Orfeo in Gluck’s opera Orfeo & Euridice has become a signature role for Jakub Józef Orliński on stages around the world. Now the countertenor embodies the mythical Greek bard in a recording that for him is the realisation of a dream. Made in his native Warsaw, it is conducted by the dynamic Stefan Plewniak and the instrumentalists and chorus are drawn from his ensemble Il Giardino d’Amore. The roles of Orfeo’s wife Euridice and the god Amore are taken by two further rising stars of the opera and concert stage: the sopranos Elsa Dreisig and Fatma Said. Orliński has acted as producer, casting director, and, with Stefan Plewniak, joint artistic director of the recording. “One of my great dreams as a student was to sing the role of Orfeo,” says Orliński, “and now I’ve been lucky enough to perform Orfeo & Euridice in different settings … Working on those different versions I achieved my very own interpretation. I knew that I would love to create my own personal version of the piece, to record my dream role, expressing myself in the way I wanted … I had a clear vision of what I wanted to do with it and how. The most important thing for me as a musician is to have great collaborators, and I couldn’t imagine a better team. Everyone was so willing to make the most of every single take during our long recording sessions. I am really grateful that I can work with people with so much passion … And now I invite you to follow Orfeo on his journey and listen to what the power of love can do.”

Alban Berg Quartett Le premier quatuor à cordes viennois en tant que tel, constitué en 1970, s'est révélé l'un des ensembles de musique de chambre les plus novateurs de son temps. Formé par quatre professeurs de l'Académie de musique de Vienne, le Quatuor Alban Berg reçoit jusqu'en juin 1971 l'enseignement à Cincinnati (États-Unis), de Walter Levin (Quatuor LaSalle) et donne son premier concert le 5 octobre de la même année dans la Mozartsaal du Konzerthaus de Vienne, après avoir reçu par la veuve du compositeur Alban Berg (1885-1935), Helen Berg,

Benjamin Luxon This British baritone enjoyed an international career propelled by a handsome instrument and a musical intelligence that allowed equal space for warmth of feeling. Against the attractiveness of vocal timbre, however, was the presence of a strong vibrato that frequently reached the point of intrusiveness, especially at higher volume. Nonetheless, Benjamin Luxon forged many memorable performances, a number of them preserved on disc. His Mussorgsky recital was warmly praised by the critical press and won the endorsement of native Russian-speaking listeners as well. In addition to opera and concert performances, he is appreciated for his work in restoring respect in parlor songs of the late 19th and early 20th century. As a student at London's Guildhall School of Music, Luxon studied with Walther Grünner. After finding himself a prizewinner at Munich's International Voice Competition, he soon launched upon a career. Luxon became a member of the English Opera Group in 1963, accompanying the troupe to the Soviet Union during his first season. After success in such roles as Tarquinius in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia and Sid in Albert Herring, Britten called upon Luxon to sing the role of Owen Wingrave for that opera's 1971 television production premiere. Also during 1971, he appeared with the English Opera Group at the San Francisco Opera.

With his Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Ton Koopman recorded all three of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Passions – after St John, St Matthew, and lesser-known St Mark, whose score has been largely lost but who has been reconstructed from excerpts of various cantatas. This album focuses on the choruses and chorales, sung by the Amsterdam Baroque Choir and the Choir of the Dutch Bach Association, with the help of the boys’ chorus from the Sacrament Choir of Breda. A compilation of arias, still by Ton Koopman, will be released on Good Friday, March 29th.

Daniel Barenboim is a conductor and pianist of top international stature, known for an extraordinarily large orchestral and operatic repertoire. He is the general music director and chief conductor for life of the Staatsoper Berlin in Germany.
Barenboim was born in Buenos Aires on November 15, 1942, into a family of Ukrainian Jewish descent. His mother was his first piano teacher. He later studied with his father, Enrique Barenboim, who was an eminent music professor.

