Lamomali Bel Ami

Pascal Rogé, long considered the greatest exponent of French piano repertoire is joined by his pianist wife Ami in a program devoted to Les Six – the group of composers brought together by Jean Cocteau in 1917 and who created a musical reaction to the suffocating influence of German romanticism upon French musical culture. Based in Montparnasse the name was inspired by Balakirev’s ‘The Five’ and the journalist Henri Collet’s 1920 article ‘Les cinq Russians, les six Français, et M.Satie’. Satie gets a look in on this album with his ‘Parade’ closing the programme. The album includes the 1920 L’Album des Six, Scaramouche by Milhaud, Cinq Bagatelles for piano 4 hands by Auric, Two Pieces for 4 hands op.7 by Durey and works by Honegger and Tailleferre.

Here the diva is the viola! How did the viola move from the status of ‘dramatic contralto among instrumental voices’ (to quote the critic Henri Blanchard) to ‘a character of nobility and languor’, according toGeorg Kastner’s treatise on instrumentation (1837)? Going well beyond mere historical interest, this album answers the question by unveiling the charms of a repertory that delighted Parisian concert halls and salons throughout the 19th century.

Susanne Elmark completed her training at the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen in 1994, and gave her debut concert in 1996. Her teachers were Susanne Eken and Ingrid Bjoner, and she has studied widh Josef Protschka. Susanne Elmark has given numerous recitals in Denmark and Germany, and has performed as a soloist in The Messiah, Mozart's Requiem, Bach's B Minor Mass and Carmina Burana, and she is a patticularly frequent guest with the Danish Radio Concert Ordhestra.

Billboard chart-topping violinist Rachel Barton Pine traverses Paganinis ground breaking set of 24 Caprices with virtuosic flair and, in equal measure, reverence for the bel canto, or beautiful singing,'' style of the composers generation. Playing on the ex-Bazzini, ex-Soldat Guarneri del Gesù violin from 1742, made by the same Cremona-based maker in the same year as Paganinis own violin, Rachel channels the composers own technical wizardry as well as his love for beautiful melodies. Rachel was first introduced to Paganinis Caprices at the age of six. In her early twenties she gave her first performance of all 24 Caprices in a single concert, a feat she has accomplished several times since including at the National Gallery in Washington D.C. and the Ravinia Festival.

Imitar col canto chi parla' ('imitating in song one who speaks'): that ideal, expressed by Jacopo Peri in the preface to his setting of Euridice, heralded a veritable revolution in vocal music, beginning with the experiments, towards the end of the sixteenth century, of the Florentine Camerata – a group of intellectuals and musicians led by Count Giovanni de’ Bardi, who aimed to revive the glorious art of ancient Greek tragedy. According to written accounts, the latter was sung, or spoken, in such a way that the words, while remaining intelligible at all times, were emotionally heightened. The members of the Camerata wished thus to break with the polyphonic madrigal tradition of the Renaissance and turn to accompanied monody, recitar cantando, thereby returning to the pre-eminence of the word as the means of conveying human emotions, with the music, henceforth subordinate to speech, serving to magnify and amplify it.

The American-born lutenist Paul Beier has been a central figure in establishing a solo lute performance scene in his adopted country of Italy. He has often participated in productions of early operas at La Scala and other major Italian opera houses, and at the Santa Fe Opera in New Mexico.
Paul Beier was born in 1954 in Salt Lake City, Utah. He attended the Royal College of Music in London, studying with Diana Poulton; she was a student of Arnold Dolmetsch and herself a pioneer in early music in Britain. From her, Beier absorbed not only lute skills, but also enthusiasm for research into historical performance practices. In 1981, Beier was asked to create a new lute program at the Civica Scuola di Musica in Milan, Italy. He has taught there ever since, adding basso continuo and Renaissance ensemble classes to his responsibilities. Beier was a founder of the Italian Lute Society; he is a consulting editor of the Lute Society of America Journal and has written widely on lute performance. Beier's solo performance career has taken him on tours throughout Europe, the Americas, and Australia. His repertory is focused on Baroque lute music, extending from music of the early 16th century to works by Bach and Silvius Leopold Weiss. Beier founded his own Baroque ensemble, Galatea, and he has also collaborated with La Cetra and other major Baroque groups in Italy and elsewhere. He is the creator of Beiertab, a computer program that facilitates the creation and editing of lute tablature, its conversion into standard notation, and its audio realization. Beier has a large discography of solo lute recordings on the Stradivarius label, including, in 2019, John Dowland: What if a day. He has also recorded for Opus 111, Glossa, Tactus, and other labels, and made four recordings as director of Galatea.