This compilation provides a showcase of the many aspects of the cello and the range of emotions and characters that the instrument is able to convey. Opening the collection is Debussy’s technically demanding Sonata in D minor, a staple of the cello repertoire. The whimsical motives, repetitive tones and scales of this work give way to the ingenious combination of atonality and Romantic lyricism of Schnittke’s Sonata No.1, which is followed by Beethoven’s visionary Sonata No.5 in D, a homage to J.S. Bach. This is in turn succeeded by Van Breen’s Flavours, written in 2011. A playful piece that combines many styles, it is written with the five base flavours in mind.

The winner of numerous international competitions, the brilliant young accordion player Ksenija Sidorova here presents her debut recording; a recital for solo classical accordion. A particularly accomplished artist, Ksenija has collaborated with many leading musicians (including the Belcea Quartet, and Valergy Gergiev with the CBSO), and won numerous awards and accolades. Still an underexploited resource in western classical music, the accordion has had a fast-increasing amount of music written for it since the mid-20th Century. Here, Ksenija Sidrova brings a varied recital featuring some of the best contemporary compositions for the classical accordion, alongside transcriptions of well-known works. No composer has been transcribed more often than Bach; but the accordion - heard here in Bachs Overture in the French Style - brings an advantage that few other instruments can offer; its notes do not die away as soon as they are sounded. This allows an array of colouristic possibilities, denied to other musicians.

Viola Space in Tokyo is one of the world’s most important musical festivals dedicated to the viola and the music composed for it. Founded by Nobuko Imai – well-known to BIS followers as well as to lovers of the viola – it celebrates its 10th anniversary, and BIS was invited to document some of the 150 works that have been performed over the years. The program spans over more than 70 years, and the list of composer includes Schnittke, Per Nørgård, Penderecki and Oedoen Partos. Nobuko Imai herself performs two of the most exciting works on the two discs: György Ligeti’s Sonata for Viola Solo and Toshio Hosokawa’s Voyage VI for Viola and Strings. This last piece was composed only last year, and is dedicated Nobuko Imai. It forms part of a series of concertos “in which the soloist symbolizes man while the ensemble represents the universe, nature and world that surrounds us within and without”, in the composer’s own description. Among these a modern classic such as György Kurtág’s Hommage à R. Sch. – in which violist Junji Suganuma is joined by a clarinet and a piano – may be mentioned, as well as Viola, Viola, a constantly surprising duo by George Benjamin.

Alfred Schnittke's Second Concerto Grosso is a different creature than his First. While the 1977 Concerto Grosso No. 1 for 2 Violins, Strings and Keyboards is a lithe, vicious, often comical work, the Second, finished five years later, is a weightier affair. The soloists are now violin and cello; the Baroque band is now a full orchestra with electric guitar, drum kit, and brake drum; there are four large movements rather than six smaller ones; the entire work is imbued with an air of sincere tragedy, albeit with mud on its shoes. Schnittke dedicated the work to its premiere soloists, husband-and-wife duo Oleg Kagan (violin) and Natalia Gutman (cello); famed for their flawless ensemble, the couple inspired in Schnittke a musical air of companionship – a single soul in two instruments.

This is a handsome-looking compact disc release, with strikingly muted graphics in cool purple tones, featuring Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer and Japanese harpist Naoko Yoshina. Here the pretty graphics go a little too far: the buyer finds no listing of compositions on the outside of the package and has no way of knowing what is played aside from a bare mention of the names of the 11 composers featured. That's where the All Classical Guide comes in. The works were all written in the twentieth century. They are: Michio Miyagi's Haru no umi (Ocean in Spring, a calming, melodic piece); Kaija Saariaho's Nocturne for violin solo (a somewhat avant-garde coloristic piece); Toru Takemitsu's Stanza II for harp and tape (also pretty far out and very Japanese-sounding); Yuji Takahashi's Insomnia for violin, voices, and kugo (strange, but oddly soothing); a movement from Satie's Le fils des étoiles as arranged by Takahashi (austere); Jean Françaix's Five Little Duets (100 percent charming); the Étude for violin from Richard Strauss's Daphne (also charming); Six Melodies by John Cage (simple and pleasant); Arvo Pärt's Spiegel im Spiegel (even simpler and not startling); Nino Rota's love theme from The Godfather (you know this one); and the final movement from Schnittke's Suite in the Old Style (gently Classical except for one deliberately horrendous dissonance).

Schnittke's Piano Quintet, a creative response to his mother's death, is an austere, haunting work full of grief and tenderness that marks one of his early ventures into polystylistic writing. The opening piano solo is unique, a spare statement of puzzlement in the face of tragedy. It gives way to a waltz, as if recapturing a lost past, then the graceful dance melody literally disintegrates as the strings venture off into other regions, vainly trying to reassemble the theme and failing. At the end of its touching five movements the music's despair is transformed into serene, hard-won acceptance. Shostakovitch's 15th Quartet, his final statement in that form, premiered just months before his death. It's six slow movements are shot through with contemplative sadness and regret. The music is so rich in texture and substance that attention never flags.

