Both highly in demand on a worldwide scale as unique, exceptional chamber music performers, Antje Weithaas and D?nes V?rjon each ideally combine the highest degree of enthusiasm and precision: their energetic, passionate playing is the result of intense concentration. In Vol. I of their complete recording of Beethoven's violin sonatas, Weithaas and V?rjon have chosen not to follow chronological order, but to seek out thrilling contrast and fascinating variety instead - thus making Beethoven's rapid evolution as a composer all the more astounding. Volume 1, featuring Op. 12/2, Op. 23, and Op. 47, revolves around the tonal center of A major / A minor.

“If I’ve accomplished anything,” said Ravi Shankar, “it’s that I have been able to open the door to our music in the West.” Born in Varanasi in 1920, he achieved worldwide renown as a sitar player and unprecedented influence as an ambassador for Indian classical music, revealing new possibilities to such figures as George Harrison of the Beatles, jazz saxophonist John Coltrane and composer Philip Glass. As a performer, composer, teacher and writer, Ravi Shankar is renowned throughout the world for his pioneering work in bringing Indian music to the West. Shankar has been a cultural influence in the West for more than four decades as India’s most recognized and esteemed musical ambassador.

Obscurus is an exploration of the obscured, in a programme which showcases some of the most incredible trumpet writing of the 20th and 21st century, as well as several reimaginings of older, more mainstream works for other instruments, arranged for trumpet by Lucy Humphris.

Mats Bergström on guitar and Georg Riedel on double bass with a tasteful instrumental record of hymns without words.

Johann Sebastian Bach was an incredibly good "recycler" of his own music and reused much of what he had already composed in a different form. For the concerts of the Collegium Musicum, which had been taken over from Telemann, in the famous Caf Zimmermann, he needed a large number of instrumental pieces. This was also a special opportunity to perform music for up to four harpsichords - a field of experimentation that must have been extremely appealing to Bach as a legendary keyboard virtuoso.

Two incredibly soulful and passionate quartets by Mark-Anthony Turnage feature in this recording. ‘Shroud’, commissioned by the Emerson Quartet in 2016 and ‘Winter’s Edge’, commissioned by us in 2019, make up his 3rd and 4th quartets and they are powerful and compelling additions to the quartet canon.

There is some great ambient electronica on these 4 Discs. This collection was put out on the Jumpin' & Pumpin' label back in 1999. If you are a Jake Stephenson fan this is a very important collection, since it includes the whole of the Crystal Moon (Jake Stephenson and Matt Hillier) album 'Temple' which is otherwise a very expensive CD to pick up. All the tracks are here. There are also a number of other Jake Stephenson tracks, either under his own name (unusually), or under more of his pseudonyms (Alien Mutation, Curly Whirly Spirits). We also get some Matt Hillier tracks, and some rather good tunes by Dave Hendry (as O-Head, Hyperborea and Twilight Pilot).

After Il Fortunato inganno and La Zingara, the Martina Franca Festival has revived another neglected masterpiece by Donizetti, Pietro il Grande o sia il Falegname di Livonia. First staged in Venice in 1819, this work met with good success and was performed until 1827. The silence that followed is justifiable only on account of the enormous success reaped by works such as Elisir d'amore, Don Pasquale and Lucia di Lammermoor, for in Pietro il Grande there is no lack of inspiration and Donizetti's creativity is, quite the opposite, generous and surprising.

No, not another Mozart piano concerto disc! No indeed, for this pioneering recording gives us intimate, almost domestic versions of three of the composer’s masterpieces, versions that have scarcely been played, let alone set to disc, in the modern concert era. Moreover they give us the opportunity to hear Susan Tomes show her mettle in strong light as concerto soloist—and bring to a wider repertoire the distinct communicative magic that has made her one of the foremost chamber pianists of today.

The movement to record Renaissance music in ways that illustrate its context has mostly bypassed Orlande de Lassus up to now. This is partly because his vast output is hard to get a grip on. Lassus was arguably music's first international star, and he was capable of bringing to his employers (mostly the Duke of Bavaria, already something of a cultural crossroads in the late sixteenth century) music from all around the continent.

Influenced by the sounds of her Mexican upbringing, French-American singer/actress Arielle Dombasle's sixth studio album, Diva Latina, features 13 Spanish-language cover versions of her favorite Latin American standards. Produced by Dave Clark, the follow-up to Glamour a Mort features colorful renditions of Lou Bega's "Mambo No.5," Nilda Fernandez's "Yo Lo Decia," and Yma Sumac's "Gopher Mambo," alongside the lead single, an interpretation of Jeanette's "Porque Te Vas," and a collaboration with French MC, Mokobe, on a reworking of Miriam Makeba's "Pata Pata."