Xiuu Records

28/11/2024

Did you know......?
Founded in 1996, Brilliant Classics has established itself as a significant player in the classical music recording industry, dedicated to providing high-quality music at affordable prices. This commitment has broadened the audience for classical music, allowing more people to enjoy its timeless beauty.

One of the label's standout features is its extensive catalog, which includes a wide array of composers and styles, from Baroque to contemporary. This diversity appeals to both casual listeners and dedicated enthusiasts, encouraging exploration of both popular and lesser-known works. Brilliant Classics collaborates with talented musicians and ensembles, ensuring that each recording meets high production standards and captures the essence of live performances.

Affordability is central to Brilliant Classics’ mission, as it offers attractive box sets and comprehensive collections at prices that make classical music accessible. This approach democratizes the genre, inviting new listeners while allowing seasoned fans to expand their collections without financial burden.

The label has also embraced digital platforms like YouTube and Spotify, making its music available for streaming and download, thus adapting to modern listening habits. By preserving and promoting classical music heritage through historically informed performances, Brilliant Classics educates listeners and deepens appreciation for the art form of classical music.

In summary, Brilliant Classics stands out for its dedication to quality and accessibility, reshaping the classical music landscape and ensuring that the beauty of classical compositions can be enjoyed by all. Through its innovative strategies and rich catalog, it continues to inspire a new generation of classical music lovers.

-->https://www.brilliantclassics.com

06/11/2024

Italian Violin Sonatas

A unique 7-CD collection of Italian violin sonatas from the 19th and 20th centuries in stylish, native, modern studio recordings.
The chamber-music traditions of France and Italy are being comprehensively explored by Brilliant Classics in boxes dedicated to violin and cello sonatas composed by celebrated and unfamiliar composers. In composing violin sonatas during the 19th and 20th centuries, Italian composers were naturally drawing on an unrivalled heritage of violinistic writing dating back not only to Paganini but to the virtuoso violinists of the Baroque era, such as Corelli and Geminiani.

A new instalment in the series “Italian Romantics”, paying tribute to the rich heritage of instrumental (as opposed to vocal, operatic) music by Italian composers in the Romantic/Late-Romantic era.
This comprehensive 7-CD set presents violin sonatas by Bazzini (1818-1897), Busoni (1866-1924), Castenuovo-Tedesco (1895-1968), Esposito (1913-1981), Malipiero (1882-1973), Margola (1908-1992), Pilati (1903-1938), Respighi (1879-1936), Santoliquido (1883-1971), Santorsola (1904-1994), Scalero (1870-1954), Sinigaglia (1868-1944) and Wolf-Ferrari (1876-1948). A generous survey of full-blooded romantic music, often rooted in German Romanticism but always ablaze with Mediterranean passion and warmth.
Played by Italian musicians of international renown: Mauro Tortorelli, Luca Fanfoni, Davide Alogna, Fabrizio Falasca, Carmelo Andriani and others.

ℹMore information on this New Release can be found here: https://www.brilliantclassics.com/articles/i/italian-violin-sonatas/

▶Downloading, purchasing and streaming can be found here:
https://brilliant-classics.lnk.to/ItalianViolinSonatasFA

08/10/2024

More than 1,200 titles from Brilliant Classics are on sale now at ArkivMusic! All titles are in stock, ready to ship, and deeply discounted from their regular prices.

SHOP NOW: https://bit.ly/3zEu1At

30/08/2024

26/08/2024

Bottesini: Music for Violin, Double-Bass & String Orchestra

Bottesini’s creative boldness is evident in the way he dared to put forward the double bass as a virtuosic solo instrument, on a par with its noble cousins, the violin, viola and cello. Many of his pieces feature solo parts that showcase dialogues between the extreme registers of the string instruments, from the ‘demonic’ violin with its high notes at the limits of perception, to the abyss of the bottom notes of the double bass. No one before Bottesini had discovered the untapped expressive potential of the latter instrument, since it had always been considered essentially a reinforcement for the cello part, one octave down. Instead, he wanted to make the double bass ‘soar’.

Played by Francesco de Angelis (violin), Francesco Siragusa (double bass) and the Nuova Orchestra Ferruccio Busoni, conducted by Massimo Belli, who already recorded several successful albums for Brilliant Classics, with works by Viotti, Cherubini, Tartini, Wolf Ferrari, Ghedini and others.

25/08/2024

Hurlebusch: Harpsichord Music

Suites, fugues, toccatas and variations by a well-travelled contemporary of JS Bach, in a new recording by an Italian harpsichordist with an impressive catalogue of Baroque rarities on Brilliant Classics.

