This band again deals multiple influences, which in the end makes the sound hard to define. It sounds dark and into bombast arrangements, sometimes reminding me of the mysterious and somewhat ritual style of The Virgin Prunes, but then also more into psychedelic treatments. The vocals of Marthynna remain pretty intriguing and only accentuating the occult side of the sound.
OUA's 6th album collides a studio session of bass driven rhythms with a marathon free improvisation session - combined, sculpted and arranged into an ever morphing tapestry of new sounds from leftfield progressive music. Fans of Soft Machine, Magma, Pink Floyd, Henry Cow, Sun Ra will enjoy this too.
Bob van Asperen's recording of Handel's Organ Concertos Op.7 is the newest addition to the Veritas x2 series. Veritas x2 is a series from Virgin Classics devoted to landmark recordings of early Baroque music. Handel's Organ Concertos contain six organ concertos for organ and orchestra. They were written for performance during Handel's oratorios and contain almost entirely original material. Bob van Asperen leads the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in this recording.
Gustav Leonhardt's account of [the symphonies] is the one to have if you want them on period instruments. They are lively and alert, and distinguished by fine musical intelligence… It is difficult to imagine a better partnership to provide authentic versions of these three fine works.
Rodelinda is a tale of unrequited love steeped in jealousy, treachery and grief. Jean-Marie Villegier's stylish production of Rodelinda sets Handel's tale of royal exile and fidelity in this silent movie era. The composer's ravishing music is perfectly set off by the sophisticated glamour and visual daring that characterized the birth of cinema.
‘Has there ever been a composer of more consistent elegance?’ If Steven Isserlis’s rhetorical question invites the listener to think of plausible alternatives, on the evidence of this wonderful album—an imaginative selection of Boccherini’s cello concertos and cello-centric chamber music—they are most unlikely to succeed. This is truly ‘music of the angels’, with performances to match.
Experience Singapore's Orchestra of the Music Makers soar through Strauss's majestic "An Alpine Symphony". With its epic sweep and grandeur and compelling drama, there has rarely been such a spine-tingling and vivid depiction of nature as found in Richard Strauss’s magnificent tone poem, An Alpine Symphony. Calling for gargantuan orchestral forces, this lavishly illustrated journey is Strauss’s crowning orchestral achievement. Using a vast musical canvas packed with vivid and exquisite details, it’s a bold, optimistic and passionate work, unleashing ecstatic blazes of orchestral colour alongside moments of awestruck contemplation in a continuous narrative of 22 sections, which Strauss threads together with his usual mastery and aplomb.
Mozart's genius in setting to music Da Ponte's comic play of love, infidelity and forgiveness marks Così fan tutte as one of the great works of art from the Age of Enlightenment. Nicholas Hytner's beautiful production for the Glyndebourne Festival in 2006, with its sure touch and theatrical know-how, lives up to its promise to be 'shockingly traditional', while Iván Fischer teases artful performances from an outstanding international cast of convincing young lovers.