Over the course of his career, Steven Isserlis has performed the two cello concertos of Franz Joseph Haydn with several orchestras, and recorded them previously with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe on RCA. This 2017 Hyperion release features Isserlis performing Haydn's Cello Concerto No. 1 in C major, H. 7b:1 and the Cello Concerto No. 2 in D major, H. 7b:2 with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen in a lively, all-Classical program that also includes Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's Cello Concerto No. 3 in A major, H439, and two short filler pieces, Isserlis' arrangement of Geme la tortorella from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's La finta giardiniera, and the Adagio from Luigi Boccherini's Cello Concerto in G major, G480.
Over the course of his career, Steven Isserlis has performed the two cello concertos of Franz Joseph Haydn with several orchestras, and recorded them previously with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe on RCA. This 2017 Hyperion release features Isserlis performing Haydn's Cello Concerto No. 1 in C major, H. 7b:1 and the Cello Concerto No. 2 in D major, H. 7b:2 with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen in a lively, all-Classical program that also includes Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's Cello Concerto No. 3 in A major, H439, and two short filler pieces, Isserlis' arrangement of Geme la tortorella from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's La finta giardiniera, and the Adagio from Luigi Boccherini's Cello Concerto in G major, G480.
Bass-baritone Adam Plachetka presents Molieri, a programme of opera arias by Mozart and Salieri, together with the Czech Ensemble Baroque under the baton of Roman Válek. Thanks to fictional works such as the film Amadeus, Antonio Salieri is often scapegoated as the man who allegedly caused Mozart’s untimely death out of professional envy. Despite the fact that this is obviously not true, Salieri’s popularity has suffered from this popular myth-making, and most of his operas have sunk into oblivion. Molieri brings the two composers together, focusing on bass-8 baritone arias from their opera buffas. Famous arias from Mozart’s Da Ponte operas are heard in a completely different light when paired to excerpts from Salieri’s Falstaff, Axur, La grotto di Trofonio and La scuola de’ gelosi. It also makes clear why Salieri enjoyed such success, as well as why great composers such as Beethoven, Schubert and Liszt all wanted to study with him. Given the importance of Prague for Mozart’s operatic successes, the music fits the players of Czech Ensemble Baroque like a glove, and Plachetka possesses the optimal combination of vocal authority and agility to sing these buffo roles.
For the sake of both vocal and family well-being, Anne Sofie von Otter has always followed the wise course of self-rationing in opera. This disc, an entirely personal selection of arias from the Viennese Classical period, means all the more to her including, as it does, arias sung by dramatic and passionate women 'most of whom', she admits in the accompanying notes, 'I have never performed on stage and, alas, probably never will'.
When Naïve offered me the chance to record a Mozart recital in 2001, it was something I hadn't even dared to dream of, because he seemed to me to be the composer most emblematic of every kind of perfection. I made the disc with a feeling almost of transgression and a tremendous fear of not being worthy of him. Now, thirteen years later, I come back to Mozart with the experience of the roles I've tackled on stage in the meantime.