The music of Conrad Friedrich Hurlebusch (1691-1765) has featured on a few enterprising collections of Baroque-era rarities, but this is the first-ever album to be entirely dedicated to the art of a composer whose style successfully mirrors his cosmopolitan outlook. This new recording presents the two-part “Compositioni musicali per il cembalo, 1735” here recorded integrally by Fernando De Luca, consisting of five suites, five fugues, two toccatas and some variations, showing the composer at ease with the forms in use at the time and mixing French and Italian styles seamlessly.
▶Download or stream this album: https://brilliant-classics.lnk.to/HurlebuschHarpsichordMusicFA
ℹMore information: https://www.brilliantclassics.com/articles/h/hurlebusch-harpsichord-music/

19/08/2024

Boccherini: String Quintets Op.30 & Op.31, Vol. XI

The continuation of a highly successful and popular series on Brilliant Classics: the String Quintets by Boccherini (1743-1805). The String Quintet series, of which 17 CD’s have already been issued, brought to light many hidden treasures and masterworks of chamber music in pure Classical Style.

This new recording presents the String Quintets Op.30 and 31, of which the Op.30 No.6 is the most remarkable: this quintet with two cellos La musica notturna delle strade di Madrid “depicts” a cross-section of the night in Madrid, from the sound of the Ave Maria on the church bells of the city until the passage of the soldiers’ patrol announcing the curfew. In five movements-episodes, the different souls of the night of Madrid are recalled: the religious and devout (Ave Maria delle Parrocchie, Rosario) that carefree and goliardic (Minuetto dei ciechi, Passa Calle), and the military one (Ave Maria del Quartiere, Ritirata). In this quintet each musical resource is employed, in an extremely original way. As Boccherini himself notes in the score, the faithful representation from real life is so central in this work, that “everything that does not conform to the rules of composition, must be justified by the truth of the represented thing”.

🎵Stream or download this album: https://brilliant-classics.lnk.to/BoccheriniStringQuintetsVolXBC
ℹMore information on this album: https://www.brilliantclassics.com/articles/b/boccherini-string-quintets-op30-op31-vol-xi/

15/06/2024

06/05/2024

The new focus on Bohemian classicism in the second half of the 18th century, manifested in recent recordings and articles in professional journals, has amply demonstrated the calibre of these composers and the quality of their music. Among them, Josef Mysliveček enjoyed considerable fame during his lifetime. He was known to such important figures as the soprano Caterina Gabrielli and was a friend of Mozart’s, who esteemed him.
Mysliveček’s like many of his contemporaries strove for musical success and economic independence through opera composition, a career that was high-profile but also challenging in the late 18th century. And he did not consider the fortepiano to be as important a vehicle of expression, unlike Mozart, as can be seen in his meagre solo keyboard output.
The Six Divertimenti are single-movement compositions, and while probably intended as didactic, they are not sterile exercises for amateurs but exquisite pieces that satisfy the most discerning palates. The Six Sonatas are short but brilliant pieces, based on the galant style transmuted into a pre-classicism very akin to the Mannheim school, with energetic first movements with a symphonic flavour alternating with elegant and delicate minuets.
Given the small number of Mysliveček’s compositions for solo fortepiano, it was decided to include two additional, rare pieces worthy of this monograph: two of his Wind Octets Op.1 in a contemporary solo keyboard transcription by Václav Vincenc Mašek. Mysliveček’s writing features remarkable counterpoint, compressed by Mašek into an exemplary arrangement.
This recording is intended as the first on historical instruments (there is already a box by Clare Hammond on modern piano with the Divertimenti for fortepiano, the six Sonatas and the Concertos for fortepiano and orchestra). The arranged Octets (most likely never previously performed, let alone recorded) are offered as world premieres.
The son of a mill owner, Josef Mysliveček (1737-1781) was born in Prague. After a brief period as a student of literature and philosophy, he started to study organ with Joseph Seger and composition with the renowned František Václav Habermann. After his success with his first symphonies he decided to go to Venice to study voice and composition with Giovanni Battista Pescetti, not only to perfect himself as a musician but probably also to integrate himself into the great operatic tradition of one of the most productive and lively cities of the time. Mysliveček’s first opera Medea was a huge success and soon he became the first internationally renowned Bohemian opera composer. During a stay with Padre Martini, he met Mozart in Bologna, who was greatly fascinated by the Bohemian's musical qualities.
This 2-CD set presents the complete works for keyboard: six Sonatas, two arrangements of Mysliveček’s Octets for solo keyboard by Vincenc Václav Mašek, and six Divertimenti for fortepiano.
The music remains firmly anchored in its period, exploring all the musical potential that classicism has to offer: strong structures, refinement and charm, as well as elegant and cantabile melodies.
Played by Marius Bartoccini, a fortepianist specialized in the Bohemian classical repertoire. As a soloist he performed with Sigiswald Kuijken en Federico Maria Sardelli. On this recording he plays an Anton Walter fortepiano made by Paul McNulty and an original Luigi Hoffer built in Venice at the end of eighteen century.

12/04/2024