for the Ballets Russes as “a choreographic symphony in three parts…faithful to the Greece of my dreams” wrote the composer. His earliest orchestral work, the “fairy overture” Shéhérazade remained unpublished until 1975. |
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| 8.570722 SZYMANOWSKI Symphonies Nos 1 & 4, Concert Overture, Study in B flat minor
Jan Krzysztof Broja, piano • Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra •
Antoni Wit, conductor
Although Szymanowski later dubbed his First Symphony a “contrapuntal-harmonic-orchestral monster” and disavowed the influence of Wagner, Reger and Richard Strauss, it is an astonishingly powerful work by a composer only in his mid-20s. His Fourth Symphony’s highly-charged Neo-baroque character invites comparison with Stravinsky.
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| 8.570556 JANÁČEK Operatic Orchestral Suites (arr. Breiner) Vol 2
Vesa-Matti Leppanen, violin • New Zealand Symphony Orchestra •
Peter Breiner, conductor
Following the release of their stunning recording of Janácek’s Operatic Orchestral Suites, Vol. 1 (Jenůfa, The Excursions of Mr Brouček) on 8.570555, Peter Breiner conducts his insightful suites from two popular Janácek operas
—Kát’a Kabanová and The Makropulos Affair.
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| 8.570930 MARTUCCI Symphony No 2, Theme and Variations, Tarantella, Gavotta
Lya de Barberiis, piano • Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma della Fondazione Roma • Francesco La Vecchia, conductor
Described by Gian Francesco Malipiero as “the beginning of the rebirth of non-operatic Italian music”, Martucci’s Second Symphony is his masterpiece. The remaining pieces, all originally for piano and predating the symphony, highlight different facets of this fascinating composer.
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| 8.570774 BAX Symphonic Variations, Concertante for Piano Left Hand
Ashley Wass, piano • Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra •
James Judd, conductor
The highly virtuosic Symphonic Variations has been likened ‘to some great epic poem dealing with the adventures of a hero’. The Concertante for Piano (Left Hand) and Orchestra (1949) is coloured by typical Baxian orchestral textures, like swirling mists in a nocturnal vision of some Irish coastal vista.
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| 8.570719 MacMILLAN Seven Last Words from the Cross,
Christus vincit, Nemo te condemnavit, …here in hiding…
Dmitri Ensemble • Graham Ross, conductor
‘In recent years it has been an enormous thrill hearing my music being performed by The Dmitri Ensemble…I am honoured and thrilled that they are choosing to mark my 50th birthday with this disc…of different choral works from 1993 to 2005.’ – James MacMillan
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| 8.572031 PENDERECKI Utrenja
Iwona Hossa, soprano • Agnieszka Rehlis, mezzo-soprano • Piotr Kusiewicz, tenor • Piotr Nowacki, bass •
Gennady Bezzubenkov, Basso profondo • Warsaw Boys’ Choir • Warsaw Philharmonic Choir & Orchestra •
Antoni Wit, conductor
Penderecki’s Utrenja was inspired by the Orthodox liturgy for Holy Saturday with its focus on the lamentation of Christ’s death and the Easter Sunday morning service commemorating the Resurrection. Enthusiastically received by audiences, it is one of the towering masterpieces of modern Polish music.
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| 8.572036 SCHUBERT Lied Edition 31 - Sturm und Drang Poets
Caroline Melzer, soprano • Konstantin Wolff, bass-baritone •
Ulrich Eisenlohr, piano
Naxos’s acclaimed series of Schubert’s Lieder continues with a selection of songs including the famous Die Forelle (The Trout), Am Tage Aller Seelen (On All Souls’ Day) and others with texts by poets associated with the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) literary movement.
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| 8.572073 GARCÍA ABRIL Madre Asturias - A Collection of Asturian Songs
Joaquín Pixán, tenor • Rosa Torres-Pardo, piano
Asturias in north-western Spain is a land of dramatic contrasts with an ancient cultural heritage. Award-winning Spanish composer Antón García Abril and writer José León Delestal drew from the rich folklore of this region for their evocative song cycle Madre Asturias.
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| 8.572013 PIZZETTI Concerto dell’estate, Three Symphonic Preludes from L’Edipo Re, Preludio to Clitennestra, La Festa delle Panatenee
Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra • Myron Michailidis, conductor
This is the first recording in more than 40 years of Ildebrando Pizzetti’s masterpiece, Concerto dell’estate (Summer Concerto), described by the composer as a ‘pastoral symphony’. Pizzetti’s passion for Greek music and drama can be heard in the other works on this disc.
