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Leo 12/11/2006Truly and awfully terrible. The music is gorgeous, but this horribly irritating voice in between all the time. Aaaachhh. Just give me the music, and please shut up!!!
Anonymous 10/17/2006A very in-depth coverage of some of Naxos' cd releases. Lots of information & music samples. There is no hard sell of their product, but I went out and bought some Naxos CD's straight away!
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Episodes
- CMS:The Theatre Music of Henry Purcell
(19mb)
Tue, 22 Apr 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An introduction to the theatre music of the great English composer Henry Purcell, in a new CD featuring the Aradia Ensemble under the direction of Kevin Mallon. Purcell is still one of the most popular of all composers, and his music has been copied or borrowed by everyone from Benjamin Britten to Michael Nyman - CMS:Frederic Rzewski's The People United Will Never be Defeated (19mb)
Tue, 15 Apr 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An interview with pianist Ralph van Raat about his new recording of Frederic Rzewski's monumental solo piano variations The People United Will Never be Defeated - CMS: Bartok's The Wooden Prince (19mb)
Tue, 08 Apr 2008 02:51:59 -0500
A podcast look at Bartok's ballet score, The Wooden Prince, written in 1912. This ballet is one of only three stage works Bartok composed during this decade before returning to composing music for the concert stage - CMS: An interview with Ralph Couzens (19mb)
Tue, 01 Apr 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Ralph Couzens, Managing Director of Chandos Records, has grown up with this record label - it was founded by his father Brian Couzens. In this interiew, he talks about the Chandos name, the Chandos sound, and what it means to be a classical label in today's media universe. - CMS: An interview with Orli Shaham (19mb)
Tue, 25 Mar 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Orli Shaham treads the concert halls of the world as a pianist in her own right. Occasionally, though, she teams up and does concerts with her equally famous brother, violinist Gil Shaham. - CMS: Nigel Clarke The Miraculous Violin (19mb)
Tue, 18 Mar 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An interivew with composer Nigel Clarke about his new CD featuring The Miraculous Violin and other works for solo violin and winds. In this interview Clarke discusses how he composes, and how his travels around the world have influenced his music - CMS: Haydn's Piano Concertos (19mb)
Tue, 11 Mar 2008 02:51:59 -0500
A podcast feature about Haydn and his Piano Concertos - CMS: Guitar Music of Chile (19mb)
Tue, 04 Mar 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An introduction to Jose Antonio Escobar's new CD "Guitar Music of Chile". As this recording shows, Chile is producing some wonderful music for guitar, as well as some outstanding performers. - CMS: An interview with composer Kenneth Fuchs (19mb)
Tue, 26 Feb 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An interview with American composer Kenneth Fuchs about his new CD "Canticle to the Sun", and about the various sources of his inspiration - CMS: Jose Serebrier and the Carmen Symphony (19mb)
Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An interview with Jose Serebrier about his new recording with "The President's Own" United States Marine Band. Serebrier discusses the composers on this disc, including Bizet, Revueltas, Ginastera and Villa Lobos - CMS: Lise de la Salle plays Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Liszt (19mb)
Tue, 12 Feb 2008 02:51:59 -0500
A podcast introduction to Lise de la Salle's new recording of the first piano concertos by Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Liszt, three concertos that all had their first performances with the composer at the piano - CMS: Shostakovich's music for the film Odna (19mb)
Tue, 05 Feb 2008 02:51:59 -0500
In 1929, Dmitri Shostakovich wrote music for a feature length film called Odna (Alone). Although some of the film has been lost, this astonishing score has been meticulously re-constructed by Mark Fitz-Gerald. - CMS: An interview with Elliott Carter (29mb)
Tue, 29 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Elliott Carter is the "Dean of American composers". At the age of 99, still actively composing, he has a perspective and depth of knowledge that few can match. In this podcast, he talks about his string quartets, and the development of his compositional ideas. - CMS: An interview with the Pacifica Quartet (19mb)
Tue, 29 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Elliott Carter is the "Dean of American composers". At the age of 99, still actively composing, he has a perspective and depth of knowledge that few can match. In this podcast, Sibbi Bernhardsson of the Pacifica Quartet talks about learning and performing his String Quartets - CMS: Brundibar (41mb)
