Dvorák: Piano Trios Nos. 3 & 4

This fruitful collaboration by three eminent chamber musicians, Christian Tetzlaff, Tanja Tetzlaff and Lars Vogt, brings together two Piano Trios by the Czech master, Antonín Dvorák (1841–1904). During the last eight years, artists forming this unique trio have recorded eight albums of chamber music for Ondine with great acclaim, including some of the Romantic standard works. These two chamber music masterpieces by Antonín Dvorák express great emotional depth and dark passion.

Requiem

Completed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, Harbison’s Requiem is full of dramatic passages from singers and musicians alike, with abundant opportunities for vocal soloists, brass and percussion to shine. “I wanted my piece to have a sense of the inexorability of the passage of time,” the composer says, “for good and ill, of the commonality of love and loss.”

Bernstein

The sparkling overture to Leonard Bernstein’s 1956 musical Candide immediately found a prominent place in concert programs all over the world and is now one of his most frequently performed pieces. Many of Bernstein’s best loved works drew inspiration from the city of New York, and this is true both of the three sailors pursuing female conquest in the ballet ‘Fancy Free,’ and of the rip-roaring swing rhythm and big tunes from the musical ‘Wonderful Town.’

A Bernstein Birthday Bouquet

While the ‘Birthday Bouquet’ takes the form of affectionate musical tributes from eight composer colleagues to one of the twentieth century’s greatest musicians. Marin Alsop is an inspiring and powerful voice in the international music scene who passionately believes that “music has the power to change lives.” She became music director of the Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra in 2012 and made history in 2013 as the first female conductor of the BBC’s Last Night of the Proms.

Music for Brass Septet Vol. 6

Septura brings together London’s leading players to redefine brass chamber music through the uniquely expressive sound of the brass septet. By creating a canon of transcriptions, arrangements and new commissions for this brand new classical configuration, aims to recast brass ensemble as a serious artistic medium. England’s otherwise checkered compositional history, and a period in which brass instruments, in the form of the brass band.

Halla Steinunn Stefánsdóttir: H e (a) r

Textura Raindamage is an album best appreciated on headphones, when you’ve got the time to really let it seep into your brain. Titled H e (a) r the album features 7 world premiere recordings, including a soundscape which lends its title to the album by the group’s artistic director; composer and violinist Halla Steinunn Stefánsdóttir. The work H e (a) r connects to ecology, acoustics and embodiment; drawing on encounters and what happens in the connection.