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| 8.570526 ARENSKY Piano Concerto, Ryabinin Fantasia on 2 Russian Folksongs, Pamyati Surova, Symphonic Scherzo
Konstantin Scherbakov, piano • Russian Philharmonic Orchestra •
Dmitry Yablonsky, conductor
Anton Arensky was a precocious composer whose youthful Piano Concerto combines Lisztian dramatic bravura with Chopin’s virtuosic lyricism. The Symphonic Scherzo is probably also an early work, while the Ryabinin Fantasia and Pamyati Surova are works of his maturity.
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| 8.572061 NIEMINEN Palomar (Flute Concerto), Through Shadows I Can Hear Ancient Voices (Clarinet Concerto), Vicoli in ombra
Patrick Gallois, flute & direction • Mikko Raasakka, clarinet •
Sinfonia Finlandia Jyväskylä
Finnish composer Kai Nieminen remarks: ‘I feel like I am a painter in music, who having seen or experienced something attempts to give that something a shape in music.’ Palomar was written for Patrick Gallois, soloist and conductor on this disc. Through Shadows I Can Hear Ancient Voices was inspired by Antonio Tabucchi’s novel Notturno indiano. In Vicoli in ombra we meander through the misty alleys of Rome.
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| 8.572129 Wild Nights!
Vince Gnojek, soprano saxophone • University of Kansas Wind Ensemble • Scott Weiss, conductor
The University of Kansas Wind Ensemble offers musically enriching and artistically outstanding performances of the finest wind band repertoire. The Ensemble here presents a diverse selection of 21st-century music which takes its name from multi-award-winning Ticheli’s exuberant Wild Nights!
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| 8.572169 DICKINSON Complete Organ Works
Jennifer Bate
Peter Dickinson’s strikingly original approach to organ music reflects a background that was not typical of British organists or composers during the mid- to late-twentieth century. The award-winning, internationally-renowned organist Jennifer Bate is an ideal interpreter of his works.
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| 8.570320 PLEYEL Symphonies Concertantes,
Violin Concerto in D major
David Perry, violin • Victoria Chiang, viola • Isabella Lippi, violin •
Baltimore Chamber Orchestra • Markand Thakar, conductor
Pleyel’s Symphonies Concertantes are expansive, leisurely-paced works, texturally transparent in their solo sections and rich in melodic invention. The original and virtually unknown version of the Violin Concerto in D, composed in the early 1780s, is one of the earliest of Pleyel’s solo concertos but no less attractive and assured than its successors.
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| 8.572196 ALBÉNIZ Piano Music Vol 3
6 Danzas Espanola, 6 Pequenos valses, 6 Mazurkas de salon
Guillermo González, piano
The third volume of Albéniz’s piano music presents three contrasting sets of dances, each brimming with delicacy, joie de vivre and voluptuous beauty. Albéniz is touched by the spirit of Chopin in his delightful Pequeños valses, while the Mazurkas de salón and Danzas españolas both transcend mere folkloricism.
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| 8.570822 KABALEVSKY Piano Sonatas Nos 1-3,
Piano Sonatinas Nos 1 & 2
Alexandre Dossin, piano
Performed on this recording by Alexandre Dossin, First Prize and Special Prize winner at the 2003 Martha Argerich International Piano Competition, Kabalevsky’s highly virtuosic Piano Sonata No. 2 represents the peak of the composer’s writing for solo piano.