Tue, 22 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Brundibar was first performed in 1943 in the Terezin concentration camp. Of the 15,000 children who passed through this camp, only 132 survived. This podcast features an interview with Ela Stein Weissberger - one of those who survived, and who took part in those original productions of this children's opera. - CMS: An introduction to Vivaldi's opera Griselda (19mb)
Tue, 15 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
A brief introduction to Vivaldi's opera Griselda, based on a story that appeared in Boccacio's book The Decameron, that had been published several hundred years earlier. - CMS- James Hartway (19mb)
Tue, 08 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
An interview with American composer James Hartway in which he talks about his new CD, how commissioners affect composers, and the delights of his mother making him take piano lessons - CMS- Leroy Anderson (14mb)
Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of Leroy Anderson - CMS- Cimarosa Overtures (19mb)
Tue, 25 Dec 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of Domenico Cimarosa - CMS- Vaughan Williams' Hodie (17mb)
Tue, 18 Dec 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Vaughan Williams' Hodie - CMS- Serebrier's Grammy Nominated The Golden Age (19mb)
Thu, 13 Dec 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha interviews Maestro Jose Serebrier about his Grammy nominated CD Shostakovich: The Golden Age - Classical Music Spotlight - Gloria Coates (22mb)
Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha interviews composer Gloria Coates - Classical Music Spotlight - The Black Dyke Band (19mb)
Tue, 04 Dec 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the history of the Black Dyke Band - Classical Music Spotlight - The Works of Respighi Conducted by JoAnn Falletta (19mb)
Tue, 27 Nov 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Respighi's Church Windows - An Interview with JoAnn Falletta - Classical Music Spotlight - Bela Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle (19mb)
Tue, 20 Nov 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Bela Bartok's creepy yet magnificent opera Bluebeard's Castle performed by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra - Classical Music Spotlight - Chants d'Auvergne (2mb)
Tue, 13 Nov 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Joseph Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne - Classical Music Spotlight - Virgil Thomson's music for The Plow that Broke the Plains (19mb)
Mon, 05 Nov 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the importance of Virgil Thomson's score to the film, The Plow That Broke the Plains. - Classical Music Spotlight - A Discussion with Gary Green regarding works by Thomas Sleeper and David Maslanka (19mb)
Tue, 30 Oct 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with Gary Green about his undiminished passion for winds and new comminsioned works from David Maslanka and Thomas Sleeper - Classical Music Spotlight - Serebrier on Stokowski (24mb)
Fri, 19 Oct 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and works of Stokowski with Jose Serebrier" - Classical Music Spotlight - Gil Shaham discusses his new label, Canary Classics, and its premier release, "The Butterfly Lovers" (19mb)
Mon, 15 Oct 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with Gil Shaham about his new label, Canary Classics, and its premier release, "The Butterfly Lovers" - Classical Music Spotlight - Composer Jefferson Friedman and his String Quartet No. 2 (19mb)
Mon, 08 Oct 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with composer Jefferson Friedman about his String Quartet No. 2" - Classical Music Spotlight - Violinist Jennifer Frautschi on the music of Stravinsky (19mb)
Tue, 02 Oct 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with Jennifer Frautschi about her most recent performance on, "Stravinsky 125th Anniversary Album." - Classical Music Spotlight - The Music and Life of Miklos Rozsa (18mb)
Mon, 24 Sep 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of composer Miklos Rozsa" - Classical Music Spotlight - Wagner - Stokowski Transcriptions (19mb)
Mon, 17 Sep 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Stokowski's transcriptions of the works of Richard Wagner - Classical Music Spotlight - Brahms' Symphony No. 4 (19mb)
Wed, 05 Sep 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Brahms' Symphony No. 4 - Classical Music Spotlight - Music From the Republic of Georgia (19mb)
Mon, 27 Aug 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Georgian Guitar Music - Classical Music Spotlight - The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Perform Brahms Symphony No. 1 (19mb)
Mon, 20 Aug 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and their recording of Brahms Symphony No. 1 - Classical Music Spotlight - Mozart's Horn Concertos (16mb)
Mon, 13 Aug 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses Wolfgang Mozart's famous Horn Concertos - Classical Music Spotlight - The Music of Charles Ives and the U.S. Marine Band, "The President's Own." (21mb)
