EarlyMusicNews.Org

“Do you own a gramophone? Can you play 78rpm discs? Many of these records have never previously been published. Others are major rarities in their original form.

Lilli Lehmann, Richard Tauber, John McCormack, Nellie Melba, Titta Ruffo, Dmitri Smirnoff, Joseph Schmidt, Feodor Chaliapine, Geraldine Farrar, Lev Klementieff, Vanni Marcoux, Jacques Urlus, Beniamino Gigli, Jussi Bjorling and Celestina Boninsegna – our list goes on and on!

Our records are pressed from the original metal parts used for pressing the discs in the days of 78s. They are not transfers or dubbings. Thus they are identical to original pressings, but instead of noisy shellac, we use vinyl which has a much lower surface noise. That means more of the music can be heard. And, modern technology enables us to produce better pressings than could be made 50 or more years ago.“

Added on: May 09, 2009 | Hits: 426

“harmonia mundi is an independent music record label founded in 1958 by Bernard Coutaz in Arles.
Its catalogue is essentially devoted to classical music but, through World Village, and new sibling Jazz Village, also to jazz & world musics.
The various offices around the world, or *filliales*, also offer distribution to a huge diversity of labels & genres, not necessarily the same for each territory.

Classical labels: actes sud, alia vox, ambronay, aparte, arte verum, audite, bel air classiques, christophorus, CSO Resound [Chicago], delphian, dolce volta, fraprod, glossa, harmonia mundi, hat[now]art, hyphen press, k617, KML, la dolce volta, LSO Live, mariinsky, melisande films, mirare, mode, muso, nascor, onyx [imminent], opella nova, orfeo, pan classics, paradizo, pearl, phil.harmonie, piano classics, praga digitals, RCOC, RCO Live [Royal Concertgebouw], RAM [Royal Academy of Music], sfz music [His Majesty's Sackbutts & Cornets], signum classics, stradivarius, united archives, wahoo, walhall eternity, wergo, wigmore hall live, winter & winter, ysaye records

Jazz / World / Roots: accords croisés, act, airmail, american jazz classics, ames, archieball, asphalt tango, aum fidelity, black saint, bonsai, british library, cadillac, camoci, camjazz, casequarter, chant du monde, chapa blues, contre jour, deda, disconforme, edition, ellipsis arts, emanem, enja, evidence, fedora, hatology, hi 4 head, highnote, high two, ieditions, institut du monde arabe, iris music, jaro, jazz village, kind of blue, long distance, marabi, National Sound Archive, network, ocora, ogun, pi, playasound, poll winners records. plus loin, psi, q-rious, regardless, recording arts, riti, savant, soul note, wergo, winter & winter, World Village.”

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Added on: Nov 16, 2011 | Hits: 171

“Devine Music was re-launched in 2009 as a webshop for recordings and publications featuring, or relating to, the use of historically informed instruments and performing practice. The idea is to provide a forum for specialists and experts in the field to offer their work to discerning customers and receive appropriate remuneration.

The site is programmed, run and maintained by harpsichordist Steven Devine

The philosophy is simple: devinemusic.co.uk is a searchable catalogue with online shop facilities. When a disc is purchased, an email is sent to the artist responsible who is then responsible for packaging and sending the disc (no more sale-or-return!). Two very small administrative costs are incurred - the credit card processing and the web-site maintenance. Typically the artist receives 85% of the retail price of the disc AND retains stock control.”

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Added on: Sep 07, 2011 | Hits: 207

“CORO is the lively and successful record label of Harry Christophers and The Sixteen. Formed in 2001, CORO has re-mastered, re-packaged and re-issued recordings of The Sixteen that were for a short time available on Collins Classics and now releases most of the ensemble’s new recordings. The label also features artists such as The Hilliard Ensemble, Elin Manahan Thomas and Sarah Connolly as well as a ‘Live’ series, a young artists focus and the Acoustic World collection of discs. The recent launch of CORO DVD has allowed the label to release Series One of the BBC’s groundbreaking Sacred Music as well as The Sixteen’s acclaimed Handel Celebration Prom.”

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Added on: Mar 16, 2012 | Hits: 90

“The Chandos label boasts over 1700 titles which cover the length and breadth of the musical spectrum.

Quite apart from the quality of performances and sound for which Chandos is renowned, the company has pioneered the idea of the 'series' which allows a composer's work to be appreciated through a range of recordings: such series include the Tchaikovsky Symphonies, Dvorák Symphonies & Tone Poems, Strauss Tone Poems, Prokofiev Symphonies & Concertos, Parry Symphonies, Tippett Symphonies, the Respighi cycle and, of course, the mammoth Walton edition.

