George Frideric Handel

Not only violinists are eternally grateful to Antonio Vivaldi for the sheer abundance of concert works he bequeathed. The instrument he wrote for with the second greatest frequency is the bassoon (!), for which he created about forty concertos. Two of the most celebrated bookend Václav Vonášek’s debut recording and are supplemented by pieces by other 18th-century masters, J. S. Bach, C. P. E. Bach and G. F. Handel. Vonášek has primarily arranged for the bassoon compositions intended for the flute, as was customary in the Baroque period. They demonstrate the soloist’s exceptional qualities, for which he has garnered a number of accolades – first prizes at the International Double Reed Society competition (Melbourne, 2004) and the Prague Spring international competition (2009), third prize at the ARD Competition in Munich (2008). Václav Vonášek, accompanied by the distinguished young ensemble Barocco sempre giovane, makes the bassoon sing, unleashes a tempest and conjures up the dreamy atmosphere of the night...

The bassoon in the hands of a true master – virtuosic, colourful, enchanting.

The Brook Street Band join forces with the Choir of The Queen’s College, Oxford, and their director Owen Rees, for the first ever pairing on disc of the two settings of the Dixit Dominus by Alessandro Scarlatti and George Frideric Handel.

Following five critically-acclaimed and immensely popular recordings for AVIE, The Brook Street Band embark on their most ambitious project to date: a recording with the estimable student Choir of The Queen's College, Oxford, that pairs for the first time ever the two settings of the Dixit Dominus written by Alessandro Scarlatti and George Frideric Handel. Both works date from early 18th century Rome, Handel’s within a year of his arriving in the musical capital, and possibly influenced by Scarlatti's work, though the date of the elder Italian’s composition is not precisely known. Indeed it has been suggested that the 22-year-old Lutheran was attempting to outdo Scarlatti with his masterly grasp of large-scale sacred music for the Roman rite. In between these two grand Vespers, The Brook Street Band serve up a palette cleanser of an instrumental concerto in G minor by Scarlatti.

On this recording the massed forces are joined by five of Britain’s brightest young singers: soprano Elin Manahan Thomas, mezzo-sopranos Esther Brazil and Sally Bruce-Payne, tenor Guy Cutting, and bass-baritone Matthew Brook.

Cries of ‘Vive Kl’empereur’ rang out in the Kroll Opera House after Klemperer’s first appointment as its director, conducting a concert of Bach and Mozart. This collection provides a wealth of the celebrated conductor’s Baroque and Classical repertoire, showcasing – at the forefront of the selection – Klemperer’s characteristically ‘unadorned’ Bach as well as his fiery interpretations of Haydn’s late symphonies. The set also includes Rameau’s Gavotte with Six Variations, Handel’s A minor Concerto Grosso and Gluck’s Overture to Iphigénie en Auilde.

Otto Klemperer was born on 14th May 1885 in Breslau, Silesia (now Wroclaw, Poland) and died on 6th July 1973 in Zurich, hence 2013 marks 40 years since his passing. He had had a remarkable career as a young man but it was at the age of 70 that he started a series of recordings that would not only establish him as an internationally renowned conductor but provide EMI with a catalogue of recordings that became and remain touchstones.

This collection contains the solo orchestral recordings that Klemperer undertook of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. He recorded the Bach Orchestral Suites twice, the first in 1954, these appear on CD for the first time, and in 1969 whilst the recording of the Brandenburg Concertos date from 1960. Of Handel, he recorded No, 4 of the set of six Concerti Grossi Op. 6 in 1956.

The Classical period is represented in this collection by Franz Josef Haydn. In all Klemperer recorded 8 of his symphonies – 6 from the set written for Salomon’s London concerts, the once-called “Oxford”, supposedly written for the time he received an honorary degree from its university and the delightful No. 88. These recordings were made over the period from 1960 to 1971.

The works by the other two composers contained in this box are arrangements. Gluck composed his opera Iphigenia in Aulis in 1774 inspired by Euripedes’s last play written between 408 and 406BC, the year of his death. Richard Wagner made his arrangement at the end of 1846/beginning of 1847 in Dresden and it was this that Klemperer heard when Gustav Mahler conducted it in 1907 just a few weeks short of his 22nd birthday and this would serve as an inspiration for his entire career.

The work by Rameau was transcribed by Klemperer himself in 1967 and is a Gavotte in A minor with six doubles – or variations – taken from his Nouvelles suites de pieces de clavecin (c.1728). It was first performed with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in June 1968.

Multiple award-winning Dutch pianist, Daria van den Bercken, displays her exceptional talent and passion for Handel’s keyboard music with her debut album on Sony Classical.

Her project, ‘Handel at the Piano’ is aimed at familiarising a worldwide audience with the keyboard works of George Frideric Handel. Daria recently addressed the TEDx Conference in Amsterdam on the subject of first reactions to music, particularly Handel, where she argued that creating opportunities is part of the musician’s work.