Mon, 06 Aug 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with former Marine Band Conductor Col. Tim Foley about the music of Charles Ives and the U.S. Marine Band, "The President's Own." - Special Editon Classical Music Spotlight - The Sonic Rebellion Collection- 20th Century Music That Shunned Conformity (19mb)
Tue, 31 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the Sonic Rebellion Collection and the composers that comprise this unconventional classical collection - Classical Music Spotlight - Pianist Allison Brewster Franzetti performs Berg, Hindemith, Schoenberg & Hartmann on "20th Century Piano Sonatas" (19mb)
Mon, 23 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Interview With pianist Allison Brewster Franzetti about the CD she performs on, "20th Century Piano Sonatas" - Classical Music Spotlight - Erick Korngold's Soundtrack to the Film, "The Sea Hawk" (17mb)
Mon, 16 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the music of Erich Korngold soundtrack from the film "The Sea Hawk" - Classical Music Spotlight - Stravinsky 125th Anniversary Album (17mb)
Mon, 09 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of Igor Stravinsky on the 125th Anniversary of his birth - Special Edition: Class of '38 - William Bolcom (24mb)
Thu, 05 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with William Bolcom about his music. - Special Edition: Class of '38 - Joan Tower (26mb)
Tue, 03 Jul 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with Joan Tower about her most recent release, "Made In America" - Special Edition: Class of '38 - A Conversation with Composer Ellen Zwilich (25mb)
Wed, 27 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with composer Ellen Zwilich about her most recent work. - Special Edition: Class of '38 - A Conversation with Composer Charles Wuorinen (29mb)
Wed, 27 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with composer Charles Wuorinen about his most recent work. - Special Edition: Class of '38 - A Conversation with Composer John Harbison (26mb)
Wed, 27 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with composer John Harbison about his most recent work. - Special Edition: Class of '38 - A Conversation with Composer John Corigliano (25mb)
Wed, 27 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with composer John Corigliano about his most recent work. - Classical Music Spotlight - Interview With Stephen Hartke about his opera, "The Greater Good" (21mb)
Tue, 19 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha interviews composer Stephen Hartke about his opera, "The Greater Good." - Classical Music Spotlight - Classic American Love Songs (19mb)
Tue, 12 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha chats with Carole Farley about her most recent performance on, "Classic American Love Songs." - Classical Music Spotlight - Interview With Conductor Richard Rosenberg of the Hot Springs Festival about Louis Moreau Gottschalk (21mb)
Mon, 04 Jun 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk and the Hot Springs Festival with its conductor Richard Rosenberg. - Classical Music Spotlight - Howard Hanson's opera Merry Mount with Gerard Schwarz (19mb)
Tue, 22 May 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses composer Howard Hanson's opera, "Merry Mount" with conductor Gerard Schwarz - Classical Music Spotlight - Three Centuries of Bagatelles (19mb)
Tue, 15 May 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses bagatelles and their place in Classical Music - Classical Music Spotlight - Interview With Roberto Sierra (19mb)
Tue, 08 May 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses composer Roberto Sierra's most recent release, "New Music with a Caribbean Accent." - Classical Music Spotlight - Gustav Holst's Double Concerto (19mb)
Wed, 02 May 2007 02:51:59 -0500
An exploration of the new recording, "Double Concerto" by Gustav Holst. - Classical Music Spotlight - Interview With Joan Tower (25mb)
Wed, 02 May 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha interviews composer Joan Tower to discuss her most recent release, "Made In America." - The life and music of Giuseppe Tartini and Adriane Daskalakis - iTunes Exclusive (29mb)
Fri, 20 Apr 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the Life and Music of Giuseppe Tartini and Violinist Adriane Daskalakis. - Classical Music Spotlight - Joseph Alessis Return to Sorrento (29mb)
Thu, 12 Apr 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Interview with Joseph Alessi discussing his newest release Return to Sorrento. - The recordings of Julia Fischer - iTunes Exclusive (29mb)
Wed, 11 Apr 2007 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha explores the recordings of Julia Fischer. - The Jose Serebrier Interview - iTunes Exclusive (19mb)
Tue, 20 Mar 2007 02:51:59 -0500
An Interview with Jose Serebrier on the release of his compositions on Naxos. - Classical Music Spotlight - A Portrait of Accentus (18mb)
Fri, 16 Mar 2007 09:58:00 -0500
