Josep Termes

It's great to see the music of Nino Rota getting so much attention. He was a wonderful composer, and the ballet suite from La strada may be his orchestral masterpiece (just a quick note: the French language title identifies this as a suite from the eponymous film; it is in fact the more familiar arrangement of the later ballet). There are now four competitive recordings of this piece, the least interesting of which is on Chandos with the Teatro Massimo orchestra: not bad, but not as well played or recorded as either Muti's slightly stiff version with the excellent La Scala forces, or Atma's brilliant recent release featuring the Greater Montréal Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin. All of the couplings differ in various ways, though Muti also has the dances from Il gattopardo (The Leopard).

Enrique Granados' famous opera 'Goyescas', first performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1916, derives from the piano suite premiered in Paris two years previously. At the head of a BBCSO in top form and a handpicked cast, Josep Pons clearly much enjoyed conducting this sparkling new production in London. Many scenes in the opera draw their inspiration directly from paintings by Goya, which listeners will also have the pleasure of discovering in the booklet of this rare and precious album.

Patricia Petibon's album Melancolía: Spanish Arias and Songs is a result of the soprano's lifelong fascination with the music and culture of Spain, with a special interest in the ways Spanish and French influences have cross-pollinated. She has put together an exceptionally attractive selection of songs and arias from zarzuelas, most of them likely to be unfamiliar to general audiences. Petibon is known for her light, silvery coloratura, and her gift for inhabiting her roles, both dramatic and comic, with great spirit and penetrating insight.

Probably the most important Catalan Classical piano work, Frederic Mompou’s Música callada, performed by the most eminent Catalan pianist of our time, Josep Colom.

Born in Girona in 1962, started a self-taught on guitar and studied classical guitar and modern. Later he studied with Manuel Gonzalez in Barcelona and won the professional title at the Music Conservatory Isaac Albeniz Girona with the highest qualifications and higher education at the Conservatory of Music of the Liceo in Barcelona. Meanwhile attended several courses in musical performance, particularly that of David Russell.