Daria is known for her innovative and unusual performance spaces, which include impromptu concerts in her home, performing in South America suspended from a crane above the audience, and being towed through the cobbled streets of Amsterdam while seated at a piano.

She has appeared as a guest on ‘Pauw & Witteman’, a Dutch late-night talkshow, to perform and discuss ‘Handel at the Piano’ to a 1.3 million viewers.

Daria has performed with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Arnhem Philharmonic Orchestra Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, Christoph Poppet, JoAnn Falletta, Ivan Meylemans and Shi-Yeon Shung and has studied with Murray Perahia and Leon Fleisher among many notable pianists.

For his 1996 Glyndebourne staging, radical American director Peter Sellars takes George Frideric Handel’s penultimate English oratorio – a tale of self-sacrificial love between a Christian virgin and a Roman imperial bodyguard in fourth-century, enemy-occupied Antioch – and, by resetting it in modern-day America, transforms it into a timeless parable of spiritual resistance to tyranny and persecution.

SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH, FRENCH, GERMAN

207 MINS • ALL REGIONS • NTSC 4:3 • COLOUR • L-PCM STEREO

George Frideric Handel, widely considered one of the foremost composers of his generation, became the pride of Britain despite the fact that he was German‐born.

Famed for his large‐scale vocal works, he was the inventor of the English oratorio, a genre that brought him much success.

Jephtha was Handel’s final oratorio, written in 1751 while the composer was suffering badly from his failing eyesight. Based on the tale of Jephtha from the Book of Judges, the title character makes a promise to God that, in the event that he should triumph over the Ammonites, he will sacrifice the first living creature he meets. Unluckily this proves to be his beloved daughter, Iphis.

As in the Renaissance version of the story, Iphis is saved by an angel who decrees that, instead of dying, Iphis will dedicate her life to God in the Temple.

In the title role is renowned British lyric tenor John Mark Ainsley, who continues to enjoy an active international career. German soprano Christiane Oelze plays the doomed Iphis, while contralto Catherine Denley takes on the role of her cautious mother, Storgè.

The Art of Magdalena Kožená is an anthology of her finest performances, documenting both the range of her voice and the breadth of repertoire to which she can bring authority, from early baroque of Monteverdi and Strozzi to sacred arias by Bach, opera arias by Handel, Vivaldi, Mozart, Gounod, Bizet and Auber, as well as orchestral songs by Mahler. To all she brings an absorbing emotional depth and maturity of her interpretative abilities.

Unique to Kožená are the songs rooted in Bohemia and Moravia by Dvořak and Janáček. She still feels closely connected to her Czech roots. “It’s music that stays in your body forever”.

This is Magdalena’s own selection of her favourite songs and arias, sung in French, Italian and German as well as in her mother tongue.

28-page Booklet, including new liner notes from Nick Kimberley.

The vocal sensation everyone’s talking about – Russian soprano Julia Lezhneva – makes her Decca solo debut with a celebratory disc of motets from Vivaldi, Handel, Porpora and Mozart, partnered by one of the world’s leading early music ensembles, Il Giardino Armonico, conducted by Giovanni Antonini.

Praised for her “pure tone” (Opernwelt) and “flawless technique” (Guardian), Lezhneva’s career has skyrocketed since her brief but extraordinary appearance at the 2010 Classical BRIT Awards in London, at the invitation of her mentor, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa. “Few young singers have been as widely celebrated so early in their careers as Kiri Te Kanawa’s protegé, the . . . Russian soprano Julia Lezhneva”, wrote The Independent. Dame Kiri recently added her voice to the critical consensus, observing that “from time time to time a really outstanding talent appears and I believe that Julia Lezhneva is just that. The brilliance of her voice and technique are extremely impressive.”

A celebration of the pioneering early music label Archiv, offering 55CDs ranged across the label’s entire 66-year history. Beautiful presentation, original jacket sleeves and documentation to the customary high standards of the label.

In more ways than one, 2013 will be an Archiv Produktion year. The beloved Silver Label – the “Early Music Studio of Deutsche Grammophon”, as it was called for many years – is being revived in a big way, both in frontline and catalogue. In early April 2013 an event in Berlin is being held to mark this relaunch. New albums from choral group Tenebrae, Anna Prohaska and Giuliano Carmignola are being released in the first quarter to coincide with this occasion.

Simple, striking and strong: in gleaming silver with the large blue Archiv Logo embossed on all sides. A large onsert on the top and back of the box details contents and is illustrated with a packshot showing contents.

Original Jackets: starting with the austere yellow covers of the 1940s and 1950s gradually giving way to the great historical illustrations and images that featured up to the 1990s, when artists at last began to make an appearance (there were no artist photos in the 1950s!)

The 180-page full-colour book has articles by journalist Nicholas Anderson, and “memoirs” by former directors of Archiv, Prof. Andreas Holschneider and Dr. Peter Czornyj, and Executive Producer, Marita Prohmann.

The book features many rare photos from Archiv recording sessions, as well as other memorabilia.