Musician-led ensemble Palaver Strings releases its new album of music by diverse female composers, Ready or Not. Works on the album include Grażyna Bacewicz’s Concerto for String Orchestra; Non può il mio cuore by Venetian singer, lutenist, and composer Maddalena Casulana; composer Barbara Strozzi’s madrigal Lagrime mie featuring a performance by m…

Cellist Ani Aznavoorian and pianist Marta Aznavoorian, each a renowned soloist and chamber musician in her own right, together celebrate the sounds of their ancestral homeland on Gems from Armenia. The album marks the Chicago-raised sisters’ recording debut as the Aznavoorian Duo. Purchase the music (without talk) at:Gems from Armenia (classicalsav…

William Tell is a French-language opera in four acts by Italian composer Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy and L. F. Bis, based on Friedrich Schiller's play Wilhelm Tell, which, in turn, drew on the William Tell legend. The opera was Rossini's last, although he lived for nearly 40 more years. Fabio Luisi said that Ros…

The project began as a nine-month exploration of the Sibelius symphonies to mark Mäkelä’s inaugural season with the Oslo Philharmonic as Chief Conductor but, with Covid cancellations, turned into a completely immersive recording project. With the orchestral season disrupted, Mäkelä and the orchestra devoted much of the Spring of 2021 to playing not…

Deutsche Grammophon released VOYAGER: ESSENTIAL MAX RICHTER, the first-ever collection of the acclaimed British composer’s work. The 33-track collection will be available as a double CD and e-album and contains work from across his vast catalog, including studio albums such as 2004’s acclaimed The Blue Notebooks, Richter; reviewed by Pitchfork as o…

Aureliano in Palmira is an operatic dramma serio in two acts written by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto in which the librettist was credited only by the initials "G. F. R." The libretto has generally been attributed to Felice Romani, but sometimes to the otherwise unknown Gian Francesco Romanelli. It has been suggested that the latter name…

. Arc I is the inaugural album of an ambitious three-part series and features important works for solo piano from the frantic years of 1911-1913 – the precipice before World War I. The three musical stories on Arc I – Granados’ Goyescas, Janáček’s In the Mists, and Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 9 ”Black Mass” – each struggle with the same impossible …

Born in 1925 in Sacramento, California, to Polish immigrants, Slenczynska gave her concert debut at the age of four (just as the world entered the Great Depression), performed on television aged five, and at six made her European concert debut in Berlin. 92 years later, the extraordinary pianist still performs to audiences around the world. ‘MY LIF…

Ziporyn who released his landmark Cantaloupe Music recording; ‘This Is Not a Clarinet’ in 2001, does the impossible on Pop Channel, taking us through some of the best iconic pop songs during the last 5 decades, imagined through a compendium of clarinets and all arranged, layered, and performed by Ziporyn. Every sound on this album – the lead vocals…

Rossini wrote L'italiana in Algeri when he was 21. Rossini stated that he composed the opera in 18 days, though other sources claim that it took him 27 days. Rossini entrusted the composition of the recitatives as well as the aria "Le femmine d'Italia" to an unknown collaborator. The opera is notable for Rossini's mixing of opera seria style with o…

Violinist Angèle Dubeau's newest release ELLE, is an album that magnificently marks the 25 years of existence of her orchestra La Pietà. This 46th album resonates with the feminine sensitivity and virtuosity specific to Angèle Dubeau and the ensemble she founded in 1997, which has ever since demonstrated its artistic excellence and audacity. ELLE t…

Night: it can be dreamy or comforting, but sometimes it’s frightening, full of dark secrets. So it’s no great surprise that the long hours of darkness, often spent awake, have inspired so many composers to write some of their most touching works: Chopin’s dreamy Nocturnes, for example, Schumann’s dainty “Nachtstücke” or Ravel’s spine­chilling cycle…

