With their new album Generations, Aleksandra and Alexander Grychtolik present prominent ‘influencers’ of keyboard music who shaped the transition from the galant style to the classical period. This journey begins with Wilhelm Friedemann Bach and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, who composed works for two harpsichords in the footsteps of their father, Johann Sebastian Bach, and continues through their half-brother Johann Christian Bach to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, widely regarded as the inventor of four-handed playing and deeply inspired by the music of the Bach sons.

Booklet: EN, DE, FR

This recording of Mozart’s Requiem stands out even in the well-trodden landscape of classical repertoire. While the piece has been recorded many times, the combination of top-tier soloists, the brilliant voices of the Flemish Radio Choir, and the enchanting timbres of Il Gardellino Orchestra on period instruments, all under the energetic direction of Bart Van Reyn, infuses this live performance with an extra spark of magic. The result is a fresh, captivating interpretation that breathes new life into Mozart’s timeless masterpiece.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE, NL

Often overshadowed by the likes of Mozart and Beethoven, Joseph Haydn’s piano sonatas have a profound story to tell. From his humble beginnings as a piano teacher to his pivotal role in the Esterházy court, Haydn’s journey as a composer and performer was as intricate as his compositions.

This collection introduces the listener in contact with Haydn’s mature keyboard works, shaped by his encounters with English pianofortes and remarkable pianists like Thérèse Jansen. Discover the exquisite “English” sonatas, where technical brilliance meets profound musical depth.

Exploring the emotional core of his work, we encounter the haunting “Andante with Variations in F Minor,” a poignant masterpiece that seems to resonate with personal grief.

Michel Kiener takes us on a journey through the life and music of this remarkable composer, unveiling the power of musical expression in Joseph Haydn’s works.

Booklet: EN, FR

Does anyone know the violinist Jacques-Philippe Lamoninary, who was born in Maroilles in northern France at the beginning of the 18th century? Despite his fairly regional career, Lamoninary knew plenty about the numerous Italian composers who were in vogue in France around 1750. He perfectly mastered the art of composing sonatas for two violins and bass in the Italian style, as his first three opera reveal. He can therefore be associated with the French school of composition, which was clearly inspired by Italy, but also by Rameau.

With this recording, the Ensemble Hemiolia – with violinist Emmanuel Resche-Caserta – wishes to pay tribute to this brilliant and enigmatic composer, whose music invites us to a voyage of discovery from the very first note.

Booklet: EN, DE, FR

Radical, daring and extremely refined: that’s how C. P. E. Bach saw his new path for the Oratorio, after his father’s Passions had marked the climax of the baroque era. Encouraged by his godfather Telemann and liberated from the yoke of the capricious Frederick of Prussia, he found himself in Hamburg with an audience hungry for new music. And he brought them his oratorios, no longer in churches but in concert halls, where he demanded the listener’s undivided attention for sudden changes of mood and colour.

Die Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu did indeed leave its traces: both Haydn and Beethoven showed great interest after a series of three performances conducted by Mozart in Vienna. Not only did it pave the way for Haydn’s oratorios, but there are also clear influences on the Pamina arias in Die Zauberflöte written a few years later. C. P. E. Bach wrote to his publisher Breitkopf, “I think this is the best work I have ever written.”

Booklet : EN, FR, DE

Lyrics: DE, EN

With this recital dedicated to German songs by Joseph Haydn, Alice Foccroulle and Pierre Gallon leave their familiar territory – that of Baroque music – and present a personal, thoroughly informed interpretation of these songs, free of the many layers of varnish that have built up over the centuries on these little treasures of vocal music. It is free of the many layers of varnish that have been applied to these little treasures of vocal music over the centuries. Alice Foccroulle is accompanied partly by harpsichord, partly by pianoforte, and leads us across the narrow ridge between the Baroque and the Classical periods. The listener is invited into the Viennese salons of the late 18th century, where love songs and little philosophical or religious tales in German are performed in domestic settings. They are characterised by tenderness, intensity and humour, sometimes with a touch of cynicism.

All in all, Haydn shows himself here from an intimate side, impressively realising the zeitgeist of an epoch in a state of transformation.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE

Lyrics: DE, FR, EN

Vienna. 1803. George Bridgetower, a violinist of Afro-European descent, causes furore with his virtuosity and captivates Beethoven, who writes a devilish and magnificent sonata for him. Despite the premiere’s enormous success performed by both of them, an unfortunate comment by the violinist about one of the composer’s female friends leads to this famous sonata being finally re-dedicated to Rodolphe Kreutzer, who however would never interpret it because of its enormous difficulty.

10 years later, Beethoven composes his next and last violin sonata, dedicated to Pierre Rode, in a completely different character, enormously poetic and introverted. Written in the stage of Beethoven’s life widely associated with his “Immortal Beloved”, the sonata nevertheless retains his incomparable energy.

Described as “Fiery virtuoso” (The Strad) “the Soul Violinist” (Sankei Shinbun) or “Devil’s fiddler” (Bayerischer Rundfunk), Lina Tur Bonet joins now Aurelia Visovan, the  2019 winner of the Brugges Competition. to celebrate the german composer in these Sonatas.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE

A new dynamic Italian Baroque Orchestra makes its debut with not mainstream symphonies. Choosing four of Bach’s sons, all born between 1710 and 1735 and programming their exploration of the then new genre between c.1755 and c.1770, when the five Sinfonie recorded here were composed.

Three keywords are essential: Galant Italian style, German Empfindsamer style and the European Sturm und Drang movement. It’s all about cantabile and sensitivity in the first two cases and about unbridled emotions announcing the romantic era in the third one.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE, IT

“Full of fire, spirit, and life”: this description of the Bohemian composer Josef Mysliveček’s character was made by none other than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, his younger contemporary. Mysliveček (1737-1781) spent his entire career in Italy and committed himself to the life of a freelance composer: he obstinately refused to accept any type of employment in permanent service. Not only did he develop into one of the most talented, successful and productive opera and oratorio composers of his time, but he also achieved distinction as a composer of instrumental music.

His great artistry lay in his mastery of all the forms and techniques current at that time, in the inventiveness revealed in his musical ideas and techniques, and in the ease with which he connected and alternated these ideas in new and often unexpected ways. All of the above are amply illustrated by this world premiere recording of Adamo ed Eva(1771), his third oratorio.

Booklet: FR, EN, DE, NL

Lyrics: IT, EN

Péchés d’opéra brings together instrumental and vocal works from the first half of the 19th century around the horn, the pianoforte and singing. This theme allows us to appreciate the excellent Alessandro Denabian, a major performer on this recording. The album plunges us into a historical musical salon, a real pleasure.

Booklet: EN, FR, DE