To celebrate the 150th anniversary of Janáček’s birth, this Decca Collector Edition brings together most of the composer’s chamber works and solo pieces plus his most popular orchestral works and the magnificent Glagolitic Mass in a superb digital recording with Riccardo Chailly and Wiener Philharmoniker. The recordings of the solo works and chamber pieces feature one of the world’s most distinguished ensembles: the London Sinfonietta and David Atherton. Their recordings were originally released as a 5-LP set in 1981 and many of these performances have not been available for several years; many also make their first international appearance on CD. This set provides the listener with all the essential non-operatic Janáček in one convenient collection.

With nine Top 20 albums and several classical Brit Awards under his belt, tenor Russell Watson has been an instrumental figure in the success of the classical crossover genre, with his collaborations with Happy Mondays' Shaun Ryder and Steps' Faye Tozer – and operatic renditions of contemporary pop songs – undoubtedly paving the way for the likes of G4, Katherine Jenkins, and Il Divo. The Platinum Collection, released to coincide with his seventh studio album, La Voce, is his second best-of following 2006's The Voice, and once again shows why the Salford-born singer is described as the "People's Tenor".

Bobby Sherman never got much critical respect during the prime years of his career. Oh, he sold tons of records, to be sure, but the virtues of those recordings were eclipsed by his good looks and the publicity successes of his management, which got him on the cover of every teen magazine in the country, seemingly for four years running. Listening to this collection, it dawns on one just how much respect he did deserve as a singer (and reportedly still does, based on what people say of his 21st century shows). This is bubblegum rock, to be sure, but it's all amazingly "unsticky" for bubblegum rock, and Sherman's delivery on the 18 songs here is solid and effective, and holds up across 40 years. When he delivers the key lines from "Seattle" (the theme song from his series Here Come the Brides), he makes you feel that he feels the "hopes and fears" referred to, and the loneliness behind "time to leave your home and your loved ones" – and then he turns around and melds into the jauntiness of "Easy Come, Easy Go" just as easily. Sherman then switches gears into the Day-Glo-toned "Hey, Mister Sun," and makes you feel the boundless, easygoing joy around those lyrics. The fact is, Sherman was not only a superb singer but also a better actor than he ever got credit for being, an attribute that he throws into his records and which, coupled with first-rate pop production, makes them work brilliantly, even four decades on.

Helena Juntunen is currently one of Finland s most dazzling young sopranos to have established an international career. Her responsive soprano voice enraptures audiences with its freshness, and her phrasing is praised for its expressive and natural quality. Helena s career in Finland was established through winning many competitions, one of the most important of which was the ladies section of the Lappeenranta Singing Competition in 2002, and in October 2006 she was awarded the Karita Mattila prize.

This is the first ever recording of Arvo Pärt’s wonderful vocal music performed by a boys’ choir. The year of release of this album is also the year when the Estonian composer celebrates his eightieth birthday. More than four decades ago, the musician Arvo Pärt fell silent, and went into retreat for eight years. His silence gave rise to a new kind of music, which has gained him international fame. “I have discovered that it is enough if a single note is beautifully played,” Pärt once said. Based on his study of the cathedrals of sound of the Renaissance or even earlier periods, the composer has developed a very personal and original style: music inspired by spirituality, striving to accomplish the ideal of perfect simplicity, of laying bare the pure essence. An everlasting stopping and pausing: eternity. At the same time a continuous flowing and being carried away: the transitory nature of time.

1996 compilation album released by Blue Note. The album brings together works by various jazz artists, all centered around the theme of New York City.

75 chansons francophones, issues de moments inédits et marquants, captés par les micros de Radio-Canada, que ce soit à la télé ou à la radio, de 1936 à aujourd'hui. Des premières prestations télévisuelles de nos grands d'aujourd'hui (comme "La dame en bleu" de Michel Louvain, "Le ciel se marie avec la mer" de Lucille Dumont, etc.), de chansons devenues des grands classiques chantés par plusieurs générations ("Les gens de mon pays" de Gilles Vigneault, "Les ailes d'un ange" de Robert Charlebois, "L'amour existe encore" de Céline Dion, et une version originale de "Quand les hommes vivront d'amour" de Raymond Lévesque et plus encore), de collaborations uniques (Kevin Parent et Zachary Richard, Pierre Lapointe et le Quatuor Molinari, Mara Tremblay et Karkwa), de spectacles mythiques (Claude Léveillée et sa dernière prestation de Frédéric aux Francofolies).