In 1994 Chandos launched the New Direction series. The repertoire presented is contemporary and in some cases avant garde with composers such as Reich, Nørgård, Schnittke, Tavener, Leifs and Yoshimatsu represented. Such composers have a crossover appeal to the larger market place. Chandos will now develop the series to explore contemporary music in its many forms. ”

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Tags: Chaconne

Added on: Sep 07, 2011 | Hits: 168

“In 1989 Chandos launched its early music label - Chaconne - which set out to present a cross section of early-music repertoire from Medieval to Classical, peformed on original or period instruments.

The recordings, which now number well over 100 titles, are of a consistently high standard in both performance and sound recording.

In terms of artistic direction, the Chaconne label has been able to offer mainstream composers such as J.S. Bach, Handel and Vivaldi as well as less-familiar composers including Leclair, Albinoni and Telemann. Chaconne recordings have a very international appeal above and beyond the many early-music enthusiasts here in the UK.“

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Tags: Chandos

Added on: Sep 07, 2011 | Hits: 391

“Avie Records operates a unique business model based on artist ownership. This model is as robust today as when the label launched in 2002, and allows artists a creative freedom not found at any other label. Run by well-known and respected executives with offices in the UK and the US, Avie combines the flexibility of an independent with the prowess of a major.

Avie was instantly recognised as a trail-blazer by international media and consumers alike. The label has been hailed as “adventurous” (New York Times), “enterprising (Gramophone),” and “admirable” (The Sunday Times – London).

Avie is noted for the strength and creativity of its marketing and promotion strategies, resulting in notable sales successes, including several international chart-topping releases. For our artists we have gained international visibility in the media and the market place, with a worldwide distribution network that extends to over 30 countries. The label was an early convert to the download arena and is universally available at digital download destinations from iTunes to emusic to Classical Archives.  …”

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Added on: Sep 07, 2011 | Hits: 179

“We are a Swedish company founded in 1999 with the vision to satisfy the listening needs of classical music lovers as well as to promote the music of world-class musicians to a larger audience.

eClassical.com is a secure online store open 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Customers and visitors can download classical music in popular downloadable formats like FLAC and MP3 at the highest quality, as well as find out more about classical music.

Our support is fast, personal and always near-by!”

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Added on: Dec 04, 2011 | Hits: 137

“BIS Records was founded in 1973 by Robert von Bahr, with the aim of helping world-class Swedish musicians to reach international audiences. Starting out with a Revox tape-recorder, two state-of-the-art microphones and a pair of non-magnetic scissors he immediately impressed connoisseurs by the natural sound of his recordings, and single-handedly built up a catalogue that could be exported all over the world.

Now in its 35th year, BIS is a flourishing and much respected label with more than 1.400 titles in stock – the only large record label to keep all its recordings constantly available. Going against the trend of the classical music business, BIS is expanding in various ways. With its present staff of 14 – including no less than six recording producers – BIS has become a leading player, yearly undertaking some 60 productions recorded all over the world: from Brazil to Japan, from Iceland to Australia. …”

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Added on: Sep 07, 2011 | Hits: 164

Globe -- The Dutch Quality Label

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Added on: May 03, 2010 | Hits: 325

“Channel Classics Records is a quality record label based in Holland. Director, producer and recording engineer is C. Jared Sacks. Having grown up in Boston Massachusetts, schooled at Oberlin Conservatory and the Amsterdam Conservatory of music with 15 years experience playing French Horn, Jared decided to make his hobby of recording a profession in 1987. The label started in 1990 with the name Channel Classics coming from the street he lived on in Amsterdam. (Kanaalstraat).

Jared and his Dutch wife Lydi Groenewegen together with a group of assistants work closely with distributors in 38 countries to promote the artists through the CD’s.

See a film about channel here.”

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Added on: Mar 18, 2012 | Hits: 144

"Brilliant Classics is now available worldwide in over 40 countries. In its 10 years’ existence it has become one of the leading classical labels. Both audiences and critics have come to recognise and appreciate the quality and diversity of the label. With high ratings, classical awards, distinctions ánd record-breaking sales as resounding results. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 27, 2008 | Hits: 490

“Welcome on www.tactus.it, home of the finest Italian classic music, from the Gregorian Chants to the 20th century!

