The Knights, the bold Brooklyn-based orchestral collective, embody the spirit of exploration with The Kreutzer Project, a programme that posits Tolstoy’s response to Beethoven’s “Kreutzer” Sonata.
Martha Argerich's associations with violinist Gidon Kremer and cellist Mischa Maisky are surely among the pianist’s most substantial and musically rewarding collaborations. The present collection includes all of the Argerich/Kremer and Argerich/Maisky duo recordings for Deutsche Grammophon as originally released and in chronological order. Although Argerich has participated in numerous musical partnerships, not to mention her longtime mentoring of young artists, her associations with violinist Gidon Kremer and cellist Mischa Maisky are surely among the pianist's most substantial and musically rewarding collaborations. The present collection includes all of the Argerich/Kremer and Argerich/Maisky duo recordings for Deutsche Grammophon as originally released and in chronological order, allowing listeners the opportunity to trace each duo's evolution in terms of artistic rapport, sensitivity, risk-taking and the fine tuning of nuance.
Composers develop their own voice and personality; singers develop their own vocal character and colour. This beautiful and unusual recital disc by Bill Barnewitz, principal horn of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, explores the voice of a special instrument and of a particular musician. Bill offers chamber works which feature the horn either as a solo personality or integrated into an ensemble. There are songs in which the horn is included, in its own right, as a partner to the voice. Bill also performs two of his own transcriptions in which the horn replaces the singer, taking on both the original voice part and the text. Throughout, Bill, like an operatic interpreter, assumes a variety of roles and uses the full expressive resources of his instrument to bring a variety of personalities to life.
Józef Elsner – Violin and Pianoforte Works is an album of wonderfully sounding works interpreted by the outstanding duet of Sławomir Tomasik (violin) and Edward Wolanin (piano). These are the first ever recordings of Elsner’s early violin works, performed on historical instruments.
Violinist Nicholas DiEugenio and pianist Mimi Solomon release their second recording on New Focus, this one a chronicle of their commissioning project, Unraveling Beethoven. The duo approached several composers, Tonia Ko, David Kirkland Garner, Jesse Jones, Robert Honstein, and Allen Anderson, and asked them to write works that are inspired by Beethoven's Violin Sonatas. The attractive results display a range, from a mixture of direct references to Beethoven's work to more oblique reactions to the violin sonatas.