Mozart: Piano Sonata No. 5 in G, K283

SFZ Music, the independent label for His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts, are pleased to announce their latest release, a recording given by one of the finest scholar-performers currently working in Britain.

John Irving is an internationally recognised Mozart scholar, having written five books including the international best-selling 'The Treasures of Mozart', and also widely acclaimed as one of the finest interpreters of keyboard music from the early classical period.

'Mozart on the Hass Clavichord' is a programme showcasing the wonderful instrument by Johann Adolph Hass (1715-76) made in Hamburg in 1763 and currently residing in the Edinburgh University Collection of Historic Musical Instruments.

Irving explores in detail historical performance practice issues, as well as reminding us that the Clavichord remained a favoured instrument for Mozart throughout his life, and accenting the intimate, domestic nature of his keyboard music.

On volume four of his widely acclaimed traversal of Mozart's music for solo keyboard, fortepianist Kristian Bezuidenhout performs on an instrument by Paul McNulty, modeled on a Viennese original by Anton Walter & Sohn (c.1805). The program includes Piano Sonatas in D major K.311 and G major K.283 and the lovely Variations on 'Je suis Lindor' in E flat Major, K.354. As with the other volumes in this exceptional series, Bezuidenhout brings out colors and shadings in these works that are only possible when performed on a fortepiano.

IRENE SCHARRER, though perhaps the least remembered of the major Matthay pupils, was the earliest to record, beginning in 1909 at the age of 21.That in itself is a credit to her early fame, which she established through an extrovert, but always musical, virtuosity.

She excelled in such works as the Chopin Etudes, nine of which she recorded, and in other brilliant pieces such as those here by Scarlatti and Liszt, but the poise and refinement of her Chopin nocture or the slow movement of the Mozart sonata reveal another side to her playing that is sadly underrepresented on disc. Her final recording, of the Litolff Scherzo, was also her most famous; in its day it was a best seller and was responsible for putting that work on the musical map. This set reissues for the first time all Scharrer’s electrical recordings and also an example of every work she recorded in the acoustic era (pre 1925) that was not later remade as an electrical recording. For completeness, a discography of all her other acoustic recordings is also included.

German pianist Gesa Lucker made her concert debut aged 12. She has been a prize winner in national and international competitions and has performed at leading venues including the Carnegie Hall and the Wigmore Hall. This is her debut disc on Genuin Classics.

The Canadian musician Glenn Gould was undoubtedly one of the greatest pianists of all time. To mark the 75th anniversary of his birth, and the 25th anniversary of his death, Sony BMG Masterworks presents this seminal artist’s vinyl recordings as re-mastered CDs, designed to replicate the exact artwork of the original gramophone records in miniaturised form. Already issued as part of an 80-CD box set (88697130942), these albums are now being made available individually, with the first 20 in the series being released in November 2007.