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Signum Classics is proud to release an album of string works by the award-winning composer, Brian Elias. Spanning almost half a century, this survey of Brian Elias’s chamber music for strings arose from a retrospective staged in 2020 by the Music@Malling festival in Kent. His first album on Sig- num, it is released alongside ‘Music for Wind’ and will be launched at Music@ Malling in September 2024. The album artwork is by celebrated artist Anish Kapoor. All Music Classical Highlights October 2024 EDITORS CHOICE "This is the finest album of contemporary chamber music I have encountered this year...Brian Elias' String Quartet (2012) is a gem that should be in the repertoire of every British Quartet...A tour de force of compositional ingenuity...The Castalian Quartet play it for all its worth in a performance that is little short of a revelation...Clein's performances are the album's high points (the magic is particularly strong in Of Elutropia)" - Gramophone “Amply gifted as an orchestral composer...purified intensity, immediacy and unrestrained lyricism” - Paul Griffiths, The Sunday Times "It’s hard to imagine more committed or more persuasive accounts of the string music of Brian Elias than the ones gathered together here. The Indian-born British composer is a senior figure in UK music, with an appropriately broad and considered output to match...It’s a deeply rewarding disc whose exquisitely crafted music is matched by performances of authority” - The Strad -
Following their acclaimed mix-tape series on Signum Classics, Earthcycle is the fifth album from Orchestra of the Swan and David Le Page. Earthcycle is an innovative and timely project which finds a compelling way to engage with humanity’s most urgent threat. Through three initial performances, a recording and a film, Earthcycle contemplates our impact on Earth’s environment and the disruption of its natural rhythms. To celebrate the 300th anniversary of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons they have commissioned a new version from our Associate Artist, baroque/jazz musician and composer David Gordon which is interspersed with traditional folk songs related to the theme of the seasons and performed by singer Jackie Oates. Earthcycle highlights the 21st century’s greatest concern whilst celebrating nature and our place within it. "The entire album is replete with musical birdsong, rain showers, shafts of light, gusty autumn winds, swirling leaves, and many other delights, which create a compelling, engaging and intriguing whole. Earthcycle provides an important reflection on climate change while offering listeners chamber music of the highest order, imaginatively presented and beautifully performed." - ArtMuseLondon "Impossible not to shiver during Gordon's duet with Le Page in his own 'Feeling the Chill'. Superb recorded sound repays listening on headphones with some ravishing details. The curious-minded won't be disappointed." - Gramophone "Outstanding pieces are ones that bring out the versatile qualities of all the musicians... Its [performance of The Bright Phoebus] wassail-like qualities leave a smile on the face and it is a lovely example of the clear honesty of this project - refreshing in spirit." ★★★★ Performance ★★★★ Recording - BBC Music Magazine -
★★★★ Performance ★★★★★ Recording “Charles Owen and Katya Apekisheva tackle Between Friends with an unassailable instinct for Dove’s playfulness, glittering sonorities and discursive breadth.” – BBC Music Magazine The Sacconi Quartet join forces again with celebrated composer Jonathan Dove for the latest instalment of their many fruitful collaborations and journeys. The String Quartet no 2 On the Streets and in the sky was written during the recent pandemic and was commissioned for the Sacconi Quartet to celebrate their 20th anniversary. Between Friends, is a world premiere recording, and a memorial to Graeme Mitchison (1944-2018), a multi-disciplined scientist, intrepid adventurer, cyclist, paraglider, mountaineer and a possessor of two pianos on which he and Dove would play together for over forty years. Who Wrote the Book of Love? Is an extended song cycle written for baritone Philippe Sly who performs the work here. Vanishing Gold is a compact five-minute piece written for the 40th anniversary of the Endellion Quartet, who then retired. Dove’s previous release with the Sacconi Quartet on Signum “In Damascus” was awarded Gramophone Recording of the Month and Presto’s Editors Choice in 2017. "You couldn’t hope for a finer way in which to discover the chamber world of this important British composer most recognised for his opera and vocal music. Essential listening, whether contemporary is usually your bag or not." - Gramophone -
