Classical Music Headlines
Welcome to the Delphian website.
Organs of Edinburgh: Buy the limited edition hardback book here. Circa 600 copies remain. Click here to buy your copy.
With two new releases every month, Delphian Records is one of the fastest-growing independent record labels in the UK. Click here to download the schedule of forthcoming releases, and click here to download a PDF of the paper catalogue.
If you already know what you would like to purchase, please visit our catalogue online. We aim to deliver within 72 hours in the UK and within 7 days to any international location.
Delphian operates a subscription scheme where subscribers agree to purchase a new release bi-monthly (for £10) and can opt to buy the whole back catalogue at a vastly-reduced rate. Click here to apply for more details.
*New Releases!
|
|
JS
Bach - The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II DCD34101 A recognised authority in 20th century and contemporary music, Peter Hill turns for the first time on disc to another of his lifelong preoccupations - the music of JS Bach. On this new recording, Hill brings his customary scholarly acumen and crystalline musical intelligence to bear on Book two of the ‘48’ - music of ‘unsurpassed inventiveness’.
|
|
|
Mozart:
‘Coronation’ Mass in C, Vesperae Solennes de Confessore DCD34102 Tewkesbury Abbey Schola Cantorum and Charivari Agréable come together for the first time in vividly communicative interpretations of three of Mozart’s sacred masterpieces. The forces are very much as Mozart intended – a period orchestra, an all-male chorus and soloists (including 2009 BBC Chorister of the Year Laurence Kilsby) drawn from the choir. Under Benjamin Nicholas’s spirited direction these performances bristle with energy and the invigorating freshness of youth.
|
|
|
Songs
of the Baltic Sea DCD34052 East meets West on this new recording as two great singing traditions are brought together, to thrilling effect. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union the three Baltic states have emerged as powerhouses of choral innovation and imagination. Mike Brewer and the NYCGB bring all their customary fervour and virtuosity to bear on this programme of masterworks from three of Europe's smallest, yet musically richest, countries.
|
|
|
The
Okavango Macbeth DCD34096 The Macbeth story as played out in a troupe of baboons in Botswana? This fanciful idea inspired the writer Alexander McCall Smith and the composer Tom Cunningham to come up with their chamber opera, The Okavango Macbeth. Set in the Okavango Delta in northern Botswana, the opera deals with the efforts of an ambitious female baboon, Lady Macbeth, to encourage her husband the dominant baboon, Duncan. The response to the opera’s premiere in the No 1 Ladies’ Opera House, led many to conclude that in this extraordinary and unusual tale a new operatic gem has emerged.
|
|
|
Judith Weir Choral Music DCD34095 In the first recording devoted entirely to Judith Weir's choral music, the Choir of Gonville & Caius explores her evolving relationship with the medium, from her earliest liturgical commission to the most recent, which was premiered in 2009. Also included in this comprehensive collection are several secular pieces and her two organ works, which are now established classics of the repertoire. The athleticism, intensity and clarity that are hallmarks of the choir's singing are ideally suited to Weir's strikingly original, approachable and fascinating music.
|
|
|
Robert Crawford String Quartets 1-3 DCD34091 The Edinburgh Quartet are Scotland's foremost exponents of new music; they have enjoyed a long relationship with Robert Crawford, who is now surely Scotland's musical elder statesman. His three quartets are given haracteristically vivid readings on this recording. They offer a fascinating overview of Crawford's development over the last forty years and the second in particular - with its inspired wit and infectious musicality - deserves far greater renown.
|
|
|
In the Beginnning DCD34072 Founded as recently as 2008, the new Choir of Merton College, Oxford is rapidly emerging as a major force in collegiate choral music. On this their debut recording, the choir’s two directors helm a diverse programme that reflects the range and reach of the choir’s daily repertoire. Bookended by two pieces titled In the Beginning – Gabriel Jackson’s ravishing version of the rarely-set Johannine Prologue, Copland’s glowing account of the first seven days of creation – this disc offers a themed sequence of Renaissance and modern classics, all captured in sumptuous sound in the radiant acoustics of Merton’s famous chapel.