The latest Accentus release features a 40-voice choir performing masterful transcriptions as close to literal as possible of both purely instrumental works. - Classical Music Spotlight - Manuel de Falla Piano Music (17mb)
Fri, 9 Mar 2007 09:58:00 -0500
The Complete piano music of Manuel de Falla - Classical Music Spotlight - Winds of Nagual (19mb)
Fri, 2 Mar 2007 09:58:00 -0500
The work that gives this disc its name, Michael Colgrass' Winds of Nagual, was inspired by the writings of Carlos Castaneda and his experiences with a Yaqui Indian sorcerer, delving into the secrets of Columbian wisdom. No Shadow of Turning by David Gillingham is based on a hymn, Great is Thy Faithfulness, and is dedicated to the memory of Lois Brock, secretary of the Ohio State University Bands. It was the Dvorak Serenade for Winds, Op. 44 that led conductor Russel Mikkelson to arrange the lovely Serenade for Strings for wind band. Donald Hunsberger's arrangement of Rimsky-Korsakov's evergreen Bumblebee was originally written as a solo for jazz trumpeter Winton Marsalis. In the present transcription, he assigns the solo trumpet line to various instruments of the band. - Classical Music Spotlight - Pichl Symphonies (19mb)
Fri, 23 Feb 2007 09:58:00 -0500
In his lifetime Wenzel Pichl was esteemed as one of the foremost European composers of the age. A friend of Dittersdorf, whose works exerted a strong influence on his development, Pichl wrote symphonies that rank among the most interesting of the period. The symphonies featured on this recording, all of which were composed in the 1760s and take as their subject mythical figures from classical antiquity, reveal a composer of flair and technical resourcefulness. - Classical Music Spotlight - John Adams Piano Music (19mb)
Fri, 16 Feb 2007 09:58:00 -0500
John Adams vast and varied output has earned him a wide audience, uncommon among contemporary classical composers. The works on this disc span his entire career to date, and illustrate his many different styles of writing for the piano. Phrygian Gates and China Gates could be regarded as his first minimal works, but are more tonal and expressive than the music of his contemporaries such as Steve Reich and Philip Glass. As a teenager Adams had played clarinet in his father's marching band, and his Hallelujah Junction reflects his love of jazz and popular music. His most recent piano work, American Berserk, recalls the fractured boogie woogie style of Conlon Nancarrow, and has been described by the composer as a short, manic, bipolar scherzo. - Classical Music Spotlight - Philip Glass Heroes Symphony (19mb)
Fri, 16 Feb 2007 09:58:00 -0500
Although he remains best known for the works he wrote for his own ensemble, orchestral music has been at the forefront of activities for PHilip Glass for much of the last two decades. Having achieved success in 1993 with his Low Symphony, a reworking of David Bowie and Brian Eno's classic rock album Low, three years later Glass repeated the experiment with another Bowie,Eno collaboration, Heroes, an album that drew its inspiration from the then divided city of Berlin. The six movements of Heroes Symphony function as independent pieces that between them build into a self sufficient musical work. The Light has its inspiration in a very different source, the Michelson Morley experiment confirming the uniform speed of light. Seeking a musical corollary, Glass' piece has an expressive introduction followed by an energetic main movement a before and after mirroring the onset of modern scientific research. - Classical Music Spotlight - Hovhaness Symphony No. 60 (19mb)
Fri, 9 Feb 2007 09:58:00 -0500
Of Armenian and Scottish extraction, the American composer Alan Hovhaness was a trend setting pioneer who absorbed a variety of archaic and modern influences from East and West. He once said My purpose is to create music, not for snobs, but for all people, music which is beautiful and healing. Khrimian Hairig, with its trumpet solo, recalls the heroic Armenian priest of the title. Hovhaness virtuoso and romantic Guitar Concerto was written for the Bolivian guitarist Juan Calderon. The Symphony No. 60, expresses the composer's love of the music and folk poetry of the Appalachians. - Classical Music Spotlight - Elgar's Sea Pictures (19mb)
Fri, 2 Feb 2007 09:58:00 -0500
Written for the striking contralto Clara Butt, who gave the work's premiere in a dress said to resemble a mermaid, Sea Pictures is Elgar's only song cycle with orchestra. These exquisite miniatures depict the sea in all its guises, peaceful and storm tossed by turns. The heartfelt Where Corals Lie is perhaps the most remarkable three minutes in all of Elgar. Inspired by the notion that artists are the real creators and the true makers of history and society, The Music Makers is a largely intimate and nostalgic work, which quotes several times from other compositions by Elgar. - Classical Music Spotlight - Das Partiturbuch (19mb)
Fri, 26 Jan 2007 09:58:00 -0500
A look into Das Partiturbuch - Classical Music Spotlight - From Byzantium to Andalusia (19mb)