One of the world’s premiere concert violinists, Anne Akiko Meyers has been celebrated throughout her nearly three-decade career for her exceptional musicianship, charismatic presence and creative diversity. On this release, Meyers is joined by long-time collaborator Reiko Uchida on piano and the young harpist of the Paris Opera, Emmanuel Ceysson. Seasons…Dreams is anchored by Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No. 5 in F Major, Op. 24, “Spring.” This sets the stage for a series of lyrical pieces inspired by songs and poems which take us on a journey through the seasons and into reverie. Meyers presents familiar songs in unique arrangements and unexpected melodies mixed with traditional classical works. “I love the interchange of sound, the feeling of being a chameleon,” says Meyers of her constant exploration of different textures and sounds.

After Mozart, the 2001 Grammy winner for Best Small Ensemble Performance, by Gidon Kremer and Kremerata Baltica, brings together the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (and his father, Leopold), with three contemporary works inspired by him. The works included, by contemporary Eastern European composers such as Alexander Raskatov, Valentin Silvestrov and Alfred Schnittke, invoke Mozart’s memory in ways direct and more subtle, and the more familiar Mozart pieces sandwiched in serve to bring the listener to a new way of hearing the more familiar pieces. The disc is an attempt, in Kremer’s words, to “set Mozart in the frame of our own time”.

Live Classics’ Natalia Gutman “Portrait” series continues with a second volume documenting the cellist’s work from her early career up to the present. A 1967 German radio broadcast of the Debussy Cello Sonata stands out for Gutman’s warm, expansive tone and strong, fluid support from pianist Alexei Nassedkin. A few moments of uncertain intonation and less-than-centered articulation in the second movement’s opening pizzicatos are a small price to pay for fine overall ensemble values. Gutman shines in the declamatory, slow-motion passages that dominate the outer movements of Schnittke’s First Cello Sonata, and throws herself head first into the central Presto’s roller-coaster arpeggios and ruthless clusters. A gripping performance, this: every bit as authoritative as Alexander Ivashkin’s with the composer’s widow Irina Scnittke at the piano. She’s a more sensitive colorist than Gutman’s solid yet comparatively monochrome Vassily Lobanov.

In the brilliant history of the Chamber Choir of the Moscow Conservatory a separate chapter is connected with the musical legacy of Alfred Schnittke (1934-1998). Both compositions are united by the subject of faith and contemplation of what Is spiritual and spiritless. Despite the fact that chronologically the Requiem (1975) Is an earlier work than the Cantata (1983), on the CD they are presented in reverse order: fol­lowing Alexander Solovyev's conception, the narrative of Faust’s tragic death, coming as retribution for his sinful earthly life, must be followed by a memorial prayer, the Requiem. The compact disc documented “live” performances: the Requiem was performed on September 17, 2013 at the Small Hall of the Conservatory, while the Cantata sounded out on September 29, 2014 at the Grand Hall of the Conservatory.

This 2009 ECM disc containing the world premiere of Alfred Schnittke's Ninth Symphony, the composer's final work, will be mandatory listening for fans of post-modernist Russian music, or contemporary music in general. Begun after the premiere of Schnittke's Eighth Symphony in 1994 and unfinished at the composer's death in 1998, the Ninth existed only as three movements of manuscript (and indecipherable manuscript at that: a stroke had paralyzed Schnittke's right side, forcing him to write with his left hand) until composer Alexandr Raskatov deciphered the manuscript and conductor Dennis Russell Davies presented its premiere. As presented in this January 2008 recording, Schnittke's Ninth continues and extends the austere sound world of the Eighth into ever more severe zones. There's no denying this is the authentic voice of Schnittke: the etiolated textures, abrupt gestures, timeless tempos, and haunting themes have clear roots in the composer's preceding works. Davies and the excellent Dresdner Philharmonie appear acutely conscious that the Ninth was the composer's last work, but the tone of leave-taking is inherent in Schnittke's inward music.

Korngold, Rota, Schnittke, Glass – four different artistic personalities. Each of these composers was active in totally different conditions; and therefore their life circumstances and consequently their artistic choices are incomparable. What may connect Korngold and Nino Rota are their early debuts as composers – both were prodigies. Seeking analogies in the lives of Alfred Schnittke and Philip Glass would come to naught. There is, however, another common denominator for their work – all of them were hugely successful in writing film music. Korngold codified its modern canons ruling to this day. Without Nino Rota it would be difficult to imagine Federico Fellini’s masterpieces. Alfred Schnittke found in the realm of cinema a domain of relative artistic freedom; Philip Glass a platform for his ambitiously non-clichéd art, opposing the musical mainstream of the last decades of the 20th century and the first decades of the 21st century.

This powerful record brings together two of the most seminal works for viola and orchestra of the twentieth century. Although these pieces are as different as they are similar, together they form a distinct balance of sentiment and execution.

Alfred Schnittke and Arvo Pärt lived through times of remarkable change in the last decades of the Soviet Union. From the 1970s, state restrictions on religion were gradually relaxed and this was reflected in the arts and especially in music. Schnittke’s adoption of Christianity was triggered by the death of his mother in 1972, and culminated in his later conversion to Catholicism. Pärt was from a nominally Lutheran background in Estonia, but embraced the Orthodox faith in the 1970s, following intensive study of liturgical music. Both composers began to incorporate religious themes into their work, moving away from the modernist abstraction that had characterized their early careers.