Anticipating the 50th anniversary of Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in 2022, we present their complete recordings on DG. The intriguing sound culture of Orpheus, especially of the string section, is often explained as a result of the cooperative mindset of the orchestra and its artistic process of rehearsing.

This is part of a series of releases on the Naxos label devoted to the 40 symphonies of Michael Haydn, younger brother of Franz Joseph. These have been commercially successful, and it's easy to see why: there's music of unsuspected high quality here, and you can see why the younger Haydn's work was taken for Mozart's in several cases for decades, and why Mozart, who was spare in his praise of other composers, bestowed it upon this one. All four of these symphonies are in the three-movement form that Mozart had mostly left behind by the late 1770s and 1780s (when the Haydn works were composed), but the individual movements are quite confidently handled, with the elegant but harmonically wide-ranging slow movements perhaps the best of the lot.

This album, the first in a series devoted to the 41 symphonies of Michael Haydn, leads off with perhaps the most historically famous one of all: the Sinfonia in G major, Perger 16, is none other than the missing Symphony No. 37 of Mozart, which was not removed from the Mozart canon until 1907. The reason for the error was that a copy of the work exists in Mozart's handwriting; he wrote a slow introduction to the first movement (not performed here), and apparently copied out the piece in preparation. It remains difficult to believe that listeners' suspicions weren't raised before that; the work's simple, squarish movements resemble those of the symphonies Mozart wrote in his mid-teens.

The “Mozart Matinees” were originally founded by Bernhard Paumgartner to introduce audiences to the genial composer’s little-known works. The Mozart Matinees of the 2004 summer festival – in addition to Mozart – were dedicated to the younger brother of Joseph Haydn: Johann Michael Haydn. Michael Haydn’s Requiem in C Minor was heard for the first time in December 1771; both father and son Mozart participated in the performance. Mozart later quoted a motive from this Requiem in his Maurerische Trauermusik and quoted the older man as well in his own requiem.

Michael Haydn’s colourful and inventive music is uplifting and expressive in equal measure, but his music has been eclipsed by that of his elder brother Joseph, and by Mozart. Sacred music is central to Michael Haydn’s oeuvre and was considered by some contemporary critics as superior to Joseph’s. Encompassing a broad range of textures and styles, parts of the Missa Sancti Nicolai Tolentini demonstrate Haydn’s music at its most exhilarating and energetic, and his supreme gift for empfindsames (‘sensitive’) lyrical writing is also to be heard in the Vespers.

Melodiya presents the string duet of brothers Ivan and Mikhail Pochekin. This is another Melodiya present for music lovers that acquaint us with representatives of musical performing art of the new generation. The young soloists continue a renowned musical dynasty their father is a famous violin maker, and their mother is a violin teacher. Prize-winners of prestigious international competitions, Ivan and Mikhail Pochekin have appeared at some of the leading venues of Russia, Europe and the world, and been active as both solo and ensemble performers for a decade. An unusual composition of this album is noteworthy it is a sort of two-part concert where the first part is dedicated to musical classicism and the other to Russian music of the 20th century.

This recording offers us a close look into Michael Haydn's musical activities for the church, the court and its surroundings. The Missa is perfectly in accord with the then current ideals for reform in the Catholic Church: functional, short, simple, modest and linked to the Gregorian tradition. It is amazing how Haydn was able to compose such varied, lively and attractive music within these strict guidelines.

Michael Haydn wrote his Italian "Serenata" to a libretto by Metastasio on the theme of the lover's grief felt by the goddess Diana, who took vows of chastity without thinking that she might be hit by Amor's arrows. This opera in two acts from 1778 celebrated it's premiere during Michael Haydn's lifetime but then was forgotten for more than two centuries; it was first performed again in full in Salzburg in 2018 and now is finally available on cpo.

Michael Haydn, younger brother of the great Josef, and Georg Druschetsky, Kapellmeister and oboist in the grenadiers, were especially famous exponents of the wind band medium. Celebrating the mariage of wind and voice, these mass-settings are accompanied only by woodwind, brass and organ - a combination of timbres, Leopold Mozart maintained, 'close to the human voice' where 'eveything flows'…

The Concilium musicum Vienna, which plays on authentic period instruments, was founded by Paul and Christoph Angerer in 1982 and has since elaborated an extensive musical spectrum from the music of the Baroque period to the dance music of the 19th century.

Wie spannend und aktuell auch die Beschäftigung mit über 200 Jahre alter Musik sein kann, zeigt unsere Edition aller Sinfonien von Michael Haydn sehr deutlich. Nun ist es mal wieder so weit: vier wundervolle Sinfonien sind produziert. Die Nummern 22, 23, 33 und 1C (Perger 1) stammen aus zwei Schaffensperioden Michael Haydns, die durch etwa 20 Jahre voneinander getrennt sind. Sie geben einen faszinierenden Einblick – sowohl in Haydns kompositorische Entwicklung als auch in die Vielfalt, die das Experimentierfeld Sinfonie jener Jahre bot. Die Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss unter Johannes Goritzki ist hörbar zum Michael-Haydn-Spezialisten geworden.

In unserer Edition der Sinfonien Michael Haydns streben wir nun einem neuen Höhepunkt zu: den 6 Sinfonien Nr. 34-39. Haydn schrieb sie in der unglaublich kurzen Zeit von nur sieben Wochen zu Beginn des Jahres 1788, und nicht nur die Tonartenfolge macht deutlich, dass ihnen eine zyklische Idee zugrunde liegt.

Wiedergaben, die durch präzise Konturierung, plastische Artikulation, instrumentalen Farbenreichtum und Detailgenauigkeit charakterisiert sind. Die Symphonien Michael Haydns erweisen sich als veritable Entdeckung. Rätselhaft ist, daß sie nicht schon längst weitere Verbreitung im Konzertsaal gefunden haben. Mit dieser CD jedenfalls kehrt ein Komponist zurück in die Musikgeschichte.

The oratorio "Der Kampf der Buße und Bekehrung" (the struggle for penance and conversion) is among Johann Michael Haydn's lesser-known works. The Purcell Choir together with the Orfeo Orchestra, under the direction of György Vashegyi now present a recording of the second and only surviving part of this three-part oratorio. It is impressive, especially for its unusual scoring: All of the the five solo roles are allotted to sopranos. The artistic mixture of majestic passages, surprising turns, Baroque rhetorical figures and virtuoso arias makes clear why later composers (e.g., Mozart, Schubert or Bruckner) repeatedly took Johann Michael Haydn's music as their model.

One of Michael Haydn's symphonies was taken for Mozart for a long time, and a good deal of their music is linked by its Salzburg roots. The sacred music on this disc, however, either postdates or predates Mozart and sounds very little like him. Included are four short masses for the Lenten season (all but one lacking Glorias, like some other masses of the period) and a charming Graduale for Palm Sunday. All but the concluding Missa Sanctae Crucis were written in the 1790s, after an ecclesiastical reform mandated simple, syllabic settings of liturgical texts, and the Missa Sanctae Crucis is a simple, youthful work. The music is accompanied only by a small continuo group.