|
|
|
Revenge of the Folksingers DCD34108 Another hallmark collaboration, this album was created by Concerto Caledonia and guests during a week’s residency in the Suffolk countryside at Aldeburgh. Traditional and original songs are interspersed with old and new tunes from Scotland, all informed by the group’s magpie diversity and by Britten’s folksong arrangements, which they found in Aldeburgh’s library. The resulting alchemy of nu-folk with an early music sensibility defies categorisation.
|
|
|
Songbook DCD34097 This ‘songbook’ is unique to the Schola Cantorum choristers of Tewkesbury Abbey. “Essentially, it's a showcase for the Abbey trebles,” their Director of Music Benjamin Nicholas explains. “We’ve been assembling our own Songbook for quite a while now – the songs the trebles sing, from time to time, in boys-only concerts, and that they are taught in individual singing lessons. I’ve always been keen to build each boy up as a soloist, not necessarily with the express idea of them singing lots of solos, but so that they can learn to sing in a soloistic way.” This is evident most of all in the distinctive singing of 11- year-old Laurence Kilsby, whose gifts won him the BBC Chorister of the Year competition in 2009. On this recording, he features as soloist in two Shelley settings by Roger Quilter, the Bach/Gounod Ave Maria and in John Ireland’s beautiful, sincerely-felt Passiontide motet Ex Ore Innocentium from 1944. 'the trebles splendidly vindicate the tradition that places them at the heart of English cathedral music.'
|
|
|
The Shadow Side DCD34099 For many years Irene Drummond has been the leading exponent of contemporary song in Scotland. With her partner Iain Burnside -- peerless in this music -- she offers a fascinating snapshot of her repertoire on this recording. From the rarified sparseness of James MacMillan, to the sustained luminosity of Paul Mealor, and the emotionally charged dramatic outbursts of John McLeod, The Shadow Side explores a world of half-lights and visceral intensity.
|
|
|
Rory Boyle: Solo Piano Music DCD34098 This year 2010 British Composer Award winner Rory Boyle celebrates his sixtieth birthday. Young virtuoso pianist James Willshire’s debut recording explores the full gamut of Boyle’s ompositional personality – from the cragginess of his finely wrought Sonata to the intensely human lyricism of Tatty’s Dancing (itself a sixtieth birthday present for Boyle's wife). 'Willshire shaped and characterised every momenth with freshness and lucidity' 'While Boyle's Scottish roots are never far away, his music has a strong, mainstream European, Stravinsky-based rigour, with its own brand of virile, challenging, but always comprehensible counterpoint, dissonance which is hard-fought yet never gratuitous, an unsentimental lyricism and unerring sense of architecture.'
|
|
|
Bruckner
Motets DCD34071 Following their highly acclaimed recording of the 16th-century John Taverner, Duncan Ferguson and his Edinburgh choir turn their attention to one of the nineteenth century’s compositional giants. This sequence of motets — among them several littleknown gems — is a testament to Bruckner’s profound Catholic faith and these performances blaze with fire and fervour in the vast cathedral's icy acoustic.
|
|
|
Wilde
Plays Beethoven DCD34090 These three piano sonatas outline a progression from the despair of the Piano Sonata No. 17 in D minor, Op. 31, No. 2, written at the same time as the start of the famous ‘Heiligenstadt Testament’, when Ludwig van Beethoven’s realization that his deafness was complete and permanent drove him to contemplate suicide, via his courageous fight back, brilliantly expressed in the irrepressible optimism of the Piano Sonata No. 21 in C, ‘Waldstein’, Op. 53 towards the lofty spiritual aspirations of the Piano Sonata No. 31 in A flat, Op. 110. Fifty years after his victory in the International Liszt- Bartók Piano Competition David Wilde’s masterful interpretations are the fruit of a lifetime’s experience of studying and performing these towering masterpieces.
