Cho-Liang Lin

Praised by Gramophone magazine as “an invigorating account of the Seasons” when first released on 24-bit 88.2 kHz Stereo and Surround Recordings Naxos CD 8557920, Vivaldi’s universally popular Four Seasons, with their virtuoso part for solo violinist, depict the changing seasons in a pastoral landscape with dazzling variety. Violinist Cho-Liang Lin, who has been compared with Gidon Kremer, Nigel Kennedy and Kyung-Wha Chung, and the virtuoso ensemble Sejong give ‘a durable and unmannered, yet bracing and continuously interesting version’ (Fanfare) of these immortal classics.

Chinese-American composer Bright Sheng acknowledges no aesthetic borders, weaving together haunting melodies and sonorities from sources as diverse as Chinese, Kazakhstani and Tibetan music, or even his own dreams, like silken threads into shimmering brocades of sound.

His love of song and dance, blending Asian and Western instrumental textures, imbues his music with a fascinating, highly personal cultural counterpoint that has won him immense popularity, critical acclaim and an enviable reputation as an ever-fresh voice in cross-cultural music.

The Sunday Times called 8554499, the previous disc of Chinese Music in the Naxos catalogue, “an excellent, unusual bargain.”

The Austrian-born Georg Tintner achieved fame as a conductor but considered himself a ‘composer who conducts’, with an ambition ‘to write beautiful music’.