Fri, 19 Jan 2007 09:58:00 -0500
A journey from Byzantium to Andalusia - Classical Music Spotlight - Mahler Symphony No. 5 (19mb)
Fri, 12 Jan 2007 09:58:00 -0500
Mahler's Fifth Symphony, a work of huge emotional and structural range, was his first purely orchestral work since the First Symphony of 1888, and his first orchestral work to dispense with both the human voice and overtly programmatic elements. The second most recorded of Mahler's symphonies, it includes the ravishing Adagietto, a love poem for the beautiful Alma Schindler, his future wife, and subsequently made famous by its use in Visconti's film Death in Venice. - Classical Music Spotlight - Christmas Through the Ages (19mb)
Fri, 22 Dec 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A look at Christmas Music through the ages with the Elora Festival Singers and Oxford Camerata. - Classical Music Spotlight - Sacred Music from Notre Dame (19mb)
Fri, 22 Dec 2006 09:58:00 -0500
From plainchant via simple 9th-century harmonies and the virtuosic duets of Master Leonin, known as organum, this hauntingly beautiful sequence charts the birth of polyphony up to the first music in four independent parts composed by Master Perotin and sung during the liturgy at the new Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. From the official laying of the cornerstone in 1163 to the completion of the famous Western facade almost a hundred years later, Notre Dame was the fertile home of singers and composers whose extraordinary handiwork has come down to us in the magnus liber organi, the "Great Book of Organum". - Classical Music Spotlight - Shostakovich's The Golden Age (19mb)
Fri, 15 Dec 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The three full-length ballet scores that Dmitry Shostakovich wrote between 1925 and 1935 remain among his least known works. The Golden Age revolves around the visit of a Soviet football team to a Western city at the time of an industrial exhibition, only for its heroic sporting and social endeavours constantly to be undermined by hostile administrators, decadent artistes and corrupt officials. Even before its premiere Shostakovich had prepared a suite, including the famous Polka (Naxos 8.553126), which barely hints at the dissonant harmonies and intricate contrapuntal designs to be found elsewhere in the ballet. This recording is the first to present the work complete with all repeats observed, enabling listeners to assess the ballet in all its exhilarating and, at times, anarchic intensity. - Classical Music Spotlight - Alberto Ginastera Ballet Panambi (19mb)
Fri, 8 Dec 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Much admired by Aaron Copland, the Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera is widely regarded as one of the most important and original South American composers of the 20th century. The two ballets featured on this recording belong to the early period ofGinastera when he was eager to promote an authentically national voice in his work through the use of Argentine folk and popular elements. The exotically scored Panambi is based on a romantic and supernatural legend of love and magic from the Guarani Indians, a tribe from the headwaters of the Rio Parana in northern Argentina. Estancia ,a farm or cattle ranch, is a powerful and passionate evocation of the vast and enigmatic Argentine pampas and the spirit of the "unlucky gaucho, who has no one to call to, with no place of his own in all that space, and in all that darkness". - Classical Music Spotlight - Vivaldi The Four Seasons (19mb)
Fri, 1 Dec 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Vivaldi's universally popular Four Seasons has become one of the most recorded pieces of classical music. The four concertos, with their virtuoso part for solo violinist, depict the changing seasons in a pastoral landscape with dazzling variety. Vivaldi evokes not only the changing atmospheric conditions, for example the dripping rain represented by the pizzicato violins in the second movement of Winter, but bird calls and animal cries, swaying grass, bubbling brooks, and human events such as drunkards, sliding and slithering, and a man walking on ice. Formally known as International Sejong Soloists, Sejong is a group of virtuoso string players including many well known young soloists. - Classical Music Spotlight - Leonard Bernstein's Ballet Music Dybbuk and Fancy Free (19mb)
Fri, 24 Nov 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The ballet Dybbuk was Bernsteins fourth and final collaboration with choreographer Jerome Robbins, written to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the state of Israel. The plot concerns a spirit that seeks to enter the body of a living person, and the battle between good and evil is represented musically by the conflict between atonality and tonality. Different in every respect is the symphonically conceived ballet Fancy Free. It follows three sailors on shore leave in New York for 24 hours, and when it was premiered in 1944 it brought Bernstein his first major public success as a composer. - Classical Music Spotlight - Spaghetti Rag (19mb)
