On this transatlantic disc, three American composers born during the first half of the last century rub shoulders with two young musicians from Eastern Europe. A member of the BBC New Generation Artists scheme, the violinist Aleksey Semenenko first met the pianist Artem Belogurov at the Stolyarsky Special Music School in Odessa at an early age. Even if their individual careers have taken to different parts of the world, the two still perform together whenever possible, and here they present three sonatas.

This programme is truly a reflection of my three years as artist-in-residence at Royaumont and my artistic personality of the last years. Working with young composers is a passion for me – to study a completely new score, to discover the intentions of the composer through discussions, experimentation and sometimes just through being in their company, is something that is very important to me as the foundation of my work as a performer. The pieces that Annie Hui-Hsin Hsieh and Matthew Chamberlain wrote for me are great examples of this work, and although very different, they both speak to different parts of being a pianist.

When a twenty-minute piece takes two weeks to rehearse is an audience robbed of some of the richness of their experience by not witnessing that creative journey? For 48 Hours, Vonnegut Collective worked collaboratively with composer Tullis Rennie. Together they documented the trajectory of the rehearsal process and the motivations of the performers as the group tackled their most challenging work to date - Thomas Adès’s Piano Quintet. Recordings from rehearsals and interviews with players are woven through improvised interpretations of a new graphic score for the quintet, combined with trumpet and electronics. In 48 Hours, Rennie and the Vonnegut Collective play with perspective, observation and interpersonal experience, providing the listener with a unique insight into contemporary music making.

The Brave is an American Rock Band hailing from the greater Los Angeles Area in Southern California, namely Lancaster. Originally signed to Pakaderm/Word Records in the early 90's, the band released two critically acclaimed albums (Battle Cries and Trust) under the Grammy award winning production of John and Dino Elefante and yielded 7+ Top 10 CCM singles. The original lineup consisted of Stayce Roberts and Freddy Tierra on dual guitars, Randy Roberts on drums, Malcolm Paris on bass, and James Salters on vocals. The Brave produced a huge arena rock sound, laden with fiery guitars and Def Leppard type harmonies rich in melody and attitude. Their debut album, Battle Cries, was mixed by none other than Neil Kernon (of Dokken and Queensryche fame), and together The Brave became a crowd and radio favorite.

“Music can be the space where people think––even just for a few minutes,” says Israel Nash. “The space is not about changing their lives or political views or their party ticket. It’s about creating something that prompts reflection in a moment––and those reflections have other chain reactions.”

Maurice Ravel composed a number of works which have become classics of the repertoire both for solo piano and for orchestra. On the present disc, all except one work were first conceived for piano, which raises the question how it is possible to transfer such pianistic music to the orchestra without making it sound like a mere ‘colourized’ version. Ravel’s orchestral writing was the result of a long apprenticeship and careful study of orchestration treatises as well as scores, notably of works by Rimsky-Korsakov and Richard Strauss. Although his skills as an orchestrator are much admired today, his ability to coax new sounds out of the orchestra wasn't always appreciated in his own time, however – in 1907 the critic Pierre Lalo complained that ‘in Ravel’s orchestra, no instrument retains its natural sound…’