Wagner: Meistersinger PreludeBruckner: Symphony No. 2 in C minor, WAB 102 (1877 version)Bruckner: Symphony No. 8 in C minor, WAB 108 (1890 version) Andris Nelsons, conductorGewandhausorchester Purchase the music (without talk) at:Bruckner: Symphonies 2 and 8 (classicalsavings.com)Your purchase helps to support our show! Classical Music Discoveries …

L'equivoco stravagante (The Curious Misunderstanding) is an operatic dramma giocoso in two acts by Gioachino Rossini to an Italian libretto by Gaetano Gasbarri. It was Rossini's first attempt at writing a full two-act opera.L'equivoco stravagante was first performed at the Teatro del Corso, Bologna, on 26 October 1811. It was only performed three t…

This broadcast introduces our international audience to Rossini, our featured opera composer for March 2022. You will hear overtures from the 4 operas we feature this month: L'equivoco stravagante (The Curious Misunderstanding) L'italiana in Algeri (The Italian Girl in Algiers) Aureliano in Palmira William Tell…

Pulitzer Prize-nominated composer, performer, and writer Kate Soper releases The Understanding of All Things, a portrait album featuring frequent Wet Ink Ensemble collaborator Sam Pluta, on New Focus Recordings. The Understanding of All Things features Soper performing as vocalist, pianist, and electronics composer in three of her works: the title …

Night falls in diverse ways in Magdalena Hoffmann's debut album. Nightscapes sees the German harpist dive deep into the intimate, mysterious, magical world of night music, as well as exploring the theme of dance. Its tracklist spans everything from the austere beauty of Britten's Suite for Harp Op. 83 to the folk-like colors of Tournier's La danse …

Hailed as “one of a kind, a banjoist who specializes in classical music and regularly knocks socks off left and right doing so,” John Bullard has released a new recording, 24 Preludes for Solo Banjo, Volume One, Books 1 & 2 Nos. I-XII was produced by multiple Juno Award and Grammy-winning David Travers-Smith. Bullard commissioned composer Adam Larr…

L'Africaine (The African Woman) is an 1865 French grand opéra in five acts with music by Giacomo Meyerbeer and a libretto by Eugène Scribe. Meyerbeer and Scribe began working on the opera in 1837, using the title L'Africaine, but around 1852 changed the plot to portray fictitious events in the life of the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama and intro…

Lisa Batiashvili’s new album, released on May 29, 2020, takes the listener across the world with eleven carefully chosen pieces that represent the most important cities in her life, as well as a suite based on Charlie Chaplin’s own music for City Lights and other films of his, extending last year’s celebration of the 130th anniversary of the iconic…

From prison reform, the plight of refugees, the need for music education for all, to the industry-defining In War and Peace, opera superstar Joyce DiDonato has long been an artist who has dedicated herself to creating and initiating projects that challenge and galvanize the public, transcending the physical confines of the concert hall. Player.FM P…

Pianist Daniil Trifonov is known for performances of 19th and 20th-century virtuoso repertory and hardly at all for Bach. Thus one might expect from his album Bach: The Art of Life a certain old-school Romantic quality and even music that is a bit over the top. The album is all that and more. The title is a bit unclear; the interview-format notes q…

Vestige, an album featuring premiere recordings of new pieces by five composers, performed by the contemporary chamber ensemble Wild Rumpus (now Ninth Planet). Five years in the making, Vestige is an ambitious melding of contemporary chamber music and Avant-rock. It features five compositions commissioned by Wild Rumpus, plus an arrangement of a Ra…

The Day the Earth Stood Still stands as one of the earliest and greatest examples of film exploring the mystery and fear of alien contact, using it as an allegory for our mistrust of one another. With its flying saucer, all-powerful robot, and unnervingly calm humanoid alien, much of this movie feels surreal, and that unsettled feeling is encourage…

Before and After, the much-anticipated new album from NOW Ensemble, a group of composers and performers creating "effervescent, genre-busting" chamber music for the 21st century. Before and After-NOW's seventh album with New Amsterdam is devoted to the "refreshingly new and solidly mature" work of Rome Prize-winning composer Sean Friar. Featuring f…