Fri, 17 Nov 2006 09:58:00 -0500
This unique recording sets out to give a flavor of American ragtime through the medium of the mandolin. It is now believed that many of the original early twentieth-century rags were regularly performed by American-Italian mandolin orchestras whose numbers were swelled by Italian immigrants. Highlights on this disc include three of Scott Joplin's best known rags, Julius Lenzberg's Operatic Rag, a syncopated take on works by Leoncavallo, Mascagni, Wagner, Bizet and others, That Italian Rag by the Tin Pan Alley composer Alfredo Piantadosi, and the Neapolitan two-step A'Frangesa by Edward George. - Classical Music Spotlight - Monumental Winds (19mb)
Fri, 03 Nov 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Monumental Works for Winds is a collection of some of the greatest pieces ever written for wind band. Persichetti's 1956 Symphony for Band, Op. 69 is not only one of his greatest works, but has become one of the most frequently performed original American works for wind band. Stravinsky's strikingly original and rhythmically vital Symphonies of Wind Instruments is one of his most adventurous pieces in neo-classical style. Copland's technically challenging Emblems, is the composer's only work for band, its eleven minute span bursting with folk melodies, dissonance, waltzes and elements of jazz. - Classical Music Spotlight - Charles Ives String Quartets (19mb)
Fri, 27 Oct 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A look into Charles Ives String Quartets with Connie Heard of the Blair QUartet. - Classical Music Spotlight - Bach's Brandenburg Concertos (19mb)
Fri, 20 Oct 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A unique look at the group of six orchestral works known as the Brandenburg Concertos, commissioned by and dedicated to the Margrave of Brandenburg, are among the greatest works of Johann Sebastian Bach. These are consummate examples of the art of Baroque composition, frequently using groups of solo instruments in a more complex and virtuoso fashion than ever before. The Concerto No. 5, with its prominent and dazzling harpsichord part, is almost a Harpsichord Concerto in its own right. - Classical Music Spotlight - A tribute to Sir Malcolm Arnold (19mb)
Fri, 13 Oct 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A wonderful look at Malcom Arnolds music and symphonies. - Classical Music Spotlight - Bartok's Mikrokosmos (19mb)
Fri, 06 Oct 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The 153 piano pieces of Bela Bartok's "Mikrokosmos" are a milestone in piano literature. Drawing on a wide range of sources, from musical terms and technical procedures to indications of regional provenance and folk derivation, they are arranged in order of increasing technical and musical difficulty, while encapsulating Bartok's maturing sound-world during the period 1926-1939. When asked, near the end of his life, about the meaning of his chosen title, Bartok explained that "'Mikrokosmos' may be interpreted as a series of pieces in many different styles, representing a small world. Or it may be interpreted as 'world of the little ones, the children'". - Classical Music Spotlight - Chloe Hanslip Interview (19mb)
Fri, 29 Sep 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Interview with Chloe Hanslip discussing her views and experiences from the latest recording of the John Adams Violin Concerto - Classical Music Spotlight - Kabalevsky Piano Concertos (19mb)
Fri, 22 Sep 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Unlike many of his fellow countrymen, the Russian composer, pianist and writer Dmitry Kabalevsky flourished under Soviet rule, writing music mainly designed to inspire heroism and patriotism. The tuneful Piano Concertos Nos. 1 and 2, clearly inspired by Rachmaninov and Prokofiev, are written in a direct and accessible style. They are performed here by the remarkable young Korean pianist In-Ju Bang, the 2004 winner of the Puigcerda International Piano Competition in Spain. - Classical Music Spotlight - Carmina Burana for Wind Band (19mb)
Fri, 15 Sep 2006 09:58:00 -0500
This wind band arrangement of Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana" is entirely instrumental in concept, the vocal music having been fully incorporated into the band itself. The throbbing rhythms, chaste tenderness and heartfelt simplicity of the original are fully captured in John Krance's exhilarating transcription. Arthur Bird's "Serenade" won the Paderewski Prize as the best chamber work by an American in 1901. Herbert Owen Reed's "La Fiesta Mexicana", subtitled "A Mexican Folk Song Symphony for Concert Band", depicts a religious festival dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. - Classical Music Spotlight - Orlando Gibbons (19mb)
