Anyone who aspires to a professional career as a violinist must eventually reckon with Beethoven's Violin Concerto. This exacting instrumental jewel demands not only technical mastery, but also an extraordinary sense of lyricism and emotion from those who seek to make it their own. It is not surprising that, over the centuries, famous virtuosos have never stopped reimagining and recording this masterpiece in order to pass it on to posterity: Fritz Kreisler, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Isabelle Faust... Now, it is in their footsteps - rather intimidatingly, let's admit - that a new, irresistibly charismatic voice has now arrived.Only 20 years old, María Dueñas possesses the talent and radiance of a long-standing virtuoso. She grew up in Granada and studied in Dresden and Vienna with Boris Kuschnir. Her first major success came in 2021, when she won first prize in the prestigious Yehudi Menuhin Competition. That same year, she attracted the attention of Deutsche Grammophon, with whom she soon signed a contract. It was with this label that she presented her first album, Beethoven and Beyond."Beethoven's Violin Concerto has been with me at the most important moments of my life," says María, for whom it seems only natural to dedicate the first chapter of her discography to this work. She had the chance to record her œuvre with Manfred Honeck and the Vienna Symphony at the beginning of 2023, during a concert held in a hall with a rich history: the Vienna Music Hall - a 'home' debut, as it were. But how to stand out from the crowd? "With the Beethoven concerto, you can't show off your virtuosity, only yourself. And only sound can reveal it.”It was precisely this sound that convinced us! But that's not all: to really add her own touch to the work, María composed her own cadenzas. The album also includes cadenzas by five other famous virtuosos (Louis Spohr, Eugène Ysaÿe, Camille Saint-Saëns, Henryk Wieniawski and Fritz Kreisler) as well as works for violin and orchestra by each of these composers. María takes up the Concerto with a unique sincerity and authenticity and manages to shed a new light on Beethoven, that of her own time. Let us be the first to warn you; instead of Beethoven and Beyond, there will soon be María Dueñas and Beyond. No doubt about it, this is a Qobuzissime! Lena Germann/Qobuz

It is hard to know where to begin enumerating the beauties of this release by the Pygmalion ensemble and its director, Raphaël Pichon, who enumerates his thoughts on Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine in the interview-style booklet. There are many good recordings of this work, sometimes known as the Vespers of 1610. Right from the beginning, with the exultant blaze of unchanging harmony in the opening Invitatorium that announced, just as clearly as anything in the opera Orfeo, that the musical world had changed, the effect of this performance is exceptionally powerful, but it is not only the glittering tutti that impresses. Perhaps even more than Orfeo, the Vespers marshal all the musical resources Monteverdi had at his disposal. There are operatic arias in all but text, handled perfectly by well-chosen soloists who master the ornamentation idioms of the day. There are polychoral brass pieces that show Monteverdi's development of that style prior to his move to St. Mark's in Venice. There is old-school polyphony and straight monody. In Pichon's hands, all these styles are held in perfect balance. Harmonia Mundi's sound, from the Temple du Saint-Esprit in Paris, evokes the splendor of the ducal chapel in Mantua for which the Vespers were written. There is much more that could be said, but let it suffice to observe that even those who think they know the Vespers well will rethink that position after hearing this remarkable recording, which rightfully made classical best-seller charts in the late summer of 2023.© James Manheim /TiVo

J.J. Cale was the embodiment of cool blues. With his atypical blend of rock, folk, country, blues and jazz, he was one of the most influential figures in rock'n' roll. Worshipped by Clapton, the Cocaine writer who spent most of his time in a mobile home remains the essence of a laid-back and relaxed musical style. For his fans, Stay Around is a gift from heaven. This posthumous record from April 2019 brings together fifteen unreleased songs mixed and produced by Cale himself and compiled by his widow, Christine Lakeland, and his old collaborator and manager Mike Kappus. "I wanted to find stuff that was completely unheard to max-out the ‘Cale factor'," says Lakeland, "using as much that came from John’s ears and fingers and his choices as I could, so I stuck to John’s mixes. You can make things so sterile that you take the human feel out. But John left a lot of that human feel in. He left so much room for interpretation.” Obviously, all these gems - from the stripped back Oh My My My to the more elaborate Chasing You - do not change anything at all about what we knew and loved about this king of cool. The quality of Stay Around, which never sounds slap-dash, proves that the man took every second of his art seriously. And as always with him, we come out of this posthumous album with the feeling of having fully lived a human and warm encounter. A sincere and engaging experience, connected to the soul and the gut. Marc Zisman/Qobuz

