Music » Historical Periods Classical Music

Release Date: 2009-11-15, Audio CD, Regent

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

Christopher Herrick's acclaimed series of Buxtehude's complete organ works continues with a selection of his praeludia, toccatas, ostinato works, and canzonas, interspersed with chorale preludes and variations. For this disc he turns to the magnificent organ of Trondheim Cathedral in Norway, originally built by Joachim Wagner (1690-1749) and restored to its former baroque glory in 1994.

Once Sibelius's protg, Rautavaara is considered to be one of the greatest living Finnish composers. His choral works have made him a household name. Recorded here is a fascinating selection of works, including the Suite de Lorca (one of the most popular Finnish works of all time) and all demonstrating the unique style forged by the composer on his travels through the musical fashions of the twentieth century. Rautavaara's rich and sonorous neo-Romantic textures have a steely modernist edge and the resulting voice if one that is deeply attractive and approachable, yet endlessly captivating.

Cesti was on of the most illustrious representatives of the seventeenth-century Venetian school of opera composers. He had an eventful and successful life and, like the murdered Stradella, he died in murky circumstances (probably by poisoning). The work recorded here dates from his period at the Viennese court, and is characteristic of Viennese opera's synthesis between comedy and parody and the moral, edifying dimension inherent to court opera.

Release Date: 2010-12-14, Audio CD, Guild

Release Date: 2010-02-23, Audio CD, Dorian

Release Date: 2010-02-23, Audio CD, Artek

The pre-Columbian myths are a force that cannot be tamed, reborn as they are in a wholly new language. Stefan Asbury brings the WDR Symphony Orchestra to a boiling point with Alberto Ginastera's late work Popol Vuh (1975-83), the creation story as told by the Mayan people. At the center of the Cantata para America Magica (1960) to words by Mercedes de Toro is the human voice, although the culture has long since disappeared. The protagonist is Rayanne Dupuis, who intones prayers, love songs and songs of farewell, surrounded by a flamboyant and vivid instrumental apparatus: the percussion ensemble of the Conservatory of Music in Cologne, Ensemble S and the piano duo Bugallo-Williams.

Release Date: 2009-09-01, Audio CD, Globe