Arne Matsson

Artaxerxes, premiered in London in 1762, was the first full-length opera seria sung in English. It proved a great success and helped to revive the fortunes of Thomas Arne, whose career had been in the doldrums. The opera featured his new protégée and mistress Charlotte Brent in the role of Mandane and Arne lavished attention on her music. Mandane’s arias and those of the hero Arbaces provide many of the opera’s high points, with their rich orchestrations, virtuoso vocal parts and captivating tunes. Though based on the Handelian model, Artaxerxes shows both Arne’s talent at the later galant style and his penchant for folk-like, pastoral airs. The results are mostly a delight (if a tad lightweight for the libretto’s blood ’n’ thunder deeds), with a variety of attractive arias further enhanced by Arne’s deft use of woodwind. Christopher Robson in the title role and Catherine Bott, thrilling as Mandane, head a fine team of singers: my only complaint is that Patricia Spence’s forceful Arbaces too often slips into shrill and strident mode.

The scent of childhood. The comforting lullaby of the parents. The first kiss. How great it would be if one could preserve the magical impressions of still young life forever! Not in the form of a discoloured snapshot, but in its entire emotional essence. As it were, as an "explosion in the heart", as the lyrics of the Dire Straits song "Romeo & Juliet" say.

Dr Thomas Arne was a real tunesmith, and this charming collection shows him at his best. Although Arne was heavily influenced by Handel (what Englishman of his generation could avoid this?) he was his own man, and no slavish plagiarist; something that needs to be said of an era, before binding copyrights, when even the great Handel could stoop to this level! It is known that Arne also admired the music of the Venetian Galuppi who visited London in the 1740s. The enchanting 'the Lover's Recantation', sung here beautifully by Emma Kirkby, will remind anyone familiar with Galuppi's comic operas of that composer's style.

This disc casts her in music composed, for the most part, for one of the most celebrated English singers of that era, Cecilia Young, one of several talented singing sisters and for a time the wife of Thomas Arne—famed in her day for the "sweetness and simplicity" (Dibdin's words) of her singing and her character. The impersonation seems a convincing one, to judge by the result here, which is uniformly delightful.

Alto saxophonist and Swedish jazz institution who played with many of the greats in the 1950s & '60s.
A legendary production from 1981. With well-known prayer house songs in a jazz recording. Recorded in Gamle Aker church by Håkon Manheim with Erik Hillestad as producer. "Bred dina vida vingar", "Blott en dag", "Barnatro" and "Navnet Jesus blekner aldri" are among the most famous tracks.

The Masque of Alfred - apart of course from its finale "Rule Britannia" - has in the 1990s reached CD. Just two years ago a version was issued with the BBC Music Magazine and now we have this more complete account (though there were several variants in Arne's own day) from Nicholas McGegan, an experienced exponent of 18th Century music, recorded in America and using mainly American performers. And very welcome is it. If offers 76 minutes of music, 25 minutes more than the BBC CD and if the OAE's playing on the latter under Nicholas Kraemer often seems rather superior, the Philharmonic Baroque Orchestra are fully equal to Arne's demands which include often atmospheric parts for oboes, horns and flute as well as the basic strings. McGegan uses only four solo singers against the BBC's six.

Thomas Arne, (who wrote “Rule Britannia”) is underplayed. Practically everything I’ve heard by him is of interest on multiple levels, either as an original voice utilizing the harmonic and melodic materials of the English baroque style, or as an innovator, at least to my ears, conjuring novel expressions within those materials, or simply as a good tunesmith.

Thomas Arne’s opera The Judgment of Paris (1742), a setting of William Congreve’s libretto of the same name, is known only from the printed score, but in this world premiere recording is performed with panache and authority by The Brook Street Band and a scintillating young cast led by sopranos Mary Bevan (Venus), Susanna Fairbairn (Pallas) and Gillian Ramm (Juno), with tenors Ed Lyon as the shepherd Paris and Anthony Gregory as Mercury, all under the expert direction of conductor John Andrews.

Arne Nordheim was Norway’s most significant and respected composer until his death in 2010, and one of the few figures in contemporary western music who proved himself able to move beyond traditional harmonic relationships while maintaining a distinct ability to communicate widely through his striking, physical music. The Bergen Philharmonic has been far from immune to that music’s power, championing it throughout the composer’s lifetime and premiering his first orchestral work, Canzona, as well as his last, Fonos. It has given multiple performances of Nordheim’s orchestral works and has recorded Tenebrae (Cello Concerto), Aurora and Wirklicher Wald. In 1992, Nordheim was the subject of a special focus at the Bergen International Festival, where the orchestra premiered Magic Island – a revised version of Be Not Afeard (the starting point for The Tempest).