After the brilliant success of their grand opera Les Huguenots (1836), Meyerbeer and his librettist Scribe decided to collaborate again on a piece based on a historical religious conflict. Meyerbeer's great personal wealth and his duties as official court composer to King Frederick William IV of Prussia meant that there was no hurry to complete the…

Wagner: Prelude and Liebestod to "Tristan und Isolde"Bruckner: Symphony No. 1 in C minor, WAB 101Bruckner: Symphony No. 5 in B-flat Major, WAB 105 Andris Nelsons conducts the Gewandhausorchester Purchase the music (without talk) at:Bruckner: Symphonies 1 and 5 plus Wagner: Prelude and Liebestod to Tristan und Isolde (classicalsavings.com)Your purch…

In 1949, two young Argentinian child prodigies met and made music together for the first time, the rest, as they say, is history. In continuation of Martha Argerich’s birthday celebrations, we announce a new album from Daniel Barenboim and Martha Argerich, performing selected works by Claude Debussy. Fantasia for Piano and OrchestraSonata for Violi…

Jennifer Kloetzel’s lifelong journey with Beethoven began early: she was eight years old when her teacher placed the composer’s second cello sonata on her music stand, opening the door to an odyssey of intrigue and, ultimately, obsession with the composer’s music. Since then, rarely has a day passed without Beethoven being a part of Jennifer’s life…

The film's music was composed by Bernard Herrmann. Herrmann had composed for Welles for his Mercury Theatre radio broadcasts. Because it was Herrmann's first motion picture score, RKO wanted to pay him only a small fee, but Welles insisted he is paid at the same rate as Max Steiner. Purchase the music (without talk) at:Herrmann: Citizen Kane (class…

REDEEMING LOVE (ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK) with music by composers BRIAN TYLER and BRETON VIVIAN. The album features music written by the composing duo for the Western romance based on the bestselling novel by Francine Rivers. The project is the latest collaboration between Redeeming Love director DJ Caruso and Brian Tyler, who have worked…

Les Huguenots was some five years in creation. Meyerbeer prepared carefully for this opera after the sensational success of Robert le diable, recognizing the need to continue to present lavish staging, a highly dramatic storyline, impressive orchestration, and virtuoso parts for the soloists – the essential elements of the new genre of Grand Opera.…

The new album “On DSCH” by Igor Levit is a 3CD discographic tour de force by “one of the essential artists of our time” (The New York Times). That the self-styled “maximalist” enjoys pushing himself to his limits – intellectually and physically – is well known, but the present project – two key cycles of musical modernism - puts all others in the s…

Multi-Grammy-nominated cellist Matt Haimovitz’s latest recording, PRIMAVERA II the rabbits, features the next 13 of 81 new pieces written for Haimovitz. Commissioned by THE PRIMAVERA PROJECT, also featuring Haimovitz’s new arrangement of Josquin de Prez’s Kyrie (from Missa Hercules Dux Ferrariae). The project asks composers to respond to Sandro Bot…

aubades, the new album from Jean-Michel Blais, marks the Montreal-born artist's transition from pianist to composer as he writes for an ensemble for the first time in his career. Written during the pandemic and following a breakup, Blais has used his distinctive musical voice to create a defiantly uplifting record with glistening instrumental textu…

This year's concert was broadcast to over 90 countries all over the world and watched by more than 50 million viewers on TV. The TV broadcast gained a market share of 60% in its home country Austria – the highest share since 2014 - with 1,16 million viewers The program included works by members of the Strauß dynasty (Johann Strauß I and II as well …

Modern Times is a 1936 American silent comedy film written and directed by Charlie Chaplin in which his iconic Little Tramp character struggles to survive in the modern, industrialized world. The film is a comment on the desperate employment and financial conditions many people faced during the Great Depression — conditions created, in Chaplin's vi…

