Today's new releases include Mahler's Symphony No. 3 from Vasily Petrenko and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on Harmonia Mundi, an all-American programme from Barbara Hannigan and the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra on Alpha Classics, a live recording of Wagner's Ring Cycle from Fabio Luisi and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (with Lise Lindstrom as Brünnhilde, Mark Delavan as Wotan and Daniel Johansson as Siegfried) on Delos, and Celtic nocturnes and folksongs from Barry Douglas on Chandos.
Mahler: Symphony No. 3
Hanna Hipp (mezzo), Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia Chorus, Vasily Petrenko
This first instalment of Petrenko's projected Mahler series with the RPO was recorded live at the Royal Albert Hall in April 2023, when The Guardian applauded Hipp's 'glowing intensity' in the fourth movement and noted that 'Petrenko and the RPO wrung all love and pity' from the long concluding Adagio; Seen and Heard International described it as 'a performance of formidable power and emotional depth'.
Vasily Petrenko joined a live audience at Presto on Monday evening to offer his insights into the symphony and the challenges of recording in the Albert Hall; look out for highlights on our YouTube channel next week....
Available Formats: 2 CDs, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
An American Dream?
Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Barbara Hannigan
The Canadian soprano and conductor's programme of music by American composers includes Aaron Copland's Dance Symphony (drawn from a ballet which was inspired by watching the silent film Nosferatu in 1925), Robert Russell Bennett’s 'Symphonic Picture' of his friend Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, and Richard Rodgers's Carousel Waltz; the album closes with Hannigan and Bill Elliott's collaborative suite At the Fair, which includes 'I Stayed Too Long at the Fair' and 'Don't Rain on my Parade' from Funny Girl (both closely associated with Barbra Streisand, and sung here by Hannigan).
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
Mark Delavan (Wotan/Wanderer), Lise Lindstrom (Brünnhilde), Daniel Johansson (Siegfried), Sara Jakubiak (Sieglinde), Christopher Ventris (Siegmund), Stephen Milling (Hunding/Hagen), Tómas Tómasson (Alberich); Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Fabio Luisi
Released to mark the 150th anniversary of the first performance of the cycle at Bayreuth and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s 125th anniversary season, this Ring was recorded live in concert in October 2024, when Texas Classical Review enthused that 'Luisi's interpretation of the music and merging of the orchestra with the voices was superb'. The Italian maestro conducted Siegfried and Götterdämmerung at the Metropolitan Opera in 2012-13, when The New York Times praised his 'uncommonly articulate and nuanced account' of the latter opera.
Available Formats: 13 CDs, Hi-Res+ FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Celtic Nocturne
Barry Douglas (piano)
The Irish pianist celebrates his heritage with this collection of six nocturnes by his countryman John Field, his own arrangements of traditional Irish melodies including 'The Wild Colonial Boy', 'The Harp that Once through Tara’s Halls', 'The Rose of Tralee' and 'Cockles and Mussels', and three original compositions: Bataille des Celts, Song of the Sea, and Celtic Waltz. In a four-star review earlier this month, BBC Music Magazine praised his 'transparency of sound' in the Field pieces, and noted that 'the traditional Irish songs he's arranged have great charm'.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Stravinsky: Fairy Tales
Susan Platts (mezzo), Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Joann Falletta
Described as 'a generous, thoroughly recommendable collection…unfailingly musical' in next month's issue of Gramophone, this Stravinsky anthology comprises the 'poème symphonique' Le chant du rossignol (adapted from his first opera The Nightingale, which was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's 1843 story of the same name), the early Pushkin setting The Faun and the Shepherdess, the Divertimento drawn from the 1928 ballet Le baiser de la fée, and the Pulcinella Suite from 1922.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Mozart: Piano Concertos Nos. 25 & 26
Alim Beisembayev (piano), Orf Radio Symphonieorchester Wien, Howard Griffiths