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| 8.570891 BUSONI Piano Music Vol 5
6 Studies, 6 Pieces, 10 Variations on Chopin's C minor Prelude
Wolf Harden, piano
Wolf Harden’s Busoni Piano Edition has been warmly applauded. For this fifth volume, Busoni’s magisterial transcription of Bach’s ‘St. Anne’ Prelude and Fugue and his inspired variations on Chopin’s famous ‘Choral’ Prélude flank the splendid Six Studies and the harmonically adventurous Six Pieces. |
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ALSO AVAILABLE:
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8.225346-48 Siegfried WAGNER Der Schmied von Marienburg
Karl Schneider • Rebecca Broberg • Ralf Sauerbrey • Anne Wieben •
Johann Winzer • Maacha Deubner • Marek Kalbus • Johannes Föttinger • Christoph von Weitzel • PPP Music Theatre Ensemble, Munich •
Baltic Philharmonic Orchestra, Gdańsk • Frank Strobel, conductor
The operas of Siegfried Wagner are gaining recognition as important works in their own right. Like his father, Richard, albeit in a highly individual way, Siegfried Wagner was a master orchestrator and compelling theatrical storyteller. |
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8.571258 BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas Nos 15, 23 & 31
(Biret Beethoven Edition Vol 8 – Piano Sonatas Vol 4)
Idil Biret, piano
‘Biret grasps the size of Beethoven’s style…One is reminded that her mentor has been Wilhelm Kempff.’ (Gramophone) ‘Idil Biret gives an impressive performance. A supreme mastery of tempi, sonorities, polyphony and technique’ (Le Nouvel Observateur) |
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8.571259 BEETHOVEN Symphonies Nos 7 & 8 (transcribed Liszt)
(Biret Beethoven Edition Vol 9 – Beethoven/Liszt Symphonies Vol 3)
Idil Biret, piano
‘Listening to Beethoven through Liszt’s keyboard transcriptions can put a fresh perspective on these familiar symphonies. Idil Biret has taken on the complete cycle, and I admire her taste, technique and sound musical decisions.’ (New York Magazine) |
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8.571270 GRIEG & SCHUMANN Piano Concertos
(Biret Concerto Edition Vol 1)
Idil Biret, piano • Bilkent Symphony Orchestra • Antoni Wit, conductor
‘This is the kind of playing that makes reservations irrelevant; there is no one like her, which is what defines a unique artist.’ (Boston Globe)
‘Extraordinary memory, brilliant technique and unusually insightful performances’ (1998 Duszniki Festival, Poland) |
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8.111004
Furtwängler Early Recordings Vol 3 (1929–1935)
WEBER Der Freischütz (excerpts), Invitation to the Dance,
MENDELSSOHN A Midsummer Night's Dream (excerpts),
The Hebrides Overture, BERLIOZ Rakoczy March
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra • Wilhelm Furtwängler, conductor
Furtwängler’s musical sympathies went beyond Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner and Wagner. The overture to Der Freischütz smoulders with anticipation, Invitation to the Dance is lovingly turned, the Rakoczy March is nimble and athletic, and the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream is notable for its translucent delicacy. |
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8.111352 Sviatoslav Richter Early Recordings Vol 1 (1948–1956)
Music by Chopin, Schubert & Schumann
Sviatoslav Richter, piano
Sviatoslav Richter mesmerized audiences with his stunning pianism, charismatic stage presence and powerful interpretations. His 1948 recording of Schumann’s Fantasiestücke, Op. 12, is here reissued for the first time since the original 78rpm issue. |
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8.120879
FORREST Song of Norway
Music of Edvard Grieg,
Adaptation and lyrics by Robert Wright & George Forrest
Original Cast Recordings 1944–45
This recording of Song of Norway represents two distinct versions of the score which came out on 78s in 1945. This Naxos recording allows you to hear both and—between them—to get a crystal-clear picture of a show that was an enormous hit over sixty years ago. |
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Capriccio, DACAPO, OUR Recordings and Phoenix Edition are distributed worldwide by Naxos.
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Capriccio
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Several Capriccio titles have recently been added to naxos.com.
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MOZART Divertimento No 17 & Salzburg Symphony No 3
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10153
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MOZART Cassations K63 & K99, Adagio and Fugue K546
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10192 |
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MOZART Divertimenti Nos 10 & 11
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10203 |
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MOZART Divertimenti K205 & K287
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10271 |
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MOZART Serenade No 3 K185, Serenade (Notturno) K286,
March K189, 5 Contredanses K609
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10302 |
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MOZART Divertimenti K113 & K131, A Musical Joke, Menuett K122
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10333 |
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MOZART Serenade No 7 "Haffner", March in D major
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10334 |
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MOZART Serenade No 4, K203, Contredances, Minuets,
German Dances
Camerata Salzburg • Sandor Vegh
Capriccio C10376 |
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RACHMANINOV Variations on a Theme of Corelli,
Morceaux de fantaisie, Suite No 2, 6 Duets
Margarete Babinsky, Holger Busch, piano
Capriccio C49295
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DACAPO 8.226066 GADE Sonatas for violin and piano
Christina Åstrand, violin • Per Salo, piano
Niels W. Gade (1817-1890) was beyond doubt the best known and most widely recognized Danish composer of the nineteenth century. He was an excellent violinist, and thus wrote a good deal for the violin. His fondness for the instrument is most in evidence in the works for violin and piano, among which the three sonatas trace Gade's stylistic development over 40 years: from youthful imagination in the early first sonata, through a firmer hand with the Classical-Romantic ideal of the period in the second, to the experienced, more rigorous Classical lines of the third and last, with none of the heavy scent of the Late Romanticism of the day. |
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DACAPO 8.226505 JØRGENSEN Moon-pain, Goblin Dance,
Lisbon Revisted
Iris Oja, mezzo soprano • klettWood • Remix Ensemble •
Paul Hillier, conductor
In his most important work to date, the song cycle Moon-pain (2003-8) for mezzo-soprano and chamber ensemble, Klaus Ib Jørgensen (b. 1967) has set the moonlit, dreaming poems of the Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) to music that is both beautiful and disturbing. The six movements of the work are interwoven here with two other, related compositions: Goblin Dance (2005) for clarinet and piano, and Lisbon Revisited (2008)–a soundscape from the streets of Lisbon, a poem by Pessoa in a variety of languages, and fragments of the Moon-pain music. This is the sound of the maternity ward of this poetry.
