Charles Camille Saint-Saëns

An innovative debut recording from EMI’s new signing, Tine Thing Helseth, in which Tine takes on the mantle of story teller through her interpretation and repertoire curation.

This collection of songs transcribed for trumpet includes music by Strauss, Sibelius, Ravel, Canteloube and Weill, and is anchored by Grieg’s Haugtussa song-cycle. The recording is with orchestra and piano accompaniment.

Tine is 23 with a refreshingly focused and straightforward approach to making music. She is a unique artist with several facets - classical soloist, ensemble leader and jazz musician – and equally at home with each.

Tine Thing Helseth, born in 1987, started to play trumpet at the age of 7, and is already one of the leading trumpet soloists of her generation. Already in her solo career, Helseth has appeared with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Vienna Chamber Orchestra, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Ulster Orchestra, Philharmonie Baden-Baden, all the major Norwegian orchestras and further afield with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, amongst others.

The Yuja Wang album that everyone has been waiting for wows with musical miniatures that are short, sweet, and huge in impact. These encore pieces by Scriabin, Gluck, Rachmaninov, Chopin and others will enthrall Yuja Wang’s fans with challenging technical demands and the bravura precision of her execution. The variety of styles – which includes neo-Classical, Impressionist, Romantic, jazz - in addition to the quality of the arrangements of pieces that are adaptations, provides a welcome and yet unique listening experience.

This delightful collection includes the wonderfully narrated Carnival of the Animals and Peter and the Wolf as well as the joyous Mother Goose – three timeless and well-loved pieces of classical music. Fun for both children and adults alike this music will encourage a keen ear, deep imagination and teach fun educational facts along the way. Children will get carried away in the story and have the adventures brought to life by superb narration and the engaging booklet that accompanies the collection. The booklet text is designed to be read either by an older child of 5 or 6 or with an adult for the younger children. The writer is Sarah Breeden noted for the fun and informative programmes she has written for the BBC Children’s Proms.

Bringing magic and music together in a fun, interactive collection this compilation encourages children to explore their imaginations, expand their minds with fun facts and stories and listen to some of the world’s greatest Classical Music. The collection features Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, Flight of the Bumble Bee and many other well-loved favourites. Children will be invited to see how sorcerers, magical toys, wondrous heroes and fantastical creatures come to life in Classical Music.

A fully illustrated 32 page booklet presents a mystical journey through magical music encouraging the young ready to hear, see and recreate as much as possible. The text is designed to be read either by an older child of 5 or 6 or with an adult for the younger children. The writer is Sarah Breeden noted for the fun and informative programmes she has written for the BBC Children’s Proms.

This collection encourages children to get up and moving! Featuring the best dance music in the Classical world this compilation will keep little ears occupied, exercise their bodies and challenge their imagination and memory. The collection features music from Tchaikovsky, Vivaldi, Grieg and Wagner and is carefully paced to build up the movement levels and expose children to many different dance styles, rhythms and tempos as possible.

Liszt had considerable influence on Saint-Saëns and his organ works demonstrate this particularly well, reproducing the paradoxes of Liszt torn between worldly virtuosity and mystical crises. The Veni creator for male voices is dedicated to ‘Monsieur l’abbé Liszt’.

This is Joshua Bell’s first CD of Sonatas on Sony Classical and it is a passionately nuanced interpretation of works from Saint-Saëns, Franck and Ravel. Joshua Bell is one of the world’s most successful violinists and has won multiple Grammy awards, was awarded the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize and named Instrumentalist of the Year by Musical America. Bell was recently named Music Director for the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields becoming the first person to hold this title since Sir Neville Marriner founded the Orchestra in 1958.

Often referred to as the “poet of the violin”, his 2004 album Romance of the Violin was named the “Classical CD of the Year” by Billboard Magazine, with Bell named “Classical Artist of the Year.”

The three Sonatas chosen for this disc are very different though linked extraneously through their inherent national style:

The Saint-Saëns sonata remains one of the most exciting sonatas in the repertoire; the feverish finale is guaranteed to bring the house down. Bell’s recording of César Franck’s Violin Sonata allows him to pay homage, through his mentor Josef Gingold, to the two great artists who created this undying masterpiece. Written 125 years ago, at the height of the French Belle Epoque for the wedding of his friend, the virtuoso Eugene Ysaÿe (with whom Gingold studied). Ravel’s more fantastic sonata offers a kaleidoscope of different thrills, as seen in the unexpected yet beautiful blending of genres in the slow “Blues” movement of his sonata.

“French Impressions is the culmination of my last decade of exploration and performance with pianist Jeremy Denk, and I hope that with this recording we can affect the listener with the same joy and spiritual enrichment that these masterpieces have provided us with over the years.” Joshua Bell

‘I am working quietly away at a Trio which I hope will drive to despair all those unlucky enough to hear it. I shall need the whole summer to perpetrate this atrocity; one must have a little fun somehow.' Should we take literally this declaration of intention by Camille Saint-Saëns. Twenty-five years after a Trio no.1 that was already an indisputable success – with its marvellous scherzo, regulated like clockwork – Saint-Saëns showed everything he was capable of in the second : premiered on 7 December 1892, it did not fail to surprise listeners: after all, one must have a little fun somehow!This title was released for the first time in 2005.