Voces Oxonienses - Heaven's Happiness: Sacred Choral Music - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

James Cook writes for voices, mainly a capella, in numbers ranging from four to forty-plus. This disc continues the survey of his music started with InchHeaven's HappinessInch (CD 25023), written very much in the Anglican choral tradition, and ideal for skilled church and amateur choirs. All first recordings.

Tzimon Barto is recognized as one of the foremost American pianists of his generation. His new double-CD for Ondine features Paganini variations by three composers, Liszt, Brahms and Lutoslawski, and the popular Paganini Rhapsody Rachmaninov, on which Christoph Eschenbach conducts the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra. The Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra was founded by Leonard Bernstein in 1987.

Beethoven's Sonata, Op. 23 in A minor seems to portray the darker side of love, it's unfulfillment, whereas the later Op. 24, the so-called spring sonata - as a sort of characterization of a loving heart's feeling of spring - references the sweet, beautiful aspects of love. Irnberger and Michael Korstick furthermore present the variations Se vuol ballare WoO 40 on a theme from the opera Le nozze di Figaro, which Beethoven dedicated to his beloved Eleonore von Breuning, which leads to all those pieces having been written thinking of beloved women. The likes of Jörg Demus, Evgueni Sinaiski, and Paul Badura-Skoda, as well the Israel Chamber Orchestra / conductor Roberto Paternostro and the orchestra 'Spirit of Europe' / conductor Martin Sieghart have stressed the young Thomas Albertus Irnberger's musical skill. Michael Korstick studied with Jürgen Tröster in Cologne, Hans Leygraf in Hanover, and Sascha Gorodnitzki at the Juilliard School. For his CD recordings, he has been awarded the 'Echo Klassik Prize', the Prize of German Record Critics, several times and the MIDEM Classical Award.