This recording is the World Premiere of Charles Koechlin's Jungle Book and received the Orchestral Gramophone Award and was, memorably, accepted by the son of the composer. Charles Koechlin loved Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book and set different parts of the book to music at various points in his career. The first of these - The Three Poems - bear the titles: Seal Lullaby, Night Song in the Jungle and Song of Kala Nag, with texts from The Jungle Book. The music, scored during 1904 - 04, is exotic and evocative. The lullaby mimics the gently lapping of waves as the soprano and chorus spin a soothing tapestry of sound. The Night-Song in the Jungle had a cadence that suggests movement (sung by the soprano, tenor, baritone and chorus) and is a song of well-wishing to the animals of the night. The Song of Kala Nag is a lament of an elephant that has been tamed for his old life in the jungle, sung by the tenor. The poem describes a night in the year when all of the elephants gather to dance together and, rather than being somber, the music is triumphant as the elephant recounts his past freedom and vows to have it again.

This set, issued to mark the 75th anniversary of Fricsay's birth, dates from late 1960 when the conductor was already suffering from the disease that killed him. It was to prove to be his final performance of the piece. I don't think it's fanciful to feel in this intensely dramatic and immediate reading that the conductor fully realized his own mortality. At any rate it's an interpretation of tragic force and lyrical beauty that eclipses most of its rivals. Fricsay was here working with a choir and orchestra entirely devoted to him and, as in the Shaw performance on Telarc/Conifer such familiarity pays huge dividends in terms of unified thought. Then, the circumstances of a live occasion seem to infect everyone concerned with a feeling of urgency.

This 10 CD-Set offers a collection of the most popular Mass compositions from the Viennese Classics up to the romantic period. It includes famous masterpieces like Mozart’s „Coronation Mass“, Beethoven Missa solemnis, Haydn „Harmony Mass“, Gounod St. Cecilia Mass but also rarities like „Missa Sancti Joannis Nepomuceni“ by Michael Haydn, the „Coronation Mass“ by Cherubini, „Missa sacra“ by Robert Schumann and the „Misa solemnis“ of the german romantic composer Friedrich Kiel. Performed by well known artists like the Vienna Boys’ Choir, RIAS Chamber Choir, Tölzer Boys’ Choir, Wiener Akademie and last but not least also includes the spectacular recording of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis with conductor Michael Gielen.