Aznach Ensemble
Zoura [ Harmonia Mundi / CD ] |
BEETHOVEN / DEBUSSY / FAURE / SAINT-SAENS / etc
Proust, or How The Heart Skips A Beat (complete ballet recorded in 2007) Choreography by Roland Petit Ballet de l'Opéra National de Paris / Stéphanie Romberg / Eleonora Abbagnato / Manuel Legris / Koen Kessels (cond) [ Bel Air Classiques / Harmonia Mundi Distibution / DVD - released 1/Dec/2008 ] G - In 1974, Roland Petit, probably the greatest and certainly one of the most prolific of 20th century French choreographers he was the first person to create a work based on Proust's novel, A la recherche du temps perdu, completed in 1922, the... |
ZELENKA / BACH / LOTTI
Thomas Hengelbrock conducts Zelenka, Bach & Lotti Balthasar Neumann Ensemble & Choir, Thomas Hengelbrock [ Deutsche Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 1/Oct/2010 ] "This is nothing short of revelatory." Gramophone Awards 2010 WINNER: Baroque Vocal |
J. S. BACH
Bach: Ich habe viel Bekammernis Cantatas BWV21 & BWV42 Barbara Schlick (sop) Garard Lesne (counter-tenor) Howard Crook (tenor) Peter Kooy (bass) La Chapelle Royale / Philippe Herreweghe [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 27/Mar/2020 ] Superbly constructed, the cantata Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis is incontestably one of Bach's finest works. The masterly arrangements of the material endows it with an emotional cohesion and a dramatic intensity worthy of the Passions and the Mass in B... |
J. S. BACH
Bach Edition [10 CD set incls Brandenburg Concertos, B Minor Mass, Art of the Fugue] Barthold Kuijken (flute) Lucy van Dael (violin) Elly Ameling (sop) / La Petite Bande / Collegium Aurem / etc [ Deutsche Harmonia Mundi / 10 CD Box Set - released 20/Feb/2013 ] Sigiswald Kuijken is both a fine violinist and an excellent conductor, with his group La Petite Bande. He has long specialized in Bach, recording cantatas, orchestral works, and a set of the Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin. |
GEORG FRIDERIC HANDEL
Handel: Ombra Cara Bejun Mehta (counter-tenor) Freiburger Barockorchester, Renee Jacobs [ Harmonia Mundi Musique d'abord / CD - released 21/Jul/2017 ] "This is, inexplicably, his first recital CD. It's superb." (10/10 ClassicsToday Feb 2011) |
VARIOUS COMPOSERS
20th Century English Songs Bejun Mehta (countertenor) / Julius Drake (piano) [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 3/Oct/2011 ] "Bejun Mehta certainly can't be faulted on his eclecticism in his whistle-stop tour of English song...Mehta's singing is so heart-stoppingly beautiful and musically perceptive that you wish he had recorded whole cycles rather than just representative... |
JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
Bach: The Complete Works For Keyboard Volume 3 - In the French Style Benjamin Alard [ Harmonia Mundi / 3 CD - released 15/May/2020 ] Having already attracted attention for his exceptional gifts, Bach entered the service of the Weimar court at the age of twenty three. This was the start of the period known as his 'early maturity', in which his formal and expressive experiments... |
J. S. BACH
Bach: The Complete Work for keyboard Vol.3 - In the French Style Benjamin Alard (harpsichord & organ) [ Harmonia Mundi / 3 CD - released 10/Apr/2020 ] Having already attracted attention for his exceptional gifts, Bach entered the service of the Weimar court at the age of twenty-three. This was the start of the period known as his 'early maturity', in which his formal and expressive experiments... |
JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
Bach: The Complete Works for keyboard Volume 2 - Towards the North Benjamin Alard [ Harmonia Mundi / 2 CD - released 12/Apr/2019 ] In this second instalment of the complete keyboard works, Benjamin Alard demonstrates with splendid eloquence how invaluable the young Bach's north German experience proved to be; his attentive examination of the works of the great organ masters and... |
