On her upcoming debut album, South Korean flautist Jeehee Han presents a trio of flute works by Carl Reinecke. At the heart of this album is the Undine sonata for flute and piano, for which she is joined by star pianist Lang Lang. For the other two works, the Flute Concerto in D major and the Ballade in D minor, Han is accompanied by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director Vasily Petrenko. “I fell in love with Reinecke when I was thirteen,” says Jeehee Han, who first discovered the composer through the recordings of Jean-Pierre Rampal. The Concerto and Undine were key works during her student years in Vienna, Paris and at Oberlin College in the US. And, having written her Master’s thesis on Reinecke’s Flute Concerto, it was the obvious choice for her return to the concert platform after a career break. While considering the repertoire for her first recording, she remembered Reinecke’s final work, the Ballade, and the plan for an all-Reinecke album was born.

Mozart composed the concerto for two pianos in 1779 and performed it with his sister Nannerl. It is a less adventurous work than the previous concerto, No.9 K271, but it is an altogether more successful work than No.7 for three pianos K242, which the composer arranged for two pianos. It is brilliant in nature, especially the finale. It foreshadows in places the great Sinfonia Concertante K364 but does not match the grandeur of that work. No.24 K491 from 1786 is one of the greatest of Mozart’s concertos. The dark, turbulent and tragic mood undoubtedly had an influence on Beethoven’s C minor concerto.

A leading icon of the British music revolution of the 1960s, Pete Townshend made his name by creating the power chord, smashing guitars on stage, and penning anthems of teenage rebellion like My Generation. Now, approaching 70 and half a century after he penned the archetypal rock lyric Hope I die before I get old, Townshend has created a classical version of one of The Who's landmark albums Quadrophenia for a symphony orchestra, opera singer and choir.

The lack of popularity of Haydn's first oratorio, written in 1775 on a subject from the Apocrypha for a musicians' benevolent society in Vienna and subsequently amplified by two choruses, is due to the wearisomely moralistic and dramatically inept libretto by Boccherini's brother—which relegates to a couple of lines of recitative even Tobias's battle with the monstrous fish and the threat of the demon Asmodeus (who has murdered seven previous bridegrooms of Sara, Tobias's new bride)—and the great length of the music (including the protracted but inventive and expressive accompanied recitatives), which reduces what little action there is to the pace of an arthritic snail. In his original review of this recording, Roger Fiske commented on the risibility of Tobias, seeking to cure his father's blindness from cataract, exclaiming ''Delay could prove fatal'' and then singing an eight-minute aria, at which his mother Anna remarks ''A just sense of urgency spurs him on''.

The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra performs magnificently from beginning to end, coupling elegance, eloquence, passion, and poser with Hyperion's fastidious sound in a way that compels admiration from the listener for conductor, ensemble and composer alike. Handley's is the definitive version of the Hebridean Symphony, outstripping that available on Naxos in every regard, and with the other works on this disc to further commend it, this release sails effortlessly into port as the newest inductee into Fanfare's Classical Hall of Fame.

Mike Oldfield’s iconic “Tubular Bells” took the world by storm when it launched in 1973, and nearly 50 years later continues to sell over 100,000 albums per year, with a total of 17.5 million copies sold worldwide and 18 million streams. In honor of the 50th anniversary of this ground-breaking album, Cleopatra Records will be releasing a new studio album entitled Tubular Bells - 50th Anniversary Celebration.

A brand new recording from one of Britain’s most beloved, respected and performed composers, released to commemorate Sir John Rutter’s 80th birthday. The first purely orchestral album from Rutter in 58 years of recording, featuring highly respected Scottish pianist Steven Osborne.

Hélène Grimaud made her first five CDs for the Denon label, when the pianist was in her mid-teens through early 20s. Brilliant Classics has reissued them as a super-bargain boxed set. Even in her formative years, Grimaud’s world-class pianism and first-rate musical mind seemed fully sprung. Listen as she fearlessly tears through Rachmaninov’s Second Sonata, or notice the way she brings out the symphonic underpinnings of the same composer’s Op. 33 Etudes-Tableaux and Liszt’s Dante Sonata and you won’t doubt that a mature artist is at work. She makes Chopin’s G minor Ballade colorful and exciting by playing it as the composer intended, rather than re-writing his dynamics, phrasings, and ritards. Sonically, her 1992 Rachmaninov Second scores over her later traversal on Erato (see my review by typing Q3366 in Search Reviews), while fans of her terrific Erato Ravel Concerto should find the earlier Denon version equally incisive and commanding.

This album combines the brilliant original vocal harmonies of The Beach Boys’ beloved classics with brand new symphonic arrangements performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, creating a unique and special experience of these iconic songs. 17 tracks produced by Nick Patrick and Don Reedman, who conducted similar projects for Roy Orbison and Elvis Presley. Executive produced by Jerry Schilling. Orchestra conducted by Sally Herbert and Steve Sidwell and recorded by Peter Cobbin at Abbey Road Studio 2.

Aigul Akhmetshina is the fiery young mezzo taking the opera world by storm. In her debut album Aigul, the illustrious young opera singer Aigul Akhmetshina finds her voice in the role of Carmen and traces a path through her own remarkable journey. Her story is one of determination and perseverance against the odds, starting in a rural village in the mountains of Bashkortostan. She left home aged 14 to pursue her singing career. Despite facing rejection from a conservatory in Moscow, where she was told she lacked the right voice and appearance, at the age of 27 Aigul has already etched her name in history.

The Beatles were not only hugely influential on the world of popular music. The creative genius of John Lennon and Paul McCartney inspired many classical musicians to create their own arrangements of these iconic songs. This 2-CD set is the ultimate classical Beatles collection, featuring a selection of arrangements. The first CD consists of arrangements for classical guitar (surely the most appropriate of all classical instruments!) including Cuban composer Leo Brouwer’s suite for guitar and strings From Yesterday to Penny Lane. The second CD, Fron Male Voice Choir newly-recorded performance of Yesterday and Hey Jude, and a rousing finale of Let It Be by Arthur Fiedler and The Boston Pops. One of the highlights of the set is The Beatles Concerto, an arrangement for two pianos and orchestra featuring eight Beatles songs, by the celebrated English composer John Rutter. Also included is Beatlecracker Suite, a fascinating arrangement of Lennon and McCartney songs in the style of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker Suite – a true lost classic composed in 1965 at the very height of ‘Beatlemania’.

The Finzi Clarinet Concerto has been particularly lucky on CD, with a whole series of fine versions issued, including those above. Yet Emma Johnson, spontaneous in her expressiveness, brings an extra freedom and often an extra warmth to make this in many ways the most winning of all. Finzi's sinuous melodies for the solo instrument are made to sound as though the soloist is improvising them, and with extreme daring she uses the widest possible dynamic range down to a whispered pianissimo that might be inaudible in a concert-hall.[[/quote]

Yuri Temirkanov's Royal Philharmonic recording has been around for a long time; it was recorded in 1986 and has been in the catalog ever since – for good reason. Temirkanov is always sensitive to the exotic nature of these scores, particularly Spartacus, and he brings excitement to the varied colorful dances of both ballets. His recording is more full-bodied than the Bolshoi CD; no under-staffed orchestra here, and their rich sounds have been superbly captured by EMI's engineers.