Onyria Ivan Torrent

Ivan Repušić made his debut as principal conductor of the Munich Radio Orchestra in September 2017 with Giuseppe Verdi's "Luisa Miller". It was followed by "I due Foscari" in October 2018 and "Attila" in October 2019 (the complete recordings have already been released by BR-KLASSIK on CD 900323, 900328 and 900330). His successful cycle of early masterpieces by the Italian opera composer continues with the recent concert performance on April 23, 2023 of Verdi's stage work "I Lombardi" – also at the Prinzregententheater in Munich. Authentic fluidity and vocal splendour are provided here once again by outstanding performers and the Bavarian Radio Chorus. The Munich Radio Orchestra plays under the direction of Ivan Repuŝić. - This highlight of Munich's musical life from the early part of this year has now been released by BR-KLASSIK as a double CD.

2 Lados - o melhor dos grandes compositores do Brasil. «2 Lados» reune o melhor que a musica brasileira ja apresentou ao mundo. Ivan Lins, Milton Nascimento e Toquinho em discos duplos apresentam o melhor da sua composicao e interpretacao. «2 Lados» e best of e songbook numa mesma embalagem. Cada um dos CDs duplos da coleccao e focado num compositor que, como e tradicao na MPB, tambem e interprete de grandes sucessos. O CD1 exibe o seu lado cantor das proprias composicoes e de cancoes de outros colegas da musica brasileira. O CD 2 complementa o perfil mostrando um outro lado de sua obra na voz dos maiores interpretes da MPB. 28 faixas em cada um dos 17 titulos, a coleccao revela os «2 Lados» de artistas como Tom Jobim, Ivan Lins, Toquinho, Milton Nascimento, Chico Buarque, Vinicius de Moraes e Caetano Veloso.

Mozart's genius in setting to music Da Ponte's comic play of love, infidelity and forgiveness marks Così fan tutte as one of the great works of art from the Age of Enlightenment. Nicholas Hytner's beautiful production for the Glyndebourne Festival in 2006, with its sure touch and theatrical know-how, lives up to its promise to be 'shockingly traditional', while Iván Fischer teases artful performances from an outstanding international cast of convincing young lovers.

Dvorák’s Violin Concerto has been undergoing a renaissance of sorts on disc, one that it entirely deserves. Its critics (starting with Joachim and Brahms) dismissed it for not adopting the usual sonata-form first movement structure, instead welding the truncated opening to the gorgeous slow movement. But really, how many violin concertos are there where you can really say that the best, most characterful and highly developed movement is the finale? And what could possibly be bad about that? Clearly Fischer and Suwanai understand where the music’s going: the performance gathers steam as it proceeds, and really cuts loose in that marvelous last movement. Suwani displays a characteristically polished technique and fine intonational ear (lending a lovely purity of utterance to the slow movement), but she’s not afraid to indulge in some “down and dirty” gypsy fiddling in the finale, or in the two Sarasate items that open the program.

Neither too nationalist nor too internationalist, this 1995 recording of Béla Bartók's two violin concertos featuring Thomas Zehetmair with Ivan Fischer leading the Budapest Festival Orchestra is just right. Austrian-born Zehetmair has a fabulous technique, a warm but focused tone, and lively sense of rhythm, all of which make him an ideal Bartók player. His interpretations are less about showing off then about digging in, and his performances are more about the music than they are about the musician. Hungarian conductor Fischer and his Hungarian orchestra are not only up for the music in a technical sense, they are also down with the music in an emotional sense, and their accompaniments ground Zehetmair's coolly flamboyant performances. Captured in white-hot sound that is almost too vivid for its own good, these performances deserve to stand among the finest ever recorded.

One of the first recordings that earned Ivan Moravec acclaim and secured him a position among the finest pianists of the 20th century was the album of the complete Chopin Nocturnes made in 1965 in New York (Steinway) and at Vienna's Konzerthaus (Bösendorfer) for the Connoisseur Society label. Many critics have branded this recording a benchmark and consider it the ultimate account of the Nocturnes; in the words of Henry Fogel (Fanfare): "This is playing that draws the listener deeply into the music-you are not drawn into Moravec's achievement, but Chopin's." Ivan Moravec presents the Nocturnes in an admirable scale of colours and dynamics (down to astonishingly tender, barely touched tones), with the music flowing so naturally that it seems as though there are no bars or individual notes.

The starting point for our attention here is the work of the Spanish composer, guitarist and guitar teacher Francisco Tarrega ( 1852-1909), whose "school" influenced numerous Spanish composers who, like Tarrega himself, saw the guitar as Spain's national instrument. The 19th century was a time when large concert halls were being constructed, something which, as the guitar began to enjoy increasing popularity, became rather problematic for guitarists, particularly as far as the acoustics were concerned. It was the Spanish guitar maker Antonio Torres ( 1817-1892) who, basing his designs on those of previous guitar makers, combined with the most up-to-date research into acoustics, developed larger instruments, something which Tarrega found vitally interesting, so much so that he developed a new playing technique. Through the evolution of his style of legato fretting and his own particular perception of the diverse timbral possibilities of the guitar, Tarrega created sounds that virtually made the in-strument sing.

First there was rhythm - pulsing, driving, primal rhythm. And a new word in musical terminology: Barbaro. As with sticks on skins, so with hammers on strings. The piano as one of the percussion family, the piano among the percussion family. The first and second concertos were written to be performed that way. But the rhythm had shape and direction, myriad accents, myriad subtleties. An informed primitivism. A Baroque primitivism. Then came the folkloric inflections chipped from the music of time: the crude and misshapen suddenly finding a singing voice. Like the simple melody - perhaps a childhood recollection - that emerges from the dogged rhythm of the First Concerto's second movement. András Schiff plays it like a defining moment - the piano reinvented as a singing instrument. His "parlando" (conversational) style is very much in Bartók's own image. But it's the balance here between the honed and unhoned, the brawn and beauty, the elegance and wit of this astonishing music that make these readings special.

So what if Liszt spent most of his life in France and Germany and never learned to speak Hungarian? The music of the Magyars' fiery favorite son played by a hot-blooded local boy is an irresistible combination. Even the delightful Dohnanyi filler (variations on ''Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star'') doesn't really douse the flames. Put it in the CD player and let 'er rip! Just be sure to remove all flammable vestments first. (Entertainment Weekly)