Fri, 08 Sep 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Orlando Gibbons' exquisite tunes and rock-solid bass-lines for the first English hymn book, "Hymnes and Songs of the Church (1623)", were written to be sung and played both at home and in church. Specially realized by Antony Pitts and Alexander L'Estrange for this recording, the complete collection is interleaved with new English hymns. - Classical Music Spotlight - Beethoven Liszt Symphonies 7 and 8 (19mb)
Fri, 01 Sep 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The transcriptions must speak for themselves. Liszt is meticulous in his accurate reproduction of original phrasing and his specification, where necessary, of the original instrumentation. Critics have compared his transcriptions [favorably] with the earlier piano versions of the symphonies by the virtuoso pianist Kalkbrenner, a pioneer in this field. Liszt does not primarily seek for technical display, however demanding the transcriptions may be. He is particularly adept in his solution of problems of balance and sonority, and helpful in the suggested fingerings that are included and in the care taken to distinguish parts in notation. - Classical Music Spotlight - El-Khoury's Lebanon in Flames (18mb)
Fri, 25 Aug 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The Franco-Lebanese composer and poet Bechara El-Khoury was born in Beirut in 1957. A master of orchestration, El-Khoury draws on the rich palette of resources available to today's composers, putting into music, "human nature and its passions". This disc features the brilliant orchestral miniature, "Dance of the Eagles, Op. 9", works inspired by the poetry of Khalil Gibran (Image Symphonique and Suite symphonique), and two panels in a triptych dedicated to the dramatic events of the war in Lebanon, "Lebanon in Flames", and "Requiem for Orchestra". - Classical Music Spotlight - Music of Ivan Khandoshkin (19mb)
Sat, 19 Aug 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A wonderful interview with Anastasia Khitruk discussing the works of Ivan Khandoshkin. - Classical Music Spotlight - Marin Alsop talks about Toru Takemitsu (14mb)
Fri, 11 Aug 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Marin Alsop discusses the works of Toru Takemitsu. Regarded as one of the most important composers of the second half of the twentieth century, Toru Takemitsu was the first Japanese composer to gain international status. The works on this disc cover Takemitsu's career from early "Solitude Sonore" to "Sprirt Garden" composed two years before his death. Inspired by a dream, "A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden" has passages of randomness, surges of dissonance and delicate melodies. - Classical Music Spotlight - Haydn Symphonies 18 to 21 (19mb)
Fri, 04 Aug 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The four symphonies included on this recording date from an early period of Haydn's career, when he was experimenting with a newly developing form. Nos. 18-20 were written around 1759 when Haydn had his first steady employment as music director to Count Morzin. "Symphony No. 21 in A major" dates from c. 1761 when Haydn entered the service of the Esterhazy family. Scored for oboes, horns, strings, and continuo, all four works are characteristically inventive. "Symphony No. 20 in C major", is unusually scored for additional trumpets and timpani. - Classical Music Spotlight - Violin Music of Max Bruch (19mb)
Fri, 28 Jul 2006 09:58:00 -0500
With its memorable tunes and dazzling writing for the solo instrument, Bruchs Violin Concerto No. 1 has been described as the quintessential Romantic showpiece. A firm favorite with soloists and audiences alike, it is coupled on this disc with two less frequently heard works for solo violin and orchestra that were originally conceived as possible concertos. - Roy Harris Symphonies 3 and 4 (19mb)
Fri, 21 Jul 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Strongly infl uenced by his native Oklahoma, Roy Harris studied in Paris with Nadia Boulanger, returning to America to establish himself as one of the leading composers of his generation. The backbone of his output is the series of thirteen symphonies, which span his career from 1933 to 1976. Described by the conductor, Serge Koussevitzky, as the first great symphony by an American composer, Symphony No. 3 is remarkable for its broad, sweeping melodies evoking vast landscapes, and for its affecting fusion of plainsong, Renaissance polyphony, hymnody and folk song. In Symphony No. 4 Folk Song Symphony,Harris draws on an eclectic mix of folk material from a variety of regional and ethnic roots that include cowboy songs, frontier ballads, spirituals and marching songs. - Edvard Grieg String Music (19mb)
Fri, 14 Jul 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Grieg was a master of the miniature, an aspect of his genius shown in this collection of works for string orchestra. The popular "Holberg Suite" translates a set of baroque dances into contemporary idiom. The other works are derived by the composer from earlier songs or piano pieces, of which Grieg wrote a very large number. Established in 1998, the internationally renowned Oslo Camerata has its own concert series at the Old Masonic Lodge in Oslo, which dates from Grieg's time. - Four Handed Brahms (19mb)