‘Beauty for Ashes’ is a unique collection of unrecorded music from some of the UK’s foremost choral composers. Whilst the programme includes well-established names from classical music such as Bob Chilcott and Judith Weir, it also includes newer voices such as Alison Willis, Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Judith Bingham, Sarah Macdonald and Roxanna Panufnik. Six of the contemporary composers featured on the recording are women, and their work exemplifies the enormous contribution female composers are making to the English choral tradition, in a genre where they have been historically under-represented and under-recorded. The principal aim of the recording is to enable these compositions to find new audiences and to promote the creation of new choral works. At a time when the sacred choral tradition is under severe threat from budget cuts, Beauty for Ashes reveals the vibrancy and variety of contemporary composition. "You can hear works from well-established names from the choral scene like Bob Chilcott and Judith Weir. A lovely disc to add to your collection.” - Scala Radio ★★★★★ "The choir's tuning in the a cappella pieces is superb. A cracking album to which I'll be returning frequently." - Choir and Organ -
Acclaimed Signum artist Alexandra Dariescu brings a new combination of concertos: Clara Schumann’s Concerto in A minor Op. 7 coupled with Grieg’s A minor concerto Op. 16. Alexandra Dariescu is a trailblazing pianist who demonstrates fearless curiosity and ground-breaking innovation. As part of her artistic journey, Dariescu has achieved gender equality in her concerto programming for three consecutive seasons, reviving and premiering important works by both male and female composers, championing inclusion and diversity. “I got to know Clara Schumann’s Concerto and fell in love with this youthful piece, full of dreams, fiendish virtuosity and a testament to what an innovative performer and composer Clara was, even as a teenager. [Recording these works] It made me realise once again what a responsibility we all have to show both sides of history, to mirror our society in concert programmes and to shine a light on the often-overlooked brilliance of women composers” – Alexandra Dariescu. ALBUM OF THE WEEK "Brilliantly performed" - Scala Radio ALBUM OF THE WEEK "A great performance...such a great listen. An exception recording" - Classic FM "[Schumann] A thoughtful and polished guide to this youthful, virtuosic concerto and her approach is hand-in-glove with conductor Tianyi-Lu...[Grieg] There's an authority and natural ease to her performance, matched by some lovely playing from the Philharmonia" - BBC Music Magazine "Dariescu sails through the more virtuosic moments of the Schumann with confidence and agility...she has a 'sensitivity and ear for colour' which shows up in the way she handles filigree and, even more, in the seductive way she coaxes out the quieter passages. The Romance at the centre of the Schumann, especially its closely measures, is exquisitely fine-spun; the opening of the Adagio of the Grieg is similarly alluring." - Gramophone "Dariescu succeeds in holding her own in the demanding piano part…enthusiastic and sublime in the Maestoso and [In the finale] an energetic tour de force…really exciting…brava!" - Piano News -
Disc on Demand available from Presto Classical David Goode continues his series of the complete organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach, played on the Metzler Söhne organ of Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge. This digital-only recording is available from all major download stores and streaming services in MP3, CD Quality and Studio Quality/24-bit audio, and includes an extensive note on the works by George Parsons. It is also available to buy as a disc on demand – made to order with a printed booklet and inlay. All downloads include booklets. -
David Goode continues his new series of the complete organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach, played on the Metzler Söhne organ of Trinity College Chapel, Cambridge. This fourteenth volume includes ‘Clavier Ubung III: Prelude (“St Anne”), BWV 552a’ and the ‘Clavier Ubung III: Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr (Fughetta), BWV 677.’ This digital-only recording is available from all major download stores and streaming services in MP3, CD Quality and Studio Quality/24-bit audio, and includes an extensive note on the works by George Parsons. It is also available to buy as a disc on demand – made to order with a printed booklet and inlay. All downloads include booklets. -