On this web site you will be able to browse and order from the complete Tactus CD on-line catalogue.“

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Added on: Feb 28, 2012 | Hits: 184

“What is “La Sala del Cembalo del caro Sassone”?

The title is an italian expression whose literal translation is “The Harpsichord Room of the Dear Saxon”. Since, for historical reasons, the term “Dear Saxon” was used in Italy to refer to the composer Georg Friedrich Händel (much less for the other “saxon”, Johann Adolph Hasse), therefore we can reformulate as “The Handel's Harpsichord Room”. …

How this project was born?

The initial goal was to create a set of web-pages, freely available to everyone via streaming, to publish harpsichord music recorded on a regular basis. It can appears that the most difficult task here is to find a professional harpsichordist who accepts to share his recordings for non-profit, but just for “popularizing the Baroque Music for the Harpsichord”. However, that task was as easy as to create the web-site, because one of the original promoters is a harpsichordist with a relevant background as a performer, as well as teacher and composer. He is Fernando De Luca, which founded the project in late 2006 together with the co-founder “Zadok”, his friend, engineer and baroque music lover. …”

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Added on: Sep 14, 2011 | Hits: 388

“Dynamic is an independent recording company with its offices in Villa Quartana on the quiet Righi hill standing above Genoa.

Its production embraces the entire field of classical music, but focuses chiefly on the immense heritage of Italian and European music of the eighteenth- and nineteenth centuries especially opera and violin works. Dynamic favours compositions in world-première recordings or works that stand outside the bounds of traditional repertoire.

Known all over the world as the first recording company to have reappraised Nicolò Paganini, in the last few years Dynamic has extended its range of interest to opera through highly fruitful partnerships with Italian festivals and opera houses, and has produced recordings of lesser-known titles by Verdi, Donizetti, Pacini, Massenet, Meyerbeer and Tchaikovsky. Outstanding productions in this field include the recordings of operas staged at the famous La Fenice theatre in Venice, at the Valle d’Itria Festival in Martina Franca and at the Teatro Lirico in Cagliari. Its catalogue boasts over 350 titles, with about 30 new titles being added every years.

Many artists of international standing have recorded on the Dynamic label: Massimo Quarta, Salvatore Accardo, Felix Ayo, Stefan Milenkovich, Ruggiero Ricci, Bruno Canino, Rocco Filippini, Ovidiu Badila, Mirella Freni, Ferruccio Furlanetto, Placido Domingo, Renato Bruson William Matteuzzi, Iano Tamar, Patrizia Ciofi, Annick Massis, Veronique Gens, Dimitra Theodossiou, Joseph Calleja, George Prêtre, Renato Palumbo, José Cura, Leo Nucci, Marcello Viotti, Franco Mezzena.

Dynamic is today the leading Italian recording company for classical music and has also become one of the foremost European producers of operatic DVDs. ..“

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Added on: May 17, 2009 | Hits: 447

“Satirino was created in 1997 by Ian Malkin and Christine Menguy and specialises in both French and international representation for Classical music artists, ensembles and orchestras. In 2001 the company created the Satirino Records label to record some of the agency's artists.”

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Added on: Nov 19, 2011 | Hits: 223

“Bruno Procopio founded the Paraty label in 2006, with the support of Intégral Distribution, in order to explore, on period instruments, the rich repertory of baroque and classical music.

The first release for the label is vol. 2 of the Bach Partitas, continuing a project started by Bruno Procopio in 2004. The first volume of the Partitas was very well received by music critics, with five stars from Diapason magazine, and a critic from Fanfare magazine listing it as one of the five best Baroque CDs of the year in USA.”

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Added on: Nov 28, 2011 | Hits: 219

“So why this name “naïve”?

Many thought you had to be a little naïve to launch a record label just when digital music and hi-tech began their ascent.

Could there be a life beyond wi-fi, the web and MP3s?

As you can see, a few diehard music lovers still believe in beautiful packages, the smell of freshly-printed paper, booklets you spend hours admiring, the beauty a human voice and a few strums on a guitar.

In short, there are still traditional craftsmen, who take their time and let talent grow on its own terms. Between classical music, pop, world, jazz, children’s music, books or DVDs… nothing scares us…“

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Added on: Jul 19, 2011 | Hits: 295

“ Founded in 1990, the label K617 has had such an impact because it has met a wide audience’s appetite for new discoveries. K617 has enabled us to discover the scope of Latin America’s Baroque music heritage whose richness bursts forth in the sumptuous series ‘Pathways of Baroque’. It has also skilfully associated with its systematic exploration of this repertoire a whole generation of performers, who although unknown yesterday, are today on a par with the greatest.