|
|
|
Handel:
Alexander's Feast DCD34094 Handel's musical illustration of Dryden's Alexander's Feast, first performed in 1736, was a critical and popular success. A day after the premiere, the London Daily Post reported 'Never was upon the like Occasion so numerous and splendid an Audience at any Theatre in London, there being at least 1300 Persons present'. Twice a year some of the UK's finest baroque players and young vocal soloists come together in Edinburgh's Canongate Kirk to give sell-out concerts of the great works of Bach and Handel. Ludus Baroque's appearances are unmissable events in Edinburgh's calendar. Now for the first time listeners from further afield can experience the vibrancy of their Festival-fuelled performances in this their debut recording. Alexander's Feast is the perfect showpiece for the vitality and abandon of Ludus Baroque and their rising-star soloists.
|
|
|
Carleton
Etherington plays the Grove & Milton organs of Tewkesbury Abbey
DCD34089 Few ecclesiastical buildings in the United Kingdom can boast possessing two pipe organs; of those that can, fewer still can rival the quality of the ‘Grove’ and ‘Milton’ organs in Tewkesbury’s magnificent Norman abbey. It must have been something of a coup for the organ builders Michell & Thynne to hear the legendary organist William Thomas Best proclaim their latest instrument (on show at the Liverpool Exhibition of 1886) to be “the finest organ of its kind that I have ever played upon”. Their ‘model organ’ was designed to be as flexible as possible within the confines of the smallest number of stops, and the result was an immediate success: its first appearance at the 1885 Inventions Exhibition in London caused something of a sensation amongst the organ cognoscenti. The blind organist Alfred Hollins, not long out of college, was one of a number of players who gave regular recitals on the instrument both at the London exhibition, and subsequently the following year in Liverpool. Tewkesbury Abbey’s other organ known as the ‘Milton’ is a happy example of enlargement and rebuilding over the decades, resulting in its current incarnation as a flexible and thoroughly contemporary instrument capable of interpreting a wide spectrum of the repertoire. This
recording demonstrates the unique qualities of each instrument in
a programme of concert organ works by some of the finest composers
for the organ of the past '‘The
Tewkesbury organist, Carleton Etherington, shows sensitivity and
subtlety... ’ 'in
a word, it's splendid'
|
|
|
Stanford
Choral Music Laurence
Kilsby treble DCD34087 For their fourth recording for Delphian, the boys and men of Tewkesbury Abbey Schola Cantorum turn their attentions to that doyen of Anglican church music, Charles Villiers Stanford. Alongside familiar gems from the Evensong repertoire, sung with characteristic vigour and freshness, the programme includes the six little-known Bible Songs, each followed by its associated hymn. Amongst the soloists - all members of the choir are Laurence Kilsby, 2009 BBC Chorister of the Year, making his solo debut on disc. '‘Under
Benjamin Nicholas, Director of the Abbey's Schola Cantorium, the
choir has developed a strong style, remarkable for its sense of
personal (or corporate) commitment as for the sonority of its tone
and the assurance of its delivery. The trebles splendidly vindicate
the tradition that places them at the heart of Englsih cathedral
music. The men's voices are also powerful and resonant and the total
effect is rich and forthright ’
|
|
|
O
Virgo Benedicta: DCD34086 For their debut recording, the six-strong Marian Consort explores music from late sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Spain. This fascinating programme celebrates the rich compositional fruits of the Siglo de Oro’s intensely competitive musical culture. These luminary works – all dedicated to the Virgin Mary – demand performances of great intelligence and vocal commitment. The youthful Marians respond absolutely, bringing hushed intimacy and bristling excitement to some of the most gorgeously searing lines in the history of European polyphony. '‘Singing
with a rich yet lucid tone and extraordinary blend ... huge contrast
in emotion, from gentle and tender to heated and impassioned ’
|
|
|
Organs
of Edinburgh DCD34100 Edinburgh's churches and concert halls are home to a rich variety of pipe organs. Open this lavishly-scaled book (30cm x 27cm) and step into a world of glorious architecture and fascinating history. In amongst these 100 pages twenty-two of the city's most notable instruments and their venues are surveyed in full colour. Meanwhile 12 illustrious players - all with deep-rooted Edinburgh connections - demonstrate the full range and versatility of these instruments on the four accompanying CDs. The full gamut of the repertoire is here, and Edinburgh's organs have the voices to match. Isn't it time to lift the veil from some of the closest-guarded treasures of one of the world's great cities? Only 2,000 numbered copies will ever be made available; demand for these is very high, so please place your order early to avoid dissapointment.
