New Releases

Alexei Ogrintchouk performs three pillars of the oboe repertoire with the support of the renowned Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra and the company of three highly respected young string players in the quartet.

As principal oboist of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Alexei Ogrintchouk is an international soloist in his own right. His performances of J.S. Bach’s oboe concertos was judged to be ‘as astonishing as it is successful’ on the web site klassik-heute.de, with a sound described as ‘generous, rounded, warm and velvety’ in Classica.

To round off the programme Alexei has called on his father, the pianist Leonid Ogrintchouk, and together the two perform a transcription of the Violin Sonata in B flat major, K 378, composed during the same period as the two other works on this disc.

In June 2013 the Swedish Chamber Orchestra under the expert direction of Thomas Dausgaard are joined by one of today's foremost Wagner singers. Named 'Singer of the Year' by Opernwelt magazine in 2012, Nina Stemme has been the Isolde of choice at Glyndebourne, Bayreuth and Covent Garden.

For this new release Nina performs the five Wesendonck-Lieder, of which two in particular, Im Treibhaus and Träume, were referred to by Wagner as 'studies' for Tristan and Isolde. Wagner himself prepared a version for violin and orchestra of Träume, and the ensemble includes this setting featuring principal violinist, Katarina Andreasson, as soloist.

The Wesendonck-Lieder are framed by two versions of the overture to Der fliegende Holländer, the rarely heard 1841 original version and the composer's final creation from 1860, with its new ending inspired by Tristan, composed three years earlier.

Described as “The most exceptionally gifted young violinist I have ever encountered” by Ruggiero Ricci, Tamsin Waley-Cohen explores her European/American heritage in her debut disc, 'An American in Paris'.

Tamsin says of this project: 'Song is one of the primary connections between all the works on this disc; folk songs, cafe songs, blues songs, traditional songs. I grew up with many of them; the Ives and the Gershwin, and even the Blues in the Ravel, from my American Mother. Some, such as the cafe songs of the Poulenc, are part of my European heritage. The juxtaposition of the beauty of these songs with the sardonic humour and the macabre, which in particular inhabit both the Ives and the Poulenc, adds power and poignancy to the content of these works.'

Poulenc’s Violin Sonata, written while the composer was coming to terms with life under Nazi occupation, is dedicated to the memory of Federico Garcia Lorca, the poet and playwright who was murdered by opposition forces in the Spanish Civil War in 1936.

Ravel’s Sonata, composed between 1923 and 1927, contains long periods of refined, rather reserved music punctuated by moments of full-blooded passion and although influenced by blues is far from mere pastiche.

Decoration Day was first composed by Charles Ives in 1912 woven with themes from part-fictional, part-autobiographical recollection of personal childhood memories. The piece was reconstructed by the pianist and scholar John Kirkpatrick from surviving sketches after 1919.

George Gershwin visited Paris in 1928 and met, among other composers, Ravel, Poulenc, Prokofiev and Berg. Although Porgy and Bess (1935) attracted mixed reviews, songs such as the lullaby ‘Summertime’, ‘It ain’t necessarily so’ and the heartbreaking ‘My man’s gone now’ became instant hits. The arrangement by Heifetz heard here of half a dozen numbers from Porgy and Bess is testament to the high esteem in which the legendary violinist held his music.

Tamsin Waley-Cohen was born in London in 1986. She is currently associate artist with Orchestra of the Swan and performs as a soloist with others, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra of St John's, London Concert Orchestra. Since 2007 she has played the 1721 ex-Fenyves Stradivarius violin.

Alexandra Dariescu presents the first disc in a 'Trilogy of Preludes' containing the complete works of this genre by Chopin and Dutilleux.

Frederic Chopin composed his 24 preludes, op.28, one in each of the 12 major and 12 minor keys, between 1835 and 1839, commissioned by the pianist, publisher, impresario and piano manufacturer Camille Pleyel.

Henri Dutilleux’s 3 Preludes were not designed as a set but composed at intervals between 1973 and 1994. Each Prelude is dedicated to a great Pianist: Artur Rubinstein (D’ombre et de silence), Claude Helffer (Sur um meme accord) and Eugene Istomin (Le jeu des contraries).

Alexandra finds the form of the Prelude as relevant today as in Chopin's time and was drawn to Dutilleux's use of polyphony and harmony in his fascinating contribution to an established genre.

Alexandra Dariescu is one of the most talented pianists of her generation and was featured as BBC Music Magazine’s Rising Star in June 2011. She has won the Guildhall Wigmore Prize and the Romanian Ambassador‘s prize for her outstanding contribution to promoting Romania’s image in the UK, and is currently a YCAT artist.