The perfect example is Gabriel Garrido, whose Latin American experience has nourished an entirely new vision of European baroque, which has found its finest testimony in his interpretations of the masterpieces of Claudio Monteverdi: ‘historically informed’ recordings of very well-known works which we rediscover from a new perspective.

However, K617, as a label based in Lorraine, very quickly realised that the Angel of the bizarre did not only brush faraway continents with its wings. Hence it is also responsible for the revival of ‘regional’ composers like Jean-François Tapray and especially Théodore Gouvy whose Requiem, which has sold over 25,000 copies, is now viewed as one of the major religious music works of the end of the nineteenth century.

Perhaps K617's secret is that it has never separated its production activity from its involvement with live music, always listening out for performers, researchers and all those who dream of being present at the birth of new emotions. A new manifestation of this is the National Month of Latin American Baroque Music, which every autumn now allows the whole of France to discover the new soundscapes of K.617.

Since the very beginning of the year 2003, K617 has been the leader of the activities of Le Couvent (Sarrebourg - France), where the Centre International des Chemins du baroque is located. But K617 is still developing its partnership with harmonia mundi.“ Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 22, 2009 | Hits: 436

“Created in 2001 by José Miguel Martínez and Pilar de la Vega, VERSO is undoubtedly one of the independent recording industry’s major contributions to this country’s culture. With a top-flight catalogue of more than a hundred discs already, focused fundamentally on lesser-known Spanish baroque, classical, romantic and post-romantic music, Verso also clearly supports the most avant-garde musical creation of our time. Meticulous and careful edition and the diversity of sources of interpretation, backed by a long list of orchestral ensembles of the very highest level and youthful artists of acknowledged national and international prestige make the young, dynamic Madrid label a Spanish recording classic. …”

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Added on: Feb 16, 2012 | Hits: 236

"Spain’s most international label, widely considered the world’s finest in early music, has its headquarters in San Lorenzo de El Escorial, in the mountains near Madrid. Founded in 1992 by Carlos Céster and the brothers José Miguel and Emilio Moreno, it is a landmark not only on account of its extreme artistic coherence – with great names in early music among its exclusive performers, such as Paolo Pandolfo, La Venexiana, the Orchestra of the 18th Century, Le Concert Spirituel, Michael Noone, or the Moreno brothers themselves – but also because of its always innovative and exquisite formal proposals, such as the introduction of digipaks into classical music, the inclusion of multimedia tracks on some of its titles or, more recently, the presentation of the Glossa Platinum collection, with its avant-garde design. One of its most salient current projects is the integral recording of the madrigals of Claudio Monteverdi." ...

Added on: Aug 05, 2007 | Hits: 446

“A recently created performers’ Label (2002), CDM was launched by the Valencian viola da gamba performer and musicologist Carles Magraner, who also founded the famous Capella de Ministrers ensemble in 1988, dedicated mainly to Spanish music from the Middle Ages to the pre-classical period. In addition to the reediting of the group’s previous recordings issued on other labels, CDM also presents the group’s latest recordings.“

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Added on: Oct 11, 2011 | Hits: 337

“Music and art in the world of recording music.

Since its beginnings it has pursued an audacious, original and very specific line of style and design philosophy.

The promotion of young performers, both national and international, coupled with the participation of already known ones, has succeeded in placing Arsis at the forefront, gaining the acclaim and positive feedback of critics, performers and music lovers alike.

Since November 2006 it publishes all its works in GPACK, an exclusive format made out of a foldable cupboard, which invokes warmness and is silky smooth to the touch; a tactile and thought provoking sensation.

This is Arsis. When the attention to detail and the desire for a job well done are the driving forces in developing new areas of advancement in musical editing.”

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Added on: Feb 16, 2012 | Hits: 202

“Without fear of the alleged crisis of the international music industry, the label Alqhai & Alqhai is born as a determined commitment to quality, from the philosophy of taking absolute care of every stage of our CDs production and making. From the very first step —the artistic conception of a program, through its development and rehearsals, sound recording, edition, design, quality standards choice until, finally, public launching, every Alqhai & Alqhai production is treated with the love that only an artist can feel for his own creation. We want to to fulfill a wish: that our public had in his hands and ears a true piece of art, not determined by the market rules”

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Added on: Nov 13, 2011 | Hits: 218

“ALIA VOX The performer's voice Since its creation in 1998 ALIA VOX has