|
|
|
Oxana
Shevchenko DCD34061 23-year-old Oxana Shevchenko from Kazhakstan made an extraordinary emergence as an artist of the first rank when a distinguished international jury awarded her first prize in the 2010 Scottish International Piano Competition. Commissioned as part of her first prize, this recording is Oxana’s debut disc and reveals an extraordinary command of structure, rhythmic dynamism and sheer pianistic exuberance. Works by Mozart, Liszt, Shostakovich and Ravel feature in a programme full of highly pictorial musical genres.
|
|
|
The
Piano Tuner: Piano Trios from Scotland DCD34084 On this second recording for Delphian, the Fidelio Trio bring together works by three of Scotland's leading composers. Alexander McCall Smith narrates Sally Beamish's The Seafarer Trio with a mingled intimacy and plangency, lending his inimitable luster to this collection of world premiere recordings. ‘their
style is electrifyingly unanimous ... ice-cool virtuosity and moody
whispers that colour in equal measure ’
|
|
|
Michael
Marra with Mr McFall's Chamber: Recorded live on tour 2010 DCD34092 Recorded live on tour 2010. 'Marra's
music has broad horizons. His songs' subjects roam across Mull and
Shetland, over the Canadian prairies, to Schenectady, New York home
of swing-era jazz broadcasting and down into Mexico. But his muse
is governed by sound Dundonian principles, including the futility
of going in the huff and the folly of vanity.'
|
|
|
Instruments
from the Rodger Mirrey Collection DCD34057 St Cecilia’s Hall is the oldest purpose-built concert hall in Scotland, dating from 1763. In 1968 it became home to the Raymond Russell Collection of Early Keyboard Instruments. This already world famous collection was further enhanced in 2005 when the University of Edinburgh received the extraordinary gift of 22 historic keyboard instruments from Rodger and Lynne Mirrey; the galleries at St Cecilia’s Hall now house one of the two most comprehensive collections of early keyboard instruments in the world. John Kitchen’s demonstration recital couples music with instrument in a way that informs and entertains. ''As
a champion of the instruments in the Raymond Russell Collection
in Edinburgh, John Kitchen's previous recording shave drawn universal
praise. This latest addition to his discography is destined, I am
sure, to enhance his formidable reputation.’
|
|
|
Di
Chitarra Spagnolà DCD34066 Italian by birth, Bartolotti was employed as a musician at the enlightened court of Sweden’s Queen Christina and in the opulent splendour of the Sun King’s Versailles. His elegant suites for guitar and theorbo fuse contemplation and virtuosity, distilling the melancholic beauty of the French Baroque. Largely neglected in modern times, Bartolotti’s music occupies a seminal place in the early guitar repertory. Lauded in this field, Gordon Ferries is a choice exponent of this cosmopolitan composer’s music. Praise
for Gordon Ferries on Delphian: ‘'A
CD not to be missed’ ‘Ferries's
playing is at once crisp, stylish and fun. He moves easily from
one mood to the next, keeping the texture of this program interesting
and varied ... this is a disc to listen to again and again'
|
|
|
Concerto
Caledonia: DCD34093 Four concerts at 2009’s Edinburgh International Festival offered us a great opportunity to draw on our repertoire of the last 17 years, and to invite a few special guests to add some new discoveries along the way. This CD presents a selection of favourite moments from those evenings at the Hub, showing just some of the fun that we had there; everything you hear on this recording happened on stage in the shows (except the gun going off in the Tattoo at the Castle next door) … It's guaranteed live, and all the better for it! ‘be
prepared to be surprised by the reams of insights, wicked and witty,
humorous and heartbreaking, exhilerating and energetic on offer
from McGuinness and his left field outfit ’ |
|
|
Bohemian
Rhapsodies DCD34083 The
Fells' journey through Eastern Europe takes in sophisticated reworkings
of Bartók and earthy reimaginings of klezmer, and introduces
some unfamiliar names along the way. The four clarinets lend a wonderfully
suggestive reediness to these laments and dances which enhances
the music's rustic tone. With the Fell Quartet as your guide, this
whirlwind tour of Eastern Europe is sure to be seductive, virtuosic,
and not without some moments of real grit.