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Phoenix141 JENKINS Fantasy Suites
Simone Eckert, viola da gamba and direction • Christoph Heidemann, baroque violin • Ulrich Wedemeier, theorbo • Michael Fürst, organ
Simone Eckert and the Hamburger Ratsmusik devote this recording to a collection of ‘fantasy suites’. Being an innovator and reformer, Jenkins earned much applause with these pieces of music. His flexible use of modern stylistic methods, as well as the fact that his music was found in manuscript collections together with pieces from other internationally renowned composers, shows that Jenkins was an active composer also at great age and that he was much appreciated as a musician as well as colleague by younger composers. |
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Phoenix154 Daniel Behl Lieder Recital
- SCHUBERT/BEETHOVEN/GRIEG/BRITTEN/TROJAHN
Daniel Behle, tenor • Oliver Schnyder, piano
‘The Lied is timeless. In the Lied, every composer concentrates on the quintessence by creating, with little means, the maximum of expression,’ says Daniel Behle. Young tenor Daniel Behle, born in Hamburg, where he also lived and studied, has since 2003 been engaged at various theatres, making opera the main focus of his singing career. Nevertheless, he decided to devote his first CD recording to the German song: ‘The Lied features the composer’s essence—and demands the singer to fully reveal himself. I can only reach the Lied fundaments if I am, emotionally speaking, completely exposed and naked.’ |
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Phoenix174 Classical Symphonies
Cappella Coloniensis • Hans-Martin Linde, conductor
This CD brings together recordings by Cappella Coloniensis with repertoire which was typical for this orchestra during the ‘80s. Music from the Renaissance and Baroque as well as from the period of Viennese Classicism by Haydn, Mozart and their contemporaries profited from the sleek, clear sound of original instruments. |
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Phoenix170 CLARA SCHUMANN Vocal Music
Jörg Waschinski, male soprano • Berlin Aulos String Quartet
Jörg Waschinski is one of the most sought after male sopranos in Europe for opera and oratorio performances. For this new addition to the Phoenix Edition catalogue he sings a beautiful selection of songs by Clara Schumann. He has arranged the songs for soprano and string quartet. |
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Phoenix181 SCHULHOFF Solo Piano Works
Margarete Babinsky, with Maria Lettberg & Andreas Wykydal
Erwin Schulhoff shows us how music in the 1920s was deeply experimental. The connection to the artists grouped around Otto Dix and the Dadaist Georg Grosz, as well as stylistic elements from Jazz music enriched his compositions, letting go of all known forms. His Pittoresken and Ironies for piano are creations of his experimental phase. Remarkable is his piano duet with only one written score, while the second piano had to improvise on top of it. His artistic aim was to elevate Jazz music to a superior form of music. This recording shows how thrilling his productions are. Based on her own research, Margarete Babinsky here presents a program full of entertainment and suspense. Together with duet partners, works for two pianos are brought back to life, as well as many first-timers are rehearsed. |
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Phoenix184 MANKELL Solo Piano Works
Anna Christensson
Henning Mankell (1868–1930) is the grandfather of the famous writer and author of crime thrillers. He lived in Stockholm, teaching piano and harmony and became member of the Royal Swedish Music Academy in 1917, and was also a music critic for the Svenska Morgonbladet and the Stockholms-Tidningen. His compositions were until now completely unknown to us. Young Swedish pianist Anna Christensson presents them to us on this double CD. Even the Swedish Broadcasting Company has only few recordings, and many compositions were never published, the young pianist playing these virtuosic compositions from copies of Mankell’s scores. Some surprising work is unveiled: Drei Preludes op. 56 and Drei Legenden op. 59 are in the manner of Debussy or Edvard Grieg with a touch of Scandinavian melancholy, are counterposed to the Fantasiesonaten Nos. 1, 3 and 6 with their expressivity and intensity. |
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More great releases from Capriccio, DACAPO, OUR Recordings and Phoenix Edition, including titles recently added to naxos.com |
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