Interested in operas that have rarely if ever traveled beyond their linguistic or ethnic homeland? You may well be delighted to get to know this Romantic-era work by the Swedish…
Category: Recordings
Heinrich Marschner’s Once-Famous Hans Heiling Gets a Fine New Recording
Heinrich Marschner (1795-1861) was one of many nineteenth-century composers in the German-speaking lands who tried to create a tradition of serious German opera, distinct from tradition of Singspiel (mostly light…
A Superb World-Premiere Recording of Leonardo (not da) Vinci’s Didone abbandonata (1726) from the Florence May Festival
This is one of three Leonardo Vinci recordings that I’ve had the privilege of reviewing in recent years. The other two were Siroe re di Persia (from the renowned Teatro…
Stéphane Fuget’s new recording of Lully Alceste from Versailles
Lully’s “tragédie lyrique en prologue et cinq actes” Alceste is set to a libretto by Philippe Quinault, after Euripides (Alcestis). The first performance took place at the Theâtre du Palais-Royal…
Stylish Performances from Trinity College Cambridge
The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge has built an unassailable reputation for the quality of its recordings. Amongst the discs under the choir’s ex Director of Music Stephen Layton, there…
Delius: A Mass of Life
‘The status attained by Frederick Delius as a composer ensures for every new work from his pen the respectful attention of all classes of musicians. In the case of a…
Dreams, Desires, Desolation: English Song
In Dreams, Desires, Desolation, baritone Trevor Alexander and pianist Peter Crockford present a miscellany of English song. There are both art songs – some well-known, others less familiar – and…
Homelands: songs of exile, alienation and escape
Homelands is the title of this programme, curated by pianist and writer Aron Goldin and released by Rubicon last October. However, in the context of creative artists’ representation of ‘home’,…
Lawrence Foster conducts Kodály and Bartók on Pentatone
In a tribute essay to Kodály in the 1965 Aldeburgh Festival programme Benjamin Britten suggested, ‘There can be no composer of our century who has done more for the musical…
An imaginative disc of French sacred song from Ad Fontes
This recent compilation for solo voice, harp and organ is a delightful tour d’horizon of songs referencing the Virgin Mary, with works written by those associated with the French organist-composer…