‘An incredible sound ... slick ensemble ... beautifully expressive
playing. The ensemble gives a flawless performance ... the quality
of the repertoire is matched by the quality of the playing. This
is a group with a bright future.'
|
|
|
Choral
Evensong from Tewkesbury Abbey DCD34019 For thirty-two years the Abbey School Choir sang daily evensong in Tewkesbury Abbey. One of their final services was captured for posterity by Delphian. In this recording swansong, the choir offers a treasurable memento of a uniquely English Office; complete with lessons and prayers, this sumptuous tapestry of Anglican jewels also includes the first recording of Gabriel Jackson’s refulgent new setting of the Evening Canticles. Reborn as Tewkesbury Abbey Schola Cantorum, the choir was immediately signed by Delphian and has embarked on a series of much-lauded recordings. ‘I've
been consistently impressed by the work of Benjamin Nicholas and
his Tewkesbury singers on the Delphian label ... the recorded sound
is never short on detail thanks not least to the full-blooded singing
of Tewkesbury's boy choristers and smart engineering. The choir's
men are on top form too ... compelling energy. Terrific choral listening.
’
|
|
|
Birds
& Beasts: Music by Martyn Bennett & Fraser Fifield DCD34085 Martyn Bennett was one of Scotland’s most innovative musicians, combining the traditional and modern, the local and international. A long-planned collaboration with Mr McFall’s Chamber was never realised during his tragically short lifetime. For their second disc with Delphian, Robert McFall has put together a programme of his own sympathetic arrangements of Martyn’s music alongside original works by Fraser Fifield, another of Scotland’s virtuosic musical innovators. The premiere recording of Martyn’s ‘Piece’ epitomises his sophisticated mastery of fusion. ‘[Bennett]
caused a sensation – and much controversy – in british folk music
… Scottish bagpipe and fiddle music with techno beats ’
|
|
|
Mátyás Seiber (1905–60): String Quartets Nos 1-3 Edinburgh Quartet DCD34082 Mátyás Seiber’s three string quartets span his career, from the astonishingly assured student essay of the first quartet, composed at the age of just eighteen, to the mature synthesis of his third and final Quartetto Lirico. Seiber’s work was nourished by several of the twentieth century’s most significant stylistic trends, from jazz and serialism to the folk music of his native Hungary. He was also, like many of the mid-century’s most important artists, an émigré and an influential teacher; Hugh Wood’s booklet essay pays tribute to his lasting influence on a generation of British composers. Recent
praise for the Edinburgh Quartet: |
|
|
Mike
Brewer's World Tour DCD34080 ‘Coming from backgrounds of both English choral music and jazz, I have always been obsessed by musical connections. I love to perform music of one culture with singers of another, to help performers to share an awareness of music in different contexts. I have had the good fortune to travel around the world every three years with the National Youth Choir of Great Britain. In South Africa I became fascinated by the rhythms and sounds of the music of the African continent. Mexico and Cuba opened up new vistas of musical connection for me, from elderly musicians performing the son jarocho in village tavernas in Veracruz to Afro- Caribbean jazz ensembles performing unbelievably complex music which arose out of that mix of cultures. The pieces of choral music found here are similarly hybrid, because in most cases they combine elements from more than one source …’ The internationally-renowned National Youth Choir is peerless in bringing to life Brewer's transcontinental choral imaginings. Headed up by the first commercial recording of Mike’s Hamba Lulu, the programme journeys us from the Icelandic tundra to the sultry jazz clubs of Latin America. Is your hi-fi ready to go?
'Praise for NYC on Delphian Records:
|
*Subscriber News
Click here for information about how to subscribe to the growing Delphian catalogue and save on purchases.
Contact Us | Terms and Conditions
| Home
34 Wallace Avenue, The Meadows, Wallyford, East Lothian EH21 8BZ
Telephone
0845 644 9308 Facsimile 07092 165 783