Daniel Hope takes a deep dive into the rich repertoire of American music, exploring its roots and distinctive qualities. "We know a piece is from America the moment we hear it", says Hope. "But what makes music sound American?". Hope’s new album provides some answers, presenting works by composers as diverse as Leonard Bernstein, Sam Cooke, Aaron C…

Robert le diable (Robert the Devil) was immediately successful from its first night on 21 November 1831 at the Opéra; the dramatic music, harmony and orchestration, its melodramatic plot, its star singers, and its sensational stage effects compelled Frédéric Chopin, who was in the audience, to say, "If ever magnificence was seen in the theatre, I d…

The album includes some works known to millions worldwide, and others, such as the Suite from Far and Away and the moving Elegy for cello and orchestra, that may be less familiar but are no less brilliant. Maestro Williams briefly introduced many of the pieces, adding to the sense of occasion and expressing his joy at working with the mighty Berlin…

GRAMMY Award-winning Catalyst Quartet releases UNCOVERED Volume 2: Florence B. Price on Azica Records. The album is the second issue of a multi-volume anthology highlighting string quartet works by historically important Black composers which aims to bring greater awareness and programming of their music. Volume 2 is entirely devoted to the six kno…

Jasmin Lacasse Roy is an accomplished musician who draws his inspiration from a wide range of sources: from Hendrix to Debussy. In addition to several other awards, he won first prizes at the International Fringe Music Competition of Hong Kong, the Montreal Guitar Grand Prix, and the Canadian Music Competition. His style plays with the limits of ex…

This episode introduces Giacomo Meyerbeer, our featured opera composer for the month of February 2022. Meyerbeer is almost a completely unknown opera composer in today's world, although he was the most internationally famous opera composer of his day. However, thanks to the politically driven "cancel culture" of his day - Wagner and the Nazi regime…

Charlie Chaplin and Virginia Cherrill in City Lights (1931) City Lights proved to be the hardest and longest undertaking of Chaplin’s career. By the time it was completed he had spent two years and eight months on the work, with almost 190 days of actual shooting. The marvel is that the finished film betrays nothing of this effort and anxiety. Purc…

Fresh from this year’s triumph of the Nomadland and The Father soundtracks, illustrious composer and pianist Ludovico Einaudi announces Underwater, his first new solo piano album in 20 years. 1. Luminous2. Rolling Like A Ball3. Indian Yellow4. Flora5. Natural Light6. Almost June7. Swordfish8. Wind Song9. Atoms10. Temple White11. Nobody Knows12. Und…

Tristan und Isolde (Tristan and Isolde), WWV 90, is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the 12th-century romance Tristan and Iseult by Gottfried von Strassburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered at the Königliches Hoftheater und Nationaltheater in Munich on 10 June 1865 w…

In January 2022, violinist Sean Lee and pianist Peter Dugan celebrate Paganini in the first-ever performance of all 24 Caprices in the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s 52-year history as well as the release of a new EP of nine Caprices with accompanying music videos. A top prizewinner at the “Premio Paganini” International Violin Competiti…

New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) releases From Rags to Riches: 100 Years of American Song on its new in-house label, NYFOS Records. The label’s debut album features the acclaimed voices of mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe and tenor William Burden, together with Steven Blier, Artistic Director of the NYFOS who accompanies Blythe and Burden, on the pi…

Piano music to help you achieve inner calm. Tracklist:StaySheAcross the DistanceOne Day You Finally KnewI Wish I Were CloseBlackwater PondI Wrote You a SongShe Dreams of TimeWhat Gorgeous ThingRainPurchase the music (without talk) at:Calm It Down (classicalsavings.com)Your purchase helps to support our show! Classical Music Discoveries is sponsored…

Critically-acclaimed composer Danaë Xanthe Vlasse’s new album Mythologies has been nominated for the GRAMMY® Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. Featuring sopranos Hila Plitmann and Sangeeta Kaur – the literal and figurative muses for Mrs. Vlasse – the stunning new album honors her heritage with a collection of works inspired by Ancient Gree…