Weaving intellect with emotion: Daron Hagen's cantata Everyone, Everywhere.
Feb 28, 2025
American composer Daron Hagen talks about his cantata Everyone, Everywhere in conversation with Raymond Bisha. Composed In 2023 to mark the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Hagen found impetus in the contemporary political status of his own nation to recontextualise the declaration's dry...
The Queene’s Masque, a courtly collection for lute.
Feb 26, 2025
A delightful collection of lute music from the courts of Queen Elizabeth I and King James I, played by Italian lutenist Elisa La Marca. This was a time of incredible cultural richness in England brought forth composers such as John Dowland and writers such as William Shakespeare. Because the lute was one of...
Pade, Krek, Batič. Denmark meets Slovenia to inspirational effect.
Feb 21, 2025
In this podcast, Raymond Bisha discusses a new album from the Danish National Vocal Ensemble with their chief conductor, Slovenian Martina Batič. The programme similarly melds the two nations in a programme of choral music by Slovenian composer Uroš Krek (1922-2008) and Danish composer Else Marie Pade (1924-2016), the...
Johann Sebastian Bach meets the Theorbo, Lutenist Yasunori Imamura plays transcriptions of Bach
Feb 14, 2025
Yasunori Imamura, whose recording of Bach’s complete lute works has been described as a ‘magnificent interpretation’ (Naxos 8.573936–37), turns his attention to the Cello Suites. Imamura has chosen to perform these iconic suites on the theorbo, the most important plucked instrument in the lute family, with...
Sir Simon Rattle looks at Haydn’s Oratorio The Creation
Feb 12, 2025
To mark his inauguration as Chief Conductor of the Bavarian Radio Chorus and Symphony Orchestra, Sir Simon Rattle chose Joseph Haydn's oratorio The Creation. After two concerts on September 21 and 22, 2023 in Munich's Herkulessaal, the work was performed on September 24 in the historic basilica of Ottobeuren in Upper...