Rupert Gough and The Choir of Royal Holloway release a new single with soprano Laura Wright, raising awareness of mental health and encouraging people to seek support and donate to mental health charities if they feel able to. The track, written by composer Thomas Hewitt Jones and lyricist Matt Harvey, speaks of the loneliness and despair felt by many around the world during the COVID-19 pandemic. All of the musicians involved gave their services for free and hope that the song can be an anthem for kindness, bringing hope all around the world to those suffering with their mental health. Proceeds from the single will be donated to a number of UK-based mental health charities. The music video for Can You Hear Me? can be found HERE. -
Recorded on March 17, 19, and 20 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the COVID-19 sessions came together quickly as society began to shut down amidst the growing outbreak in the United States. Recorded on March 17, 19, and 20 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the COVID-19 sessions came together quickly as society began to shut down amidst the growing outbreak in the United States. “Cantus tour dates and home concerts were being canceled and it was clear there would be only a limited window in which to sing together before the world went on pause,” says Paul Scholtz, tenor. “What would social distancing and prohibitions on large gatherings mean for vocal music, our communities, and the world at large?” continues Scholtz. “Cantus’ vision is to give voice to shared human experiences and what better way than to offer these performances amidst this great turmoil and uncertainty. We hope you can find yourself and your experience reflected somewhere in these sessions. The pieces you will hear span a great breadth of emotion, from joy to sorrow to wonder to pain. We hope you will find the performances themselves informed by the emotional states in which they were recorded — heightened at different times in different ways.” ★★★★ "Cantus are a class act, performing everything with both immaculate balance and plenty of character" - BBC Music Magazine “Looking back in years to come, historians will find a musical time-capsule in the releases of the current period: recordings that commemorate, testify to, mourn, offer consolation or simply ponder this strangest of times. ‘The Covid-19 Sessions’ from American lower-voice ensemble Cantus is a classic of the new genre...Cantus is a class act vocally.” - Gramophone "What is so noticeable about this album is the variety of songs on offer. They draw on different cultures, genres and musical eras ranging from the Renaissance to the present day…It was pleasing to see several female composers in the song list – Hildegard von Bingen for instance…With nineteen different works on the album, there is a wealth of material to capture your imagination and lighten your mood…Magnificently sung. I have been humming it ever since. Would love to see this ensemble on the London stage." - ArtMuse London -
Despax has recently released a piano fantasy based on the themes of The Sound of Music, in celebration of the musical’s 60th anniversary. The piece pays tribute to Rodgers and Hammerstein’s beautiful and iconic melodies, adding a few jazz and classical influences: “There is a long tradition in classical music of virtuoso instrumental transcriptions based on opera, from Carmen fantasies to various Liszt transcriptions, and I wanted to do the same with a musical. I have wonderful childhood memories watching The Sound of Music with my family, and I wanted to pay tribute to these beautiful melodies. This piece has influences ranging from jazz to classical composers like Ravel, Chopin, Liszt, Scriabin, Godowsky and Rachmaninov. There is even a small one bar quote from Debussy’s L’isle joyeuse, one of my favourite piano works hidden in there. At the start, I set out to write a small simple work using one theme, but it quickly became much more ambitious in scope. In the words of Ravel describing Scarbo, one of the most fearsome works of the piano repertoire: “perhaps I let myself get carried away”. - Emmanuel Despax -
The new recording from percussionist Joby Burgess includes ambient electronics fused with mellow vibraphone, explosive cinematic drumming and the delicate muted sounds of 1960’s New York.Psappha Iannis Xenakis
Psappha is an archaic form of Sappho - a great Greek poetess from the Island of Lesbos, born in the 600's BC. Composed for six groups of instruments (of wood, skin and metal) Psappha is muscular, abrasive and often violent - an intensely masculine work in contradiction to its title. The inspiration comes from Sappho's poetry, whose rhythms appear constantly in both small cells and the large scale over arching structure. Instrument choice is left to the performer, Xenakis writes ‘timbre serves only to clarify the rhythmic structures’ - my performance seeks maximum range and colour, with a nod to touring practicalities.