In 2015, Melody Gardot stepped out of her comfort zone with Currency of Man, an album which suited her entirely but displayed a more soul’n’blues side. That is not to say that her brilliant past efforts were not in keeping with her musical personality, but it was with this record that she confirmed her love for Philadelphia, the town in which she grew up and where groove holds a different meaning.  Five years later, Sunset in the Blue holds all the hallmarks of a return to the singer’s old days which made Melody Gardot’s name. The album is a stripped-back approach to jazz and bossa-nova as imposed by the unexpected circumstances of the year 2020. When the album was beginning development, the pandemic brought a halt to everything an forced the American to rethink the project. She hence proposed that her associates, spread out all over the world, work from a distance. Melody Gardot was based in Paris, her arranger and conductor Vince Mendoza in Los Angeles and the majority of her musicians in England! Despite these constraints, the miracle record was on course for creation which would span a period of roughly five months. And so, Mendoza found himself conducting on-screen from California with musicians playing in London’s Abbey Road Studios (things weren’t made any easier considering the various time-differences). In addition to Mendoza, Melody Grant recruited a set of silky smooth sound connoisseurs who were also instrumental in the success of 2009’s My One and Only Thrill: the producer Larry Klein and sound engineer Al Schmitt.Upon listening to the end result, however, we soon forget the last-minute DIY means with which this album was made. Because throughout Sunset in the Blue, Melody Gardot maintains a fascinatingly solid and intimate direction. Here we see a return to Gardot whispering hypnotically into the ear as she sings amid intermittent piano phrases and guitars. Her voice gracefully lounges upon a bed of refined and perfectly balanced violin strings. This formula reaches an irresistible climax with the album’s title track as she turns to her much-loved Brazil with tracks like Ninguém, Ninguém and Um Beljo, before she returns to the exquisite-sounding Moon River and I Fall in Love too Easily. A beautiful album which finishes with a somewhat intrusive track, Little Something, a pop duet with Sting that doesn’t really fit in with Sunset in the Blue’s general mood. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

Christmas has come early! That’s the spirit German label ACT is evoking with this delightful exclusive compilation. The tracks on the album are extraordinarily varied, from classical jazz (Irving Berlin’s “Snow”, Felix Bernard’s “Winter Wonderland”; Mel Tormé’s “Christmas Song”, Thad Jones’ “A Child is Born”), to traditional songs arranged à la Dixieland (“O Tannenbaum”) or ‘Burt Bacharach style’ (“Es wird scho glei dumpa”). It also takes us on a trip to the more cozy climates of Scandinavian folk jazz (the stunning “Vinter” by singer Janne Mark accompanied by trumpetist Arve Henriksen), and features the Jazzrausch Big Band, singers Viktoria Tolstoy and Jeanette Köhn, pianist Ida Sand, as well as the group Echoes of Spring along with pianist David Helbok. Through this kaleidoscope of moods, masterfully incarnated by a panel of highly diverse voices, including that of Landgren who, along with the trombone, doesn’t hesitate to carry a tune himself, this record is enchanting. A true success. © Stéphane Ollivier/Qobuz      

A “roadhouse” is a kind of roadside bar located in the middle of nowhere for drinking and listening to music. Thanks in part to David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, roadhouses have acquired a unique reputation and irremediably generate an image that is at once strange, comforting, and melancholic. For the conception of their sixth album, the members of the Australian group The Paper Kites have certainly had a Lynchian ambiance in mind, as the record’s sleeve proves. The photo taken by Dara Munnis represents an actual roadhouse where the group played every night for a month. All of the album’s songs are taken from the concerts performed during this unique residency in the small town of Campbells Creek. Sam Bentley, the leader of the group, explains that Roadhouse is the fruit of a “collective dream”. “We wanted it to be a combination of all the greatest dive bars you’ve ever been to, late-night watering holes, smoky taverns, biker bars”, he adds. The overall color of the album is country and folk, found in the ballads dominated by the banjo, the harmonica, or even the steel guitar (“Rolling On Easy”, “The Sweet Sound of You” and “Hurts So Good”). Others, like “Marietta”, “Mercy” and “I Don’t Want to Go That Way” can instead be put away in the syrupy romanticism aisle, which is emphasized by the singer’s beautifully mournful voice. As for the tracks “Black & Thunder” and “June’s Stolen Car”, they stray a bit from the original folk trajectory and swing toward a more bluesy rock flavor. It’s an atmospheric album that feels like a comforting pause in the middle of a long trip on the desert roads of Australia. ©Nicolas Magenham/Qobuz