J.S. BACH
Johann Sebastian Bach / Complete Keyboard Edition Vol.1 - The Young Heir Benjamin Alard [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 23/Mar/2018 ] Bach's youth was a vast field of observation. From the years of apprenticeship in Ohrdruf, where his precocious artistic sensibility was dazzlingly demonstrated, to his first major post as organist at Arnstadt, Bach constantly enriched his musical... |
J.S. BACH
Bach: Vol 8: Köthen 1717-1723 "For Maria Barbara" Benjamin Alard & co [ Harmonia Mundi / 3 CD - released 12/May/2023 ] Eagerly pursuing his exploration of Bach's corpus for solo keyboard, Benjamin Alard focuses here on works associated with the composer's first wife, Maria Barbara, and her untimely death in 1720. This instalment therefore includes both the Inventions... |
J. S. BACH
Bach: The Complete Works for Keyboard, Vol. 6 "Das Wohltemperierte Klavier" Benjamin Alard (harpsichord & clavichord) [ Harmonia Mundi / 2 CD - released 25/Apr/2022 ] After five volumes devoted to the early years of J. S. Bach, up to the Weimar period, Benjamin Alard takes an utterly fascinating approach to the first book of The Well-Tempered Clavier. First he offers the listener an astonishing mental preparation... |
J. S. BACH
Bach: The Complete Works for Keyboard, Vol. 7 Orgelbüchlein, Bwv 599-644 (with Choir) Benjamin Alard (harpsichord & clavichord), Ensemble Vocal Bergamasque, Marine Fribourg, Maîtrise Notre-Dame de Paris [ Harmonia Mundi / 2 CD - released 14/Oct/2022 ] 'The effect, both individually and collectively, is stunning.' Gramophone Award Finalist 2023 - Instrumental |
MONTEVERDI
Madrigali Guerrieri Ed Amorosi Book 8 Bernarda Fink / Maria Cristina Kiehr / Concerto Vocale / Rena Jacobs [ Harmonia Mundi / 2 CD - released 12/Dec/2002 ] 'This is early vocal chamber music at its most sophisticated.' (BBC Radio CD Review) |
RODRIGO / de FALLA / GRANADOS
Canciones españolas Bernarda Fink (mezzo) Anthony Spiri (piano) [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 10/Dec/2012 ] "Fink is one of the song repertoire's most complete polyglots...these performances are idiomatic and thrilling." (The Sunday Times) |
VARIOUS COMPOSERS
Slovenija! - Slovenic Art Songs & Duets Bernarda Fink (mezzo) Anthony Spiri (piano [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 10/Mar/2011 ] Closely associated with the folklore of the Balkans, the musical tradition of Slovenia also has a Romantic branch born at the confluence of the Alps and the Adriatic, between Austria and Italy. Bernarda and Marcos Fink (whose parents are Slovenian)... |
MAHLER
Bernarda Fink sings Mahler Lieder Bernarda Fink (mezzo) & Anthony Spiri (piano) / Gustav Mahler Ensemble & Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich, Andrés Orozco-Estrada [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 19/Jun/2014 ] An exciting exploration of the sources of Mahlerian inspiration. Can one really grasp the whole of Mahler's symphonic output without knowing his songs? Not only do they extensively irrigate the first four symphonies, often known as 'Wunderhorn... |
SCHUMANN
Lieder: Maria Stuart Op 135 / Liederkreis op 39 / etc Bernarda Fink (mezzo) Anthony Spirl (piano) [ Harmonia Mundi / CD - released 10/Mar/2010 ] "The cycle fits Fink's grave, elegant voice ideally, while pianist Anthony Spiri gently highlights some of the stranger timbres. In the Rückert and Myrthen songs, "Jemand" and "O Sonn', o Meer, o Rose!" have extraordinary shimmer" Independent Jan 2010 |
BACH
Solo Cantatas Bernarda Fink (mezzo-soprano), Freiburger Barockorchester, dir. P. Müllejans [ Harmonia Mundi Gold / CD - released 17/Jun/2016 ] "Fink's velvet-timbred mezzo evokes to perfection the consoling sentiment of Bach's alto arias. Vergnügte Ruh has long been a favourite of star mezzos and countertenors, but Fink sings with an artless humility, with eloquent yet never overemphatic... |