Ekstasis Linda Buckley
A ‘leading figure in the younger generation of Irish composers’ Linda Buckley combines medieval harmony, ambient electronic music and the hypnotic atmosphere of Javanese Gamelan in her commission for Pioneers of Percussion. Referring to the Greek term for ‘trance, to stand outside oneself, rapture’ Ekstasis is composed for vibraphone, Thai gongs and electronics. Premiered by Joby Burgess in 2016, Ekstasis was commissioned using funds from Arts Council England.
The late musicologist Bob Gilmore writes: ‘Buckley engages with an area of experience that new music is generally shy of, which, simplified and reduced to a single word, I’d call ecstacy. Not the drug-induced euphoria of dance music, but exultant, heightened states of being that are the product of an excitable sensibility, of an emotional response to the world that sees the bright places of life as clearly as the dark.’The King of Denmark Morton Feldman
Feldman’s reply to Stockhausen’s Zyklus is the great early anti-percussion composition, where a collection of soft sounds, twinkle like stars in the night. In The King sounds move without weight as dust through a gentle breeze, to create a deep seemingly disconnected sonic canvas. Feldman captured the muted soundscape of New York from Coney Island on a summer afternoon in 1964.
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This new recording for Signum Records includes silvery vibraphone with live looping, a quasi rock n roll documentary exploring censorship and a musical picture of the subtle shifts in our changing Seasons.
The Filthy Fifteen Nicole Lizée
Montreal based composer Nicole Lizée has been called a musical scientist, with a body of work inspired by the glitches of outmoded and well-worn technology. The Filthy Fifteen is a quasi rock n roll documentary taking a satirical look at censorship and the PMRC. Formed in 1985 the ‘Parents Music Resource Center’ was a committee of ‘Washington wives’ including Tipper Gore, which led to the labeling of albums with ‘Parental Advisory’ stickers. The live percussion - which includes a 'censorship kit' (typewriter, books, papers) - meld and intermingle with the rhythmic and pitch inflections of voices taken from footage and recordings related to the hearings. Premiered by Joby Burgess in 2016, The Filthy Fifteen was commissioned using funds from Arts Council England.
Can’t Sleep Rebecca Dale
Hailed by Classic FM as "one of today's most exciting young composers" Rebecca Dale is a London based composer, working most often with large orchestral and choral forces in the worlds of cinema and theatre. Written for solo vibraphone and live looping Can’t Sleep explores the moments around sleep, where our brains fire ideas around to keep us from resting. Premiered by Joby Burgess in 2016, Can’t Sleep was commissioned using funds from Arts Council England.
Seasons Tōru Takemitsu
Tōru Takemitsu is one of the most influential Japanese composers of the 20th Century. Combining traditional Japanese music with ideas from the American experimental and European Avant-Garde, Takemitsu created a sound uniquely his own for both the concert hall and film scores. Seasons (1970) is a 16 minute exploration of the sounds between our Seasons, using only metallic materials to describe the subtle shifts and changes. At the heart of my performance is the Canna Sonora (Aluminium Harp) - a Capone-era friction instrument, designed and built in Chicago - this replaces Francois and Bernard Baschet’s instrument of glass bars ‘Trombone’, which featured in the early performances of this work. Seasons is notated graphically, with an echo effect applied to this generally soft music, a response to statements of an almanac, atmospherics and astrology.
