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With his agile technique, dramatic eloquence and rich palette of vocal colours, Jonathan Tetelman here inhabits a range of roles from the French and Italian repertoire. Recorded at the Auditorio Alfredo Kraus with the Orquesta Filarm¢nica de Gran Canaria and its Chief Conductor, Karel Mark Chichon, this collection shows the strong and powerful voice of the tenor in a selection of popular and rather unknown arias. © Deutsche Grammophon

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France's Benjamin Biolay left behind his provocative Buenos Aires cycle after two acclaimed albums, Palermo Hollywood in 2016 and the platinum-certified Volver in 2017). Grand Prix is nostalgic and unquestionably autobiographical. Its title references Formula 1 racing's excitement, drama, heroes, and tragedies. "Grand Prize" artfully contrasts racing with his own life experiences and the sacrifices he's made in pursuit of art. Of course his romantic life plays a major part: Ex-wife Chiara Mastroianni makes two guest appearances, former lover Keren Ann makes another, and current girlfriend, actress Anaïs Demoustier, assists on two others. The younger Biolay loved the Smiths, Happy Mondays, New Order, and the Strokes and he pays homage to them all and more, with a small band, analog synths, complete guitar and drum takes, and live vocals in songs that caress elements of Krautrock, post-punk, Brit-and electro-pop, Euro-disco, chanson, and MPB. Single "Comment Est Ta Peine," with Demoustier, opens with a disco-phonic synth similar to Daft Punk's "Get Lucky." However, the organic drums, sharp, funky guitars, and rigid bassline are adamantly rockist. Biolay's lyrics enquire about his lover's existential pain, contrasting it egotistically and ironically with his own. Mastroianni appears on the poignant yet hooky "Visage Pâle," where Biolay claims with too much protestation that "I have less appetite than sincerity/Love has a price that I can no longer pay…." On "Comme Une Voiture Volée," guitars ring with longing and excitement (think M83!) as drums and swirling synths propel the mix up and out. His lyrics offer only longing: "My heart is like an old engine when you lift the bonnet. You're as beautiful as a stolen car.…" The chanson ballad "Vendredi 12" questions a lost lover's memories while betraying the depths of his own abjection and loneliness. The title track is introduced by a nostalgic organ and distinctly "French rock" dancefloor beat. It's an uptempo elegy for Formula 1 driver Jules Bianchi, who died from his racing injuries at age 24. For "Papillon Noir," with Demoustier, he channels New Order's dancefloor rock beautifully. Again, despite the joy in the mix, his lyrics are resigned to always being in a temporary place when it comes to love: "I am an evening visitor, I am the vestiges of the dark sun/I am the night watchman, I am the bizarre boy...who has nothing to do/I am your only alibi, your temporary libido…." Closer "Interlagos (Saudade)" touches on the 1994 death of Brazilian Formula 1 driver Ayrton Senn, then revels in Biolay's own tears, joys, and small victories; it's a dreamy lament, complete with choirs, strings, and shuffling percussion, elevated by the presence of his daughter Anna (credited as "Bambi") on backing vocals. Ultimately, Grand Prix is Biolay's finest album since 2009's La Superbe, if not his best overall, and is easily his most revealing and vulnerable. No longer the enfant terrible of modern chanson, the singer, songwriter, and producer is now one of France's most evocative -- and necessary -- artists.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

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Pianist Bertrand Chamayou's Good Night! takes its title from one of the numbers of Leoš Janáček's From an Overgrown Path, which opens the program. It's appropriate, for the entire program consists of works capturing the moment when sleep comes. They go by the names of lullaby, berceuse, wiegenlied, and more, but they have are consistent in tone, and listeners in search of an album with which to unwind and even to fall asleep to will be satisfied here. The program is very artfully constructed so as to deepen the mood with each piece. (That is, until Helmut Lachenmann's Wiegenmusik, a modernist work that may wake one right up again.) There are some familiar examples of the genre from Liszt, Brahms (the "Brahms Lullaby," in an arrangement by Max Reger), and Chopin, but also lesser-known works by Sergei Lyapunov, the worth-knowing female composer Mel Bonis, and Bryce Dessner, whose entrancing Song for Octave confirms that he has moved definitively beyond being included on programs simply to draw in rock music fans. However, it's Chamayou's playing that ties the whole thing together; he keeps the music at a low but constant intensity and has remarkable control throughout. This is an ideal gift for those with a new baby, or really for anyone else.© TiVo

