Chamber Music & Recitals

The English composer-pianist Freda Swain (1902-85) left behind a huge legacy of music that was largely unknown even during her own lifetime. Her compositions - hundreds of them, in a series of large boxes - found their way to the Swiss pianist Timon...

The English composer Steve Elcock spent years writing music without ever expecting it to be heard: based in rural France, he worked as a translator, composing 'for the drawer.' A recent Toccata Classics recording of his Third Symphony and other...

The English composer Michael Brough (born in Yorkshire, in northern England, in 1960) is rather an unusual character: he is also a full time solicitor. Late in 2013, with a commission from the Swaledale Festival, he sat down at his piano and began to...

The English composer Howard Blake is a living legend with soundtracks like "With Umbrella, Charm and Bowler" and the Academy Award winning "Snowman". That such a musician invites someone to make music is probably quite unlikely. That he then also places...

The English composer Gustav Holst served for many years as director of music at St Paul' Girls' School in London, and it was for the pupils there that he wrote his St Paul' Suite, his most famous work for amateurs.1. Prelude 2. Air 3. Dance 4. Jig:...

The English composer Benjamin Dale's compositions are relatively few in number but of great distinction. In particular it was his friendship with Lionel Tertis, the father of modern viola playing, which inspired a series of outstanding works for the...

The Enescu Project began life in the concert hall and has now been faithfully recorded to create this album. The program is devoted to the music of the great Romanian composer and violinist George Enescu, and to that of his contemporaries and friends,...

The Enea Baroque Orchestra, founded by the mezzo-soprano Francesca Ascioti in 2018, is currently regarded as the best Roman Baroque authority because of the high quality of it's musicians. On this album the ensemble turns to Johann Adolf Hasse's...

The endless genre of operatic fantasy, which explodes and spreads without embankments in the musical culture of the entire Italian nineteenth century, has already been extensively explored in various Tactus productions dedicated both to chamber and...

The endless capabilities of the saxophone are heard to full effect in this wide-ranging program of virtuoso works by 20th century Greek composers.1. I-Vivo 2. Ii-Largo 3. Iii-Allegro 4. Adagio for Soprano Saxophone and Strings 5. I-Allegro Giocoso 6...

The end of an era and a musical highlight: Simon Rattle's farewell as chief conductor of the Berliner Philharmoniker with Gustav Mahler's stunning Sixth Symphony was given a standing ovation by the audience. On 14 November 1987, the young Simon Rattle...

The Encyclopedias of Music would do well to add Montanari name to those of Cathy Berberian and Gabriella Bartolomei. Fantastic in contending with Ceccarelli's concrete-digital sound [...]. (Mario Gamba) "The worlds of sound and words created by...