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Disc on Demand available from Presto Classical "In a word I feel myself the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair over this ever makes things worse and worse instead of better ...but I have tried my hand at several instrumental things ... in fact, I intend to pave the way towards a grand symphony in this manner.” These extracts from a letter of 1824 epitomise to me the paradox of Schubert, the manic depressive composer. On the one hand his music has that world-weary element of profound grief – 'the most wretched creature in the world' – and on the other a life-affirming exuberance bordering on the manic that characterises the Wanderer-Fantasie and parts of the D major sonata D.850. While Schubert's later piano music has a range of emotions that rivals Beethoven's last sonatas, in the beginning of his career he perhaps lacked the assurance of the older composer, and he was less fastidious about destroying sketches and fragments. As a result there are a large number of unfinished works and, therefore, the pianist has to make a decision about where to start the Schubert odyssey. Schubert himself made no effort to try and publish any of his sonatas before the great A minor D.845 of 1825. I decided to start slightly earlier with the B major of 1817 where one senses an assurance and boldness of tonal experiment not found before in his piano music. In this series, Llŷr Williams explores Schubert's solo piano repertoire in exquisite detail, producing some truly unique performances of some of the most romantic music ever composed. All download include booklets. -
Disc on Demand available from Presto Classical "In a word I feel myself the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair over this ever makes things worse and worse instead of better ...but I have tried my hand at several instrumental things ... in fact, I intend to pave the way towards a grand symphony in this manner.” These extracts from a letter of 1824 epitomise to me the paradox of Schubert, the manic depressive composer. On the one hand his music has that world-weary element of profound grief – 'the most wretched creature in the world' – and on the other a life-affirming exuberance bordering on the manic that characterises the Wanderer-Fantasie and parts of the D major sonata D.850. While Schubert's later piano music has a range of emotions that rivals Beethoven's last sonatas, in the beginning of his career he perhaps lacked the assurance of the older composer, and he was less fastidious about destroying sketches and fragments. As a result there are a large number of unfinished works and, therefore, the pianist has to make a decision about where to start the Schubert odyssey. Schubert himself made no effort to try and publish any of his sonatas before the great A minor D.845 of 1825. I decided to start slightly earlier with the B major of 1817 where one senses an assurance and boldness of tonal experiment not found before in his piano music. In this series, Llŷr Williams explores Schubert's solo piano repertoire in exquisite detail, producing some truly unique performances of some of the most romantic music ever composed. All downloads include booklets. -
Disc on Demand available from Presto Classical "In a word I feel myself the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair over this ever makes things worse and worse instead of better ...but I have tried my hand at several instrumental things ... in fact, I intend to pave the way towards a grand symphony in this manner.” These extracts from a letter of 1824 epitomise to me the paradox of Schubert, the manic depressive composer. On the one hand his music has that world-weary element of profound grief – 'the most wretched creature in the world' – and on the other a life-affirming exuberance bordering on the manic that characterises the Wanderer-Fantasie and parts of the D major sonata D.850. While Schubert's later piano music has a range of emotions that rivals Beethoven's last sonatas, in the beginning of his career he perhaps lacked the assurance of the older composer, and he was less fastidious about destroying sketches and fragments. As a result there are a large number of unfinished works and, therefore, the pianist has to make a decision about where to start the Schubert odyssey. Schubert himself made no effort to try and publish any of his sonatas before the great A minor D.845 of 1825. I decided to start slightly earlier with the B major of 1817 where one senses an assurance and boldness of tonal experiment not found before in his piano music. In this series, Llŷr Williams explores Schubert's solo piano repertoire in exquisite detail, producing some truly unique performances of some of the most romantic music ever composed. All downloads include booklets. -
Disc on Demand available from Presto Classical “In a word I feel myself the most unhappy and wretched creature in the world. Imagine a man whose health will never be right again, and who in sheer despair over this ever makes things worse and worse instead of better …but I have tried my hand at several instrumental things … in fact, I intend to pave the way towards a grand symphony in this manner.” These extracts from a letter of 1824 epitomise to me the paradox of Schubert, the manic depressive composer. On the one hand his music has that world-weary element of profound grief – ‘the most wretched creature in the world’ – and on the other a life-affirming exuberance bordering on the manic that characterises the Wanderer-Fantasie and parts of the D major sonata D.850. While Schubert’s later piano music has a range of emotions that rivals Beethoven’s last sonatas, in the beginning of his career he perhaps lacked the assurance of the older composer, and he was less fastidious about destroying sketches and fragments. As a result there are a large number of unfinished works and, therefore, the pianist has to make a decision about where to start the Schubert odyssey. Schubert himself made no effort to try and publish any of his sonatas before the great A minor D.845 of 1825. I decided to start slightly earlier with the B major of 1817 where one senses an assurance and boldness of tonal experiment not found before in his piano music. In this series, Llŷr Williams explores Schubert’s solo piano repertoire in exquisite detail, producing some truly unique performances of some of the most romantic music ever composed. All downloads include booklets.