Pro Cantione Antiqua is among the most honored and long-established vocal groups in the early music movement. The 1960s were a period when pioneering singers followed the lead of instrumentalists (primarily in Britain, Austria and Germany, and Holland) to create ensembles devoted to researching and performing the long-forgotten treasure of Western music composed before the time of Bach and Handel, and it was in the middle of that decade that three British musicians and scholars founded Pro Cantione Antiqua in the mid-1960s. They were tenor James Griffett, countertenor Paul Esswood, and conductor Mark Brown, who were joined by conductor and musicologist Bruno Turner early on.

Manon Lescaut, from the eponymous Puccini opera, is a difficult character to grasp, evolving from a naïve young girl to a venal and manipulative femme fatale, and finally a despaired woman weeping over her miserable end. Maria Callas never performed the role on stage but left this milestone recorded version in 1957, forming with Giuseppe Di Stefano (as Des Grieux) one of the most iconic couples of the whole Puccini discography.

Named after the Greek goddess of hunting and the wilderness, The Artemis Quartett was formed in 1989 in Lübeck, Germany. They are recognized for their chamber music repertoire, most notably Beethoven’s string quartets and are considered to be one of the foremost string quartets in the world. Originally founded by four students of chamber music at Lübeck Conservatory, they came to international prominence when they won first prize at the ARD Wettbewerb in 1996, followed by another first prize at the Premio Borciani six months later.

Argentian-born Ingrid Fliter is best known for her incisive interpretations of the piano works of Chopin and Beethoven. Little known until 2006, she has emerged as one of the more prominent pianists on the international scene, with a major recording contract, a half-dozen or so recordings since that year, and a busy schedule of concerts and recitals at major venues across the globe. Fliter has been especially busy in the US making appearances with the major orchestras of Cleveland, Cincinnati, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis and others.

Conductor Seiji Ozawa was best known for his long tenure as the conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, at 29 years one of the most durable in the history of the American orchestral scene. Ozawa was noted for his advocacy of contemporary music, even early in his career, when such a thing was rare among American orchestra conductors of the top rank.

The Alban Berg Quartet was founded in 1971 and within a decade was established as one of the finest string quartets in the world. It was known for its large recorded sets of the complete quartets of many masters of the genre. Its founding members were all part of a Viennese chamber orchestra, who, while getting together to play chamber music, discovered the musical rapport essential to founding a great quartet.

Claudio Arrau (1903-1991) is a pianist fully deserving of the epithet ‘legendary’. His rigorous intellect and sense of the sublime found expression in his transcendent technique and sumptuous, yet lucid sonorities.

'The Artemis Quartet's technique is on par with the most virtuoso competitors - and their musicality surpasses that of all other ensembles!' Joachim Kaiser, Süddeutsche Zeitung The Berlin-based Artemis Quartet was founded in 1989 at the Musikhochschule Lübeck, and is recognised today as one of the foremost quartets in the world. Their mentors include Walter Levin, Alfred Brendel, the Alban Berg Quartet, the Juilliard Quartet and the Emerson Quartet.

Shortly after Beethoven's death in 1827, the 18-year-old Felix Mendelssohn composed his String Quartet in A minor. Two years later, while on tour in England, the 20-year-old Mendelssohn composed his String Quartet in E flat major. The young Mendelssohn knew and loved Beethoven's late quartets – he'd heard, played, and even analyzed them – and his.

Boris Christoff was a Bulgarian operatic bass of the 20th century who specialized in roles from Verdi and Mussorgsky. He was also active as a recitalist and made several recordings of songs by Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, and other Romantic era composers. He was born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria in 1914. His mother was Russian, and his father was a Bulgarian teacher who also sang at a nearby church. Christoff began singing when he was very young, and he sang in the choir at the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Sofia. Although his musical talents were already apparent, he decided to study law at Sofia University. After he finished his schooling in the late 1930s, he worked as a magistrate, and he sang in the Gusla Chorus.