Zvezda Catalogue

In December 1825, distinguished members of the Russian military, most of whom were quite affluent and of noble lineage, took it upon themselves to stir revolution against the autocratic and tyrannical Czar Nikolai I in the wake of his not honoring (or even acknowledging) the drafting of a constitution for the Russian people. The revolution failed miserably and the conspirators (known as the Decembrists) were weeded out by the czar himself. One by one, each of the conspirators confess and are systematically exiled to the harsh winters of Siberia, slated to work and wither in a prison/mine. The wives of the conspirators are faced with the prospect of leaving the bosom of wealth and family (including their own children) to be with their husbands in the brutal Siberian locale. If they agree to this, they face having their illustrious social stations stripped away and certain disdain from everyone around them. Among these remarkable women is a princess exiled from France who falls in love …

Three different persons, three different lives are connected in a mysterious way. 15-year old teenager suffering of misunderstanding, his glamorous and arrogant stepmother and the young untalented but full of optimism actress. Their destinies aren't predetermined and their lives are very fragile.

Renowned French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard kicks off his exclusive engagement to PENTATONE with a recording of Olivier Messiaen’s Catalogue d’Oiseaux (1956-1958). The pianist had intimate ties to the composer himself and his wife, Yvonne Loriod, for whom Messiaen wrote the Catalogue. Praised by The Guardian as “one of the best Messiaen interpreters around,“ this is Aimard’s first recording of Messiaen’s most extensive, demanding and colourful piano composition.

Emojis have become part of our lives. They are a comparatively recent addition, but their look and style as well as their use has shaped communication in our digital world. They are a pictorial, symbol-driven language and, in this way, quite close to the language of music notation. While using an emoji instead of a word makes communication more abstract, it also opens space for ambiguity and playfulness. Catalogue d'Emojis explores this ambiguity and playfulness in the communication between composer and performer.

From an Alpine crow circling rocks and precipices to a lonely curlew off the coast of Brittany; from a golden oriole singing in the sun to a tawny owl hooting in a dark forest… The Catalogue d’Oiseaux of Olivier Messiaen forms an extraordinary and varied tribute to the landscape and bird-life of France, and to its composer’s powers of invention as he explored and developed innovations in harmony, melody and rhythm at a time when all the elements of music were in flux and up for grabs. Any new recording of one of the 20th-century’s major piano cycles is a major event.

UK four CD set contains a quartet of albums by the best-selling British band led by Chris Martin. This box contains the band’s first four full-length releases: Parachutes (2000), A Rush of Blood To The Head (2002), X&Y (2005) and Viva la Vida Or Death And All His Friends (2008).