This latest volume of Alpha's Next Generation Mozart Soloists series was recorded in Vienna two years after Alim Beisembayev won First Prize at The Leeds International Piano Competition (when The Guardian applauded the 'polish and maturity' of his playing); a few months before the recording, the Kazakhstani pianist made an unexpected and triumphant Proms debut in Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 (substituting for an unwell Benjamin Grosvenor). Playing a Bösendorfer VC 280, Beisembayev supplies his own cadenzas for both concerti.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Le Chevalier de Saint-George - Portrait
Lauranne Oliva, Victor Sicard, Bastien Rimondi, Théotime Langlois de Swarte (violin), Roxana Rastegar, Anna Sypniewski (viola), Hanna Salzenstein (cello), Justin Taylor, Orchestre de l'Opéra Royal
This portrait of the Guadalupe-born swordsman, athlete, composer and violinist is structured around excerpts from his sole surviving opera L'amant anonyme (1780); the programme also includes the Violin Concerto in C Op. 3 No. 2 with soloist Théotime Langlois de Swarte (who is later joined by Justin Taylor for the Sonata in G minor), one of the early Haydn-inspired string quartets, and the songs 'Sospiri, volato' and 'Rose d’amour'. The recording was made at Versailles, where Saint-George was employed first as a bodyguard to Louis XV and later as a court musician to Marie-Antoinette.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Spin: New Music For Violin & Orchestra From Northern Ireland
Darragh Morgan (violin), Ulster Orchestra, David Brophy
This collection of music by contemporary Northern Irish composers comprises four works written for Morgan (who has devoted much of his energies over the past three decades to commissioning works by his compatriots): Bill Campbell's Swim, Brian Irving's À mon seul désir (inspired by a series of fifteenth-century Flemish tapestries), Ryan Molloy's Violin Concerto (which draws on traditions laid out in Edward Bunting's 1840 treatise on the 'Ancient Music of Ireland'), and Frank Lyons's Boulez-influenced Spin:3 for amplified violin, live electronics and orchestra.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Clavecin XX
Justin Taylor (harpsichord), Orchestre National de Lille, Chloé Dufresne
The Franco-American harpsichordist's programme is structured around four twentieth-century concertos for the instrument (by Falla, Poulenc, Françaix and Górecki), interspersed with shorter solo pieces: the 'Hommage à J.S.B.' from Bartók's Mikrokosmos (arranged for harpsichord by Taylor), Stéphane Gassot's Bluesinuum (which Taylor commissioned), the second of Martinů's Two Impromptus for Harpsichord, and Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag. Reviewing the album for Gramophone this month, Thomas May described the programme as 'consistently engaging – and sometimes surprising'.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
American Ethos
Carolyn Enger (piano)
Released in anticipation of the celebration of the 250th anniversary of America’s Declaration of Independence, Enger's programme includes Bernstein's Thirteen Anniversaries (dedicated to family and friends including his wife Felicia Montealegre, Stephen Sondheim and the pianist William Kapell), John Corigliano's postscript An Anniversary for Lenny, four of William Grant Still's Seven Traceries, excerpts from Ned Rorem's Soundpoints, Florence Price's Adoration, and Aaron Copland's Three Piano Excerpts from 'Our Town'.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Troubled Times
The Queen's Six, Rose Consort of Viols
This exploration of 'Music and Espionage in Renaissance England' examines how composers responded to shifting allegiances, censorship, accusations of espionage and the prospect of exile or execution in the years from the Reformation to the Elizabethan settlement of 1559. The programme includes sacred works by William Byrd, John Taverner, Thomas Morley, Peter Philips, John Bull and Alfonso Ferrabosco père et fils.
Available Formats: CD, Hi-Res+ FLAC/ALAC/WAV, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
Lully: Proserpine
Marie Lys (Proserpine), Ambroisine Bré (Arethusa), Jean-Sébastien Bou (Crinise), Véronique Gens (Ceres), Nick Pritchard (Mercury), Laurence Kilsby (Alphée); Les Talens Lyriques, Christophe Rousset
Inspired by a story in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Lully and Philippe Quinault's 1680 'tragédie mise en musique' throws the focus of the myth more squarely onto the heroine's mother Ceres, who is devastated by Pluto's abduction of her daughter. Rousset's previous recordings of Lully operas have been showered with awards, with the Financial Times hailing his 'lithe and imaginative' approach to the music and International Record Review describing him as 'an assured stylist who produces gratifying results from singers and instrumentalists alike'.
Available Formats: 3 CDs, Hi-Res FLAC/ALAC/WAV, FLAC/ALAC/WAV, MP3