Recorded in the inspiring settings of the Château de Chambord in 2020, this album does justice to Louis de Caix d'Hervelois, whose career, like Watteau's paintings and Marivaux's plays, began in the eighteenth century. His elegance, lightness and delicate eroticism can still impart a certain frisson in an age when seriousness and constraints of all kinds have rather displaced a certain joie de vivre.Likely a pupil of Marin Marais, Caix d'Hervelois wrote and published extensively for the viola da gamba, an instrument that was in the final stages of its development and would shortly be supplanted by the cello, which was more sonorous and easier to play. He left a considerable legacy in stone as well as in music, which he taught to a great many pupils. A totally independent musician, which was very rare at the time, he made his living from tutoring the bourgeoisie of Paris, from his publications and, above all, it seems, from his real estate investments: for this excellent musician was also a formidable businessman.At first, his style was inspired by that of his master Marin Marais. But it evolved in a new direction, oriented towards lightness and virtuosity. In hushed salons, listeners came to be intoxicated by the original and playful harmonies of this Picard who had come to Paris seeking fame and fortune. The delicacy of his music and the modesty of his art still touch listeners today, especially since the musicians of the ensemble La Rêveuse, led by Florence Bolton on viol and Benjamin Perrot on continuo, bring consummate artistry to bear on this characterful example of fine French art. © François Hudry/Qobuz

After leaving Tai Phong, Jean-Jacques Goldman's solo career gradually took off between 1981 and the release of Non Homologué, the best-selling French recording of 1986. He followed it with Entre Gris Clair et Gris Foncé in 1987, which sold even better. Part of this has to do with the ubiquitous presence of Goldman on French radio and MTV, but the rest is the sound on the recording, which balances rock dynamics with very stylized '80s production: glossy keyboards, heavily treated guitars, drum machines and programs, etc. And then there are the hooks, as evidenced in the first single "La Bas."© Thom Jurek /TiVo

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No one can accuse soprano Sandrine Piau of ever resting on her laurels, and with this 2023 release, she began, in her late fifties, a new partnership with accompanist David Kadouch. It is a bit hard to tell what the theme is supposed to be all about. Only some of the songs are "intimes," and many are not about voyages; Piau also notes that some of the songs are about "the theme of people being snatched away from the land of the living," not an especially intimate concept. Best just to listen and take the songs one by one, and this will reveal not only strong performances but organizational principles the performers don't mention. The first part of the program is devoted to German lieder, the second to French mélodies (before a final return to Schubert), with one piano piece in each set. Piau is arguably the greatest French interpreter of German song, and her Schubert Erlkönig, D. 328, has nothing trite about it as she inhabits but doesn't make opera characters out of the three characters in the piece. Another "theme" is that Piau really makes songs by women her own. There is a group by Clara Schumann, with an excellent setting of Heine's Lorelei that owes something to Erlkönig but is in no way a knockoff, and a fine group by Lili Boulanger that fits Piau beautifully. Sample Si tout ceci n'est qu'un pauvre rêve. Perhaps the Mignon songs do not fit her quite so well at this late date, but the heftier numbers by Liszt and Wolf more than make up for this. Yet another theme is that these are all songs that give the pianist a great deal to do, and Piau's interactions with Kadouch are sensitive and detailed enough to make one eagerly anticipate future collaborations. Superbly recorded by Alpha at the Teldex Studio in Berlin, the album made classical best-seller charts in early 2023.© James Manheim /TiVo