Overture

Until the emergence of Mendelssohn and Schumann, the only symphonies to receive regular performances—beyond those of the three Viennese giants Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven—were those by Louis Spohr. In fact Spohr’s symphonies, as well as his overtures, remained staples of the concert repertoire until the general decline of his reputation towards the end of the nineteenth century. His generally acknowledged symphonic masterpiece, the fourth symphony, still cropped up occasionally in concerts well into the 1920s, but even this work soon joined the others in obscurity.
Keith Warsop

It figured that some other prolific composer of Handel’s time would have composed a competing “Water Music,” but Telemann’s half-hour work–otherwise known as an Overture in C–remains relatively obscure. Written for the centenary of the Hamburg Admiralty a few years after Handel’s “Water Music,” it is an invigorating piece of work, consisting of an Overture and nine dance movements with various watery descriptions from mythology that the listener can take or leave.

Nightingale's sought-after “Nightfall Overture” release, which gathers re-imagined and re-recorded versions of songs from the band’s first four albums, is now remastered by songwriter/frontman/producer Dan Swanö (Opeth, Katatonia, Edge Of Sanity, etc).
First released in 2005, “Nightfall Overture” in its upgraded shape offers a perfect introductory opportunity to (re-) discover Nightingale’s early and highly versatile body of work. The shadow breathes once more…

The German composer Draeseke wrote four symphonies. All of them are now to be heard spread across three CPO discs played in a uniform edition by the NDR Radiophilharmonie conducted by Jörg-Peter Weigle. You can also hear a Wuppertal-based reading of the First Symphony coupled with the Draeseke Piano Concerto on MDG 335 1041.

Early on in his career, Wagner composed two symphonies, both of which are included on this disc. The Symphony in C, which he wrote when he was just nineteen years old, is heavily influenced by Beethoven in its character, mood, and instrumentation. Written two years later, in 1834, the Symphony in E was left unfinished, Wagner completing only the first movement and thirty bars of the second. The completed version recorded here was prepared by the conductor Felix Mottl more than fifty years later at the request of Wagners widow, Cosima. The two marches on this disc are the composers most obvious contributions to the genre of pomp and circumstance.