Fri, 07 Jul 2006 09:58:00 -0500
In keeping with the custom of the day, the scores of each of Brahms' four symphonies were all published in four-hand piano versions, so as to be accessible to a domestic audience. These arrangements reveal the cheerfulness and serenity of the Second Symphony, and those qualities which led the Third Symphony to be dubbed "Brahms' Eroica", in a fresh and fascinating light. - Lute Music of John Dowland (19mb)
Fri, 30 Jun 2006 09:58:00 -0500
The pre-eminent lutenist of his day, John Dowland was an almost exact contemporary of William Shakespeare. This first volume of his complete lute music, which comprises about one hundred solo pieces, includes the 7 Fantasies, free-form, improvisatory works in which the composer gives free rein to his fertile imagination and wonderful melodic gift. - Stockowski/Bach 01 (19mb)
Fri, 23 Jun 2006 09:58:00 -0500
It was as a young church organist that Leopold Stokowski grew to love the music of Bach. Later,he arranged a number of Bachs organ works for full symphonic forces. The results were a spectacular success and through Stokowskis Bach transcriptions music lovers heard baroque music in a new guise. Some of Stokowskis finest Bach arrangements are newly recorded here in highly enjoyable performances by Jos Serebrier and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. As one of the Leopold Stokowski Societys chief aims is to encourage performances of Stokowskis Symphonic Transcriptions we welcome his new Bach-Stokowski selection as a brilliant successor to the disc of Stokowskis transcriptions of music by Mussorgsky. - John Cage Piano Music (19mb)
Fri, 16 Jun 2006 09:58:00 -0500
American-born, John Cage, was one of the most adventurous musicians of the 20th century. Always seeking new musical sounds, he was a pioneer in the technique known as the Prepared Piano. This involved placing screws, bolts, and pieces of rubber and plastic on defined strings in the body of a grand piano. The fascinating range of sonorities created, often akin to music of the Orient, is explored in the Sonatas and Interludes composed between 1946-1948. - Ned Rorem Concertos for Violin and Flute (19mb)
Fri, 09 Jun 2006 09:58:00 -0500
Chosen in 1988 as Composer of the Year by Musical America and now recognized as one of the finest song composers in America, Ned Rorem has also written a significant body of music for orchestra,including Three Symphonies. Written in a refined tonal idiom like so much of Rorems music, the 1985 Violin Concerto is notable for its elegiac lyrical invention. The recent Flute Concerto, the first in a series of Philadelphia Orchestra commissions for its principals, was described at its premire as not so much a concerto as a surpassingly imaginative fantasy for flute and orchestra. It is performed on this world premire recording by its dedicatee, Jeffrey Khaner. - Mahler Symphony No. 8 (19mb)
Fri, 02 Jun 2006 09:58:00 -0500
With its enormous vocal, choral and orchestral forces, Mahlers Eighth Symphony, later to be dubbed Symphony of a Thousand, is one of the largest and longest symphonies in the active repertoire. Part One, inspired by the Whitsuntide Vesper hymn Veni creator spiritus, is an invocation to the Creator Spirit. Part Two, a setting of the closing scene from Goethes Faust, depicts Fausts redemption through wisdom and love. Try to imagine the whole universe beginning to ring and resound, was how Mahler himself described the impact of the closing pages of the Symphony. - Choral Music of Healy Willan (19mb)
Fri, 26 May 2006 09:58:00 -0500
A choirboy in his youth, Healey Willan had a life-long passion for the human voice. Not counting his output for organ, chamber music and orchestral works, the bulk of his almost 800 compositions involved voice in one form or another. Born in England, Willan moved to Canada in 1913, where he dominated the field of sacred music. This anthology includes the most popular choral work by Willan, Rise up my love, a wonderful illustration of the famous words a true church music is beautifully fit and fittingly beautiful. - Shostakovich: The Execution of Stepan Razin (19mb)
Fri, 19 May 2006 09:58:00 -0500
This disc of music by one of the greatest symphonists of the twentieth century ranges from the rarely heard Five Fragments of 1935, experimental practice runs for the Symphony No. 4, to one of the composers last orchestral works, the vibrant symphonic poem October, which commemorates the 50th anniversary of the 1917 Revolution. The Execution of Stepan Razin, composed in 1964, is based on the 17th century Cossack rebel and folk-hero who led an unsuccessful revolt against Tsar Alexis I, father of Peter the Great. Shostakovichs energetic score displays a mastery of orchestral and choral sonorities, alternating powerful climaxes and heartfelt evocations of Russian folk-song. - CMS- Thomas Tallis (19mb)
Fri, 12 May 2006 02:51:59 -0500
Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of Thomas Tallis
