Andris Nelsons is the Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and in fall 2015 he was announced as Gewandhauskapellmeister of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, commencing in the 2017/18 season. With both appointments, and in leading a pioneering alliance between these two esteemed institutions, Andris Nelsons is firmly underlined as one of the most renowned and innovative conductors on the international scene today.
Andris Nelsons even though he is only in his mid 30ies has had a long journey with Shostakovich. He is one of the last conductors of his generation who still grew up in the Russian and, more especially, the Soviet musical tradition ever since he started his training as a conductor. He studied in St Petersburg with Alexander Titov and also with Mariss Jansons. His new orchestra has had a great tradition in performing many of Shostakovich’s works in America for the first time.
This recording provides a kaleidoscope of Shostakovich’s struggle with historical events and political pressures. The pre-war eclectic but accessible and popular 5th, in which he would seem to bow to political pressure, ensured his temporary rehabilitation. The beautiful but dark and gloomy mid-war 8th provoked yet again his fall from favour and instead of providing the political authorities with a triumphant post-war 9th Symphony, Shostakovich wrote a light Haydnesque work which would not be performed until after Stalin’s death.

普罗科菲耶夫第三钢琴协奏曲的版本很多，在此强烈推荐这张阿格里奇与阿巴多，柏林爱乐的合作（DG公司）。阿格里奇把此曲的豪放与浪漫发挥至极至，令人叫绝。
普罗科菲耶夫是20世纪最有天才的作曲家之一。他的《C大调第三钢琴协奏曲》（op.26）是作曲家最著名的作品之一，也是他的五部钢琴协奏曲中最受欢迎的一部。这部作品始创作于1917年，于1921年完成于巴黎。同年12月16日在美国芝加哥首演，作者本人演奏钢琴，斯托克（F.Stock）指挥芝加哥交响乐团协奏。
这部协奏曲音乐语言的特点，是民俗性与复调手法结合，显示出作曲家创作个性的高度成熟。全曲分三个乐章。第一乐章为行板－－快板，奏鸣曲式。行板的序奏，开始由单簧管独奏奏出悠扬的民歌风旋律，进入奏鸣曲式快板后，连续十六分音符急促进行的引子先由弦乐奏出，随之钢琴奏出响亮的充满生气的主部主题，音乐以充沛的活力铺陈展开并形成高潮。副部主题平易近人，但不乏幽默情趣，丰富的复调手法把这个主题装饰得有声有色。呈示部结尾处再次奏响序奏主题后，乐章进入激动人心的展开部。展开部中的赋格式的推进将音乐的情绪推至顶点。随后的再现部将前面的各种素材作了变化的回顾，钢琴华丽技巧的炫示令人兴奋异常。整个乐章最后在急促有力的强烈音响中结束。第二乐章为小行板，变奏曲式。其主题美柔如歌，由长笛、单簧管在弦乐的和弦衬托下奏出，清澈明净、引人入胜。接续的五个变奏快慢相间，时而娇媚，时而粗野，时而安详宁静，时而热烈狂暴，对比丰富，变化万端。最后在庄重的气氛中结束全乐章。第三乐章为不太快的快板，回旋曲式。叠部主题具有跃动的节奏活力，由弦乐拨弦与大管的齐奏开门见山地引出，带有拉威尔式的某种性格。乐章最后以令人炫目的钢琴技巧将音乐推向高潮。
这部协奏曲钢琴技巧的难度令人瞠目，但效果惊人，因而被人称为“吃力而讨好的作品”。它已成为大钢琴家们争相演奏以显示自己高超技艺的20世纪经典钢琴名作之一。

中央民族乐团1960年创建于北京﹐是目前规模最大﹐编制最完整﹐水平最高的国家民族乐团。乐团创始人为原中国音乐家协会主席﹑著名作曲家李焕之先生和著名声乐教育家唐荣枚女士﹐现任团长为顾夏阳。