The trio of Enya, producer and sound engineer Nicky Ryan and lyricist Roma Ryan, have joined forces for Dark Sky Island, a new album inspired by the voyage to the Isle of Sark (off Normandy), a journey which represents a lifetime journey through history and emotion, and travels to the very heart of the oceans. Musically, Dark Sky Island is an incredibly eclectic collection of titles, naturally unified by a panoramic and masterful execution. Time does not yet seem to have taken its toll on Enya, who again and again manages refresh her pop and new age stylings, her haunting accents and wonderful lyricism. © CM / Qobuz

It has been a long time, perhaps going back to the days of E. Power Biggs, since an organ recital appeared on a major label, backed by real marketing muscle. Yet here is organist Anna Lapwood on Sony Classical, with not only a hair and make-up artist but also a stylist credited. She delivers, in every way, with terrific engineering treatment of a small organ at the Royal Hospital School in London, setting an intimate mood that immediately draws the listener in. Lapwood is a choir director leading young musicians, and she is young herself; one might call this a contemporary organ recital, with scores from recent films and works by a group of contemporary crossover composers such as Ludovico Einaudi and the minimalist Ēriks Ešenvalds, all mixed with Bach and Chopin and Florence Price (who, one learns from Lapwood's own intelligent notes, worked as a theater organist and wrote five volumes of organ music). The arrangments are mostly Lapwood's own, with Philip Glass, of all people, represented by a work originally for organ, Mad Rush. She notes that the Glass work makes a perfect fit with the Bach-Gounod Ave Maria, and she might have picked almost any other pair of segues on the album; her sequence of events on the album is just beautifully structured. This album has performed strongly among listeners, and it shows that even a fairly obscure genre of recording will connect with a wide audience if it is artistically approached.© James Manheim /TiVo

"From Afar" is a new album full of beautiful arrangements recorded on two pianos with the repertoire mirrored on both grand piano and upright piano. Inspired by a meeting with the iconic Hungarian composer György Kurtág, this album is a musical response with music from: Kurtág, J. S. Bach, Brahms, W. A. Mozart, Adès, Schumann, Birgisson or Kaldalóns. With beautifully evocative titles & forgotten melodies, Víkingur Ólafsson creates a thread of stories within a bigger structure: nature, home, childhood, family. © Deutsche Grammophon

' This set... put into the hands of those who have not yet unlocked the paradise of Mozartean opera, is worth... what ? A year at a foreign university ? I don't believe I exaggerate.' (Gramophone)

The night before the release of her new album, Natalia Lafourcade was on stage at Carnegie Hall in New York alongside special guests David Byrne and Omara Portuondo. Natalia Lafourcade is a star throughout the American continent, from the very north to the very south. Up until now, France has managed to resist her charm, though De Todas Las Flores might just change that. The sound of this release is immediately exciting, and it’s a beautiful gateway into her discography. The songs were recorded on the border between Mexico and the United States in an analogue studio, the old-fashioned way. This wasn’t a decision born out of nostalgia or arrogance; it was simply a way to cherish the organic sound of tape recording and bring it back to life. In fact, this album’s sound is sometimes reminiscent of the music produced by the Cuban studio Egrem, giving the listener the impression that they’re hearing the music from inside the instruments.Marc Ribot, a fine connoisseur and interpreter of Latin blues, adds to the Cuban flavour with his dreamy guitars. On the piano, the young Emiliano Dorantes revives the elegance of Rubén González. On percussion, Cyril Atef light rhythms gently envelope each of the songs. Let’s not forget the strings, bass and backing vocals, which only add to the finesse of the album. Natalia Lafourcade shines in the middle of this dream team, her expressive voice ringing with the ghosts of past Latin singers, from Chavelas Vargas and Elizete Cardozo to Lhasa. There are no covers here, only personal compositions with a classic sound that flirts with jazz and Brazilian song. Natalia Lafourcade can sing anything, from a light, romantic samba to a mysterious, dark Haitian incantation. De Todas Las Flores is more than a pretty bouquet of songs; it’s a secret garden that knows no bounds. © Stéphane Deschamps/Qobuz

