John Agnew

Created from the legendary Deutsche Grammophon Catalogue, The History of Classical Music in 24 Hours is a collection that can spark a life-long interest in classical music. Thematically arranged on 24 discs, The History weaves its way from Medieval Music to Minimalism, with many stops along the way: The Renaissance, Baroque (vocal and instrumental), the great Concertos, the Rise of the Virtuoso, a three disc focus on opera and more.

Handel's oratorio Alexander's Feast, composed in 1736, is English to the core, with its talky text by John Dryden and straightforward, clearly structured arias and choruses. The victory of Alexander the Great in the Persian city of Persepolis (an impressive ruin today) in 330 BCE was said to have been followed by a feast that gave Dryden the excuse for a sort of ode to the power of music (rendered in mixed language as "the power of musik" in the booklet of this German release), with arias illustrating the various affects. There isn't really any plot or action; the piece is more an extended secular cantata than an oratorio, especially inasmuch as the soloists (the soprano and the tenor are the prominent ones) do not represent characters in the story.

Most of us come to the Saint John Passion knowing the Saint Matthew Passion first. The bigger and more elaborate Saint Matthew, which came along three, or possibly five years later (there is controversy about the date), has tended to cast a shadow in which the earlier work is swallowed up, and this has been so ever since Mendelssohn's Saint Matthew performance in 1829 marked the beginning of the public rediscovery of J.S. Bach. (The professionals had never forgotten.) But if the Saint John is smaller in scale than the Saint Matthew, it is hardly the lesser work in quality, though it would of course be silly to claim that the master of the Saint Matthew Passion had not learned from the experience of setting Saint John. But the most interesting differences between these two towering attestations of faith are differences in intention. Read Matthew 26-27, Mark 14-15, Luke 22-23, and John 18-19, and you get four tellings of the last days in the life of Jesus that differ in tone, emphasis, and detail…

Nazareth are a Scottish hard rock band, founded in 1968, that had several hits in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s, and established an international audience with their 1975 album Hair of the Dog. Perhaps their best-known hit single was a cover of the ballad "Love Hurts", in 1975. The band continues to record and tour…

Grainger’s mastery of choral textures shines out of this wide-ranging collection of folk-song arrangements, each highly individual and memorable. Plus his friend Grieg’s finely scored religious settings. Superior performances by Stephen Layton and Polyphony.

Nazareth are a Scottish hard rock band, founded in 1968, that had several hits in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s, and established an international audience with their 1975 album Hair of the Dog. Perhaps their best-known hit single was a cover of the ballad "Love Hurts", in 1975. The band continues to record and tour…

Described by The Australian as 'a boon for lovers of the piano and those keeping an ear on exciting musical talent', the Sydney International Piano Competition (The Sydney) has become a fixture on the classical music landscape. This unique retrospective chronicles more than 100 fascinating performances. They were recorded by 77 pianists during seven events over two decades (1992-2016). Over it's 14 hours, the eleven CDs in this Limited Edition encompass music by more than 55 composers from Agnew to Zaderetsky and the anthology is organized in seven categories: Baroque, Classical, Romantic, Twentieth Century, Transcriptions & Encores, Australian Piano Music and Piano Concertos.