Release notes
ROYAL MINSTRELS 1450 - 1690 Birth and development of the Renaissance and pre-Baroque instrumental ensemble of the Golden Age.
One of the most interesting new developments on the 15th and 16th century musical scene was the affirmation and development of instrumental music as an independent language, with the flourishing of new forms of musical expression based on vocal forms or improvisation and dance. Just as in 15th-16th century Italy, vocal song inspired the development of Canzoni da sonare and Madrigali passeggiati, from the middle of the 15th century, during the heyday of Alfonso V the Magnanimous’s newly installed court in Naples, the courts that had close contacts with Italian culture, such as those of Flanders and Catalonia-Aragon, saw the emergence a new and increasingly specific repertory which, during the Golden Age of the 15th and 16th centuries, was to become popular and spread throughout the Iberian peninsula and, particularly at the courts of Castile, Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia, as well as those countries where the latter maintained a political presence, such as Flanders, Naples and Sicily. At the same time, it is no mere coincidence that the first paintings and frescoes depicting early versions of the viola da gamba, one of the first typically Renaissance instruments, are to be found in various forms in the region of Valencia and Gandía, two cities which had close ties with Italian culture.
Our professional involvement with this repertory goes back to our early discoveries and experiences (1966-67) with the Barcelona-based ensemble ARS MUSICÆ (with Enric Gispert), followed by our studies, research and experimentation at the SCHOLA CANTORUM BASILIENSIS (1968-70), and later (in 1974) with the creation of HESPÈRION XX (with Montserrat Figueras, Hopkinson Smith and Lorenzo Alpert). During more than 40 years researching and reviving the musical legacy of the Hesperides (the name that the ancient Greeks gave to the Iberian and Italic peninsulas) in the company of our fellow musicians in HESPÈRION XX and, since 2001, HESPÈRION XXI, we have been able to trace the key significance and importance of the instrumental legacy of the ministriles, dating back to the mid-15th century, through works such as the different versions of the Hautes Danses (performed on wind instruments, with their predominantly brilliant, high-pitched sound) and the Basses danses (typically rendered by viol ensembles, with their deeper, more serious sound) which developed as improvisational counterpoint on the basis of Gregorian chant (“In exitu Israel”) or more popular melodies transformed into “cantus firmus”, such as “la Spagna”, “la Romanesca”, “Las Vacas”, the “Passamezzo” and “Mappa mundi”, not forgetting the fanfares peculiar to each individual court and city (“Dit le bourguynon”, “Vive le Roy”, “Propiñan de Melyor”, “Chiave, chiave”) and the popular dances (“Collinetto”, “La Perra mora”, “La Folia”), as well as those of courtly origin (Pavanes, Galliards, Saltarellos, etc.) to which the fantasias, tientos, batallas, diferencias and glosados were added from the middle of the 16th century.
In order to give a balanced picture of the early years of this process (1450-1550), for which there are few printed sources, we have added to the wonderful examples by Johannes Cornago, Hayne van Ghizeghem, Josquin des Prés and Bartolomé Ramos de Pareja a selection of villancicos and canciones from the 15th and the early 16th centuries, performed here in an instrumental version inspired in the masterly adaptations to be found in later publications by Luys de Narváez (1538), Diego Ortiz (Roma 1553), Luis Venegas de Henestrosa (1557), Tomás de Santa María (1565), Antonio and Hernando de Cabezón (1578).
Many of these works have featured as instrumental interludes in our recordings of Golden Age vocal music, and particularly in our albums devoted to the principal songbooks: Colombina, Juan del Enzina, Palacio, Calabria, Medinaceli and Sablonara. In this new programme on the repertory of the MINISTRILES REALES, they are heard together for the first time, thus forming an independent corpus, one in which the pieces are selected and grouped according to a contrasted musical concept respecting the musical space of each work, and ordered according to mainly chronological criteria. This approach serves further to highlight the originality, beauty and great variety of forms and styles of a repertory which is not only important in its own right, but also because it signals the birth and glorious development of a new art, that of las músicas para tañer (music to be played), an art which was to lay the foundations for the development throughout the 17th and 18th centuries of the extraordinarily rich instrumental chamber music and orchestral repertory.
JORDI SAVALL
Paris/Seoul, December, 2008
Translated by Jacqueline Minett

This album represents what is akin to a piano recital. As a piano student I never participated in this standard ritual (the recital). The pieces that I choose are not ones that are terribly difficult to master and typically serve as pieces that I play to "keep my fingers nimble". I felt compelled to try a project recording classical music, by the masters; such as Mozart, Bach and Beethoven. I learned much more from the process of recording these pieces than I had anticipated. With all that being said, here it is, for your listening pleasure, completely free of charge. Download, listen, relax, take a walk in the park with this music, or fall asleep to it. Whatever your application of these songs, I hope they offer something to you.
credits

《Julemeditasjoner 圣诞沉思》（注意：国内有些地方写成了“Fulemeditasjoner”，那是错误滴）也翻译作《喜乐的宁静》，由大提琴家 Aage Kvalbein 奥格·科瓦尔本 和享誉国际的跨界钢琴巨匠 Iver Kleive 艾弗·克雷夫 共同合作演绎，以醇美的大提琴和珠玉钢琴交织出一首首如诗的音乐篇章。
二位音乐家以音乐传递乐活能量，让这些选自挪威、丹麦、欧洲等地的民谣或诗歌，在音乐的美学中散发出极其温暖、宁静、典雅的气息，令听者神醉。这股充满喜乐的宁静感，是演奏者带给听者既深远又幽静的聆赏感动。

The Good CD Guide 3 discs

Music written for the Sistine Chapel, including two new recordings of Allegri's Miserere - one with the familiar top Cs, and one with additional embellishments developed by Deborah Roberts during hundreds of concert performances by The Tallis Scholars since their landmark first recording of this work in 1980.