This was to be the end of the line for Italian word-setting by Viennese composers: once the confident sentiments that belonged to the poet Metastasio's opera seria felt the chill and threatening wind of Enlightenment and Revolution, their time was up. Even we, for the most part, prefer to remember the German-speaking Beethoven, Schubert and Haydn. So it is good to be reminded of their responses to the Italian muse (usually as part of their craft-learning student work) in this particularly well-cast recital. Central Europe, in the person of Andras Schiff meets Italy, in Cecilia Bartoli, to delightful, often revelatory effect.

NOW Music is very proud to present the second of our ‘Now That’s What I Call An Era’ releases. ‘The Albums 1980 > 1984’ celebrates 72 iconic albums that were released between 1980 and 1984, featuring a magnificent track from each - and none of them UK hit singles! Most of the albums being highlighted produced huge hit singles that have become both synonymous with the decade and enduringly popular – but these albums are of such a high quality – forever part of the artist’s legacy - that other tracks could have equally become hits – and some have become as well-loved by fans as the singles, and have for many artists always been an established part of their live shows.

The Art of Renée Fleming is essentially an album of the soprano's most popular hits, probably not targeted at listeners who are already big fans (who are likely to already have the albums from which these selections were culled), but at more general audiences interested in expanding their operatic horizons. With a few very familiar exceptions, the songs and arias are from the Romantic and post-Romantic eras, and showcase the luxurious creaminess of Fleming's voice and her ability to spin out melodic lines with seamless, soaring lyricism.

This fabulous five disc set is replete with some of those old Stokowski warhorses all recorded in absolutely mind boggling Phase 4 sound, overblown perhaps but astounding for its time. Decca's remastering is absolutely magnificent and the discs are jam packed with almost six hours of music. This is another fine memorial to a great conductor who remained astonishingly vital until the very end of his life.

It is mentioned in almost all biographies of Johann Sebastian Bach: Bach was part of a large family of musicians and at festive gatherings the musical gifts were used to increase the revelry. We know, for example, an occasional piece by Bach about the departure of a brother, in which the wailing of the family who stayed behind, the dangers of the journey and the sound of the post horn (as a sign of the departure of the stagecoach) are portrayed in a humorous way.

Soprano Sandrine Piau has been known mostly as a Baroque specialist, but she has recorded several albums of 19th century French mélodies with spectacular results. Si j'ai aimé (the title comes from one of three songs by the little-known Théodore Dubois) will be very hard for her to outdo. The list of attractions is very long and begins with the repertory. There are some familiar pieces here, such as the opening pair of songs by Saint-Saëns, but many of the composers – Dubois, Charles Bordes, Alexandre Guilmant – are rarely performed, at least outside France, and all the songs here are top-notch.

Italian-born Caterina Valente comes from one of Italy's most prestigious families of artists. Her mother Maria Valente was the most famous circus clown of her time, her brother Silvio Francesco (1927-2000) was also active in show business and made numerous recordings and performances together with Caterina. Caterina was already performing in the circus ring with her siblings at the age of five. Her extraordinary international career began in 1953 as a guest singer with the Kurt Edelhagen Orchestra. Her first record, Istanbul, reached the top 20 of the German charts. With her first No. 1 hit Ganz Paris träumt von der Liebe, Caterina Valente remained in the German charts for 36 weeks. The song sold half a million copies in Germany, which was unusually high for the time. Other top placings included Baiao Bongo (#2, 1955) and her second No. 1 hit Wo meine Sonne scheint (1957), followed by Tschau Tschau Bambina (#2, 1959) and her third No. 1 Ein Schiff wird kommen (1960). At the beginning of the 1960s, Caterina Valente achieved further top placings with Pepe (#3, 1961), Ein Seemannherz (#5, 1961), Quando, Quando (#9, 1962) and Rosen sind rot (#7, 1962).

75 cool, sophisticated and timeless tracks on three CDs, packaged in a handy fold-out bag with pockets. Includes Andy Williams, Elvis Presley, Ella Fitzgerald, Roy Orbison, Dusty Springfield, Frank Sinatra, Doris Day and many more. It's unlikely that most of us need entire albums from most of the artists included in this compilation. But this compilation of foreign pop music from the 50s and 60s is really something special. Here you get the classics of the genre as well as some rare tunes.