We are very pleased to share with you the May 2015 issue of NEW ON NAXOS, presenting an array of exciting new releases, no less than eight of which include world première recordings! Our monthly spotlight release is the highly-acclaimed Prokofiev orchestral cycle with Marin Alsop and the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra (OSESP). This is the fourth release in the series, earlier releases of which have received critical acclaim from leading international music publications.
Other highlights include: Rossini’s opera seria, La gazza ladra, conducted by Alberto Zedda, who is considered to be one of the world’s foremost authorities on the operas of Rossini; Antoni Wit and the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir’s performance of Penderecki’s Magnificat and Kadisz. Earlier releases in Antoni Wit’s Penderecki cycle have received many awards, including a GRAMMY®, and this new release is also expected to astound and delight! The world première recordings of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Zhou Long, widely regarded as one of China’s leading composers, performed by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, and directed by Darrell Ang. The album includes Zhou Long’s Symphony ‘Humen 1839’, co-composed with Chen Yi, another internationally acclaimed contemporary Chinese composer; three new works from American composer Joan Tower, including two world première recordings and the Pulitzer Prize-nominated Violin Concerto. The album features Cho-Liang Lin as violin soloist, with the Nashville Symphony and Giancarlo Guerrero conducting; the latest recording in the Naxos series of orchestral music by the 20th century Italian composer Gian Francesco Malipiero, featuring five vividly contrasting works including four world première recordings; and music from contemporaries of the Strauss family, including Johann Schrammel, Joseph Hellmesberger Jr., and Philip Fahrbach Jr. This collection is the first volume of two, and presents many world première recordings of works by undeservedly neglected composers of light music from the 19th and early 20th centuries.