Ivan Yefremov

Born in Alexandria, Egypt and migrated to Perth in 1963, Ivan Zar was drawn to the Blues at an early age and taught himself the harmonica and Delta Blues style Guitar. In 1968, he formed his first band "King Biscuit Co", as well as writing his own songs. After playing in several bands, Ivan formed a band called The Elks in 1975, which was to introduce the Chicago style of Blues to the mainstream. The band toured the South West and across to major cities in the Eastern States. They had the opportunity to support B.B King, Rory Gallagher, Joe Cocker and Ike and Tina Turner, and recorded an album Refer to Drawer, which is now a sought after Australian Blues album by blues affeciandos. In 1981, Ivan recorded some of the material that he had written and worked in a duo with Brian Fitzgerald called The Deltatones…

For this his third volume of works by Antoine Reicha, the pianist Ivan Ilic turns to one of the composer’s most extraordinary works, L’Art de varier, Op. 57. ‘The Art of Variation’ consists of fifty-seven variations on a theme (that the number of variations match the opus number is not a coincidence) and was composed in 1802 – 03, at the beginning of the six-year period which Reicha spent in Vienna, where he studied with Haydn and re-kindled his previous friendship with Beethoven. The set is remarkable for its scale and invention. Ivan Ilic describes the work as the missing link between Bach’s ‘Goldberg’ Variations and Beethoven’s ‘Diabelli’ Variations, which was certainly influenced by Reicha’s work. The recording was made at Potton Hall in Suffolk, on a Steinway Model D grand piano.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Ivan Lins is one of the most treasured and recorded Brazilian composers in the world and a melodist with few equals. The winner of four Latin Grammy Awards, Lins has recorded nearly fifty albums since 1970; they contain countless songs, notably “Madalena” and “Começar de Novo” (To Begin Again), that have become standards in his country. “Love Dance,” cowritten with his longtime arranger, Gilson Peranzzetta, and lyricist Paul Williams, is Lins’s English-language classic. Its performers include Sarah Vaughan, Peggy Lee, Mark Murphy, Shirley Horn, Blossom Dearie, Carmen McRae, George Benson, Nancy Wilson, Barbra Streisand, and Quincy Jones, who helped maneuver Lins’s U.S. breakthrough in the early ‘80s.