Skip Sempé talks about the music of John Dowland

Working amidst political and personal setbacks, Mieczysław Weinberg (1919-96) flourished as a composer, admired by Shostakovich and championed by the leading Soviet musicians of the day. His death in Moscow in 1996, however, went largely unnoticed. More happily, his extensive catalogue has recently secured an increasing number of performances and recordings, witness this Naxos release of his complete music for cello and orchestra, works written largely during the earlier part of his maturity. Raymond Bisha introduces the Cello Concertino, the Cello Concerto, and the Fantasia for Cello and Orchestra.

In this podcast Skip Sempé introduces his new album of music by John Dowland and talks about the Renaissance orchestra and why it creates such a unique and beautiful sound.  According to Sempé: "The idea of a ‘Renaissance Orchestra’ in which all the different instrumental consorts are brought together is the overlooked message of these sixteenth- and seventeenth-century publications. Large ensembles, for important or commemorative occasions, were every bit as much the ‘composer’s intention’ as were smaller, intimate groups."

This podcast presents pianist Giorgio Koukl in conversation with Raymond Bisha at the end of a five-year project to rehabilitate the complete works for piano solo and duo by Vittorio Rieti (1898-1994). Virtually self-taught, Rieti went on to establish his composing credentials, becoming the only Italian composer, for example, to be invited to write ballet music for Diaghalev. His neo-classical style remained a constant in his output, as did his sense of musical humour.

Vol. 27 in the Naxos Music of Brazil series features music by César Guerra-Peixe (1914-1993). In this podcast, Raymond Bisha discusses the life and music of the composer, known as the 'Brazilian Bartók' on account of his ethnomusicological research, with conductor Neil Thomson. Describing Guerra-Peixe as an “extremely prolific, incredibly rounded, complete musician”, Thomson also details how the Music of Brazil series got off the ground; how the featured orchestra, the Goiás Philharmonic, has raised its profile over the last forty years; and how the stylistic differences between Guerra-Peixe's First and Second Symphonies came about.

Raymond Bisha introduces the latest instalment in the Capriccio label's exploration of rarely performed or recorded symphonic works by Miklós Rózsa, outlining his maturation not only into one of the most successful film composers of all time, but also the creator of equally fine concert works. The album's programme comprises his Rhapsody for Cello, in which the young composer found his true style; the Notturno Ungherese (“a nostalgic night piece, harking back to the memories of my childhood in Hungary”); and the late Sinfonia concertante for violin and cello, a fiendishly difficult work that is among Rózsa’s finest, least filmic concert works, and one of his most underrated.

The GRAMMY Award-winning team of composer Michael Daugherty, conductor David Alan Miller and the Albany Symphony returns with a new album comprising a set of remarkable works exploring associations with flight and space exploration, both tragic and triumphant. In this podcast, the composer explains the context and inspiration behind the three works on the programme: from aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart's mysterious disappearance in 1937, to rock ’n roll legend Buddy Holly's tragic death in a plane crash just hours after his final performance in 1959, and Neil Armstrong's role in the triumphant Apollo 11 moon mission in 1969.

Italian composer Goffredo Petrassi’s reputation was established in 1932 when his Partita (8.572411) won critical acclaim. Three years later he premiered the first of his eight Concertos for Orchestra which secured his reputation outside of Italy. Raymond Bisha delves into a new release of the first three of those concertos performed by the Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma and conducted by Francesco La Vecchia.

Raymond Bisha introduces the third instalment of a collectable series of seven albums showcasing Ukraine-born composer Alexey Shor’s appealing personal style and superb craftsmanship. The programme features vivid portraits of literary figures for piano (Behzod Abduraimov) and orchestra (Kyiv Virtuosi), similarly an homage to Glinka, and a dazzling concerto for flute (Jasmine Choi). The conductors are Dmitry Yablonsky and Massimiliano Caldi. Commenting on a previous album of Shor's music (8.579061), MusicWeb International noted how Shor's popularity “is easy to understand. His idiom is highly melodic, lively, varied, deftly orchestrated – and could have been written at almost any time in the last century. His gift seems to be for the miniature, and he invests his pieces with great variety.”

Born in 1986, Jake Runestad is a versatile and prolific young composer whose visceral music and charismatic personality have fostered a busy schedule of national and international commissions, residencies, workshops, and speaking engagements, enabling him to be one of the youngest full-time composers in the world. In this podcast he discusses with Raymond Bisha the profound message behind his Earth Symphony, as Mother Earth recounts mankind's evolution, to lust for power and progress, to the impact this has had on the planet, and how she will move on after all that we have managed to inflict on her.

Notker Balbulus (c.840-912), also known as Notker of St Gall or Notker the Stammerer, was a renowned Benedictine monk at the Abbey of St Gall in Switzerland who made substantial contributions to both the music and literature of his time. In this podcast Michael Alan Anderson, musical director of Schola Antiqua of Chicago, explains to Raymond Bisha the challenges of marrying elaborate melodies with threadbare musical notation to unravel the mediaeval mysteries behind plainsong performance.