This recording showed up on classical best-seller charts in the autumn of 2023, and it may have been a surprise to see it there. The music is by Ludwig Daser, an almost unknown German Renaissance composer, and while Cinquecento is an esteemed vocal group specializing in the music of the period, it is not commonly a chart resident. Several factors may have drawn listeners to the recording, not least the terrific cover art featuring a painting of a Munich court jester with a lion (there is also a beautiful illustration with one of the original choirbooks). There is also the fact that Daser, the predecessor of Orlande de Lassus at the Bavarian court in Munich, is all but unknown; listeners will be glad to discover him. He did not have the wide-ranging genius of Lassus, but his music, like that of Tallis and Byrd, reflected the shifts of the age between Catholicism and Protestantism. The program here presents a good overview, with an imposing, rather conservative but ingenious Missa Pater noster (it is based on one chant, but another one is worked into the all-important Credo). There are also small, intimate motets in German and an alternatim hymn setting. The small Cinquecento group (mostly two voices per part) works quite well in these but seems underpowered in the mass; sources of the day specify at least a dozen singers, more likely 16, and up to 24 at the Sistine Chapel, which would have furnished a sound ideal. Nevertheless, the singing is clear and brings out the polyphonic details in a complex piece like Fracta diuturnis. A release of great interest to lovers of the eventful 16th century.© James Manheim /TiVo

As much as jazz musicians love to do it, the Christmas album exercise can quickly turn stale. Especially when you opt for a repertoire essentially composed of hits like Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, Oh Christmas Tree, Il est né le divin enfant, Petit Papa Noël, Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow, Silent Night and Jingle Bells. But here, Ibrahim Maalouf has managed to create an impeccable record that gives his trumpet an even better showcase than usual. The starting point of the project is a set of very personal values. "It's an album of 25 great Christmas standards and 3 new songs that I wrote to celebrate both my son's very first Christmas and my grandmother Odette's very last one last year. My memories of Christmas are full of wonderful moments and I wanted to record the album in a way that would capture the magic of those moments.“For this classical, touching effort, Maalouf brought in three friends: guitarist François Delporte, pianist Frank Woeste and choir director Sofi Jeannin, who has selected eight singers with angelic voices. The whole group met in two different recording locations: Armand Amar's Babel studios in Montreuil, where Ibrahim Maalouf worked on his first albums, and the Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre church, the oldest church in Paris, a few metres from Notre-Dame, where his father was sacristan in the 1960s; it was also where the trumpeter got engaged and married...Bolstered by all these strong symbols, First Noël moves forward with simplicity and humility, emphasising the melodies above all, without any kind of Hollywood arrangements. "After having recorded so many albums, I felt that the time had come to set down my version of these great Christmas classics, giving them a less childish, more musical dimension, and a more spiritual aspect as well: but at the same time preserving their necessary and subtle fragility as music for children, and as great classics known and sung worldwide.” The end result is a soothing, dreamlike, fraternal and universal journey. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

The 400th anniversary year of William Byrd's death gets off to a roaring start with this collection of mostly Catholic choral music from the small (mixed-gender, adult) choir Stile Antico. This justly celebrated group works without a conductor and is recognized for its flexible and sensitive treatment of texts, even in one as well-worn as that of the Catholic mass. Here, sample the "Qui propter nos homines" section from Credo of the Mass for Four Voices, which runs all the way through Christ's crucifixion and resurrection. There are many performances of this Byrd masterpiece, but few that convey so much of the sense of awe and reverence with which Byrd infused these words. The Mass is broken up, as would have occurred in Byrd's time, with motets appropriate to the various parts of the mass. None of these is particularly rare, but the clarity and warmth of Stile Antico's music-making here is consistently remarkable. There are a few Anglican English pieces, and for listeners who do not speak Latin, these will confirm the group's gifts in clear text articulation. A superb job all around on a release that could serve any listener well as an introduction to Byrd's sacred music and made classical best-seller charts in early 2023.© James Manheim /TiVo