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Robert Ballard was one of the most famous lutenist-composers of the first decades of the seventeenth century, during which the lute was the favored instrument of the Parisian aristocracy and upper bourgeoisie.

Le toréador, ou L'accord parfait (The Toreador, or The Perfect Agreement) is an opéra comique in two acts by the French composer Adolphe Adam with a libretto by Thomas-Marie-François Sauvage. It was first performed at the Opéra-Comique, Paris on May 18, 1849. It was a huge success and the work regularly appeared in the repertoire of the Opéra-Comique until 1869.

Spanish colonies in Central and South America emerged as wellsprings of cultural activity throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. The meeting of indigenous populations with Latin American cathedrals and courtly life resulted in styles bearing the imprint of folk music, even in sacred compositions. The sophisticated musical culture of Guatemala City Cathedral is represented in an archive of hundreds of works, several of which are recorded here. The guitars, harp, voices and percussion of acclaimed ensemble El Mundo bring to life the vibrant and at times hypnotic dance rhythms of Spain, Africa and the New World, creating a sound unique to this region, and one that still flourishes to this day.

Franz Joseph Haydn is an artist so great that somebody stole his brain. Literally. Shortly after his death his grave was robbed by phrenologists, who studied Haydn’s skull and found that “the bump of music” on his skull was “fully developed”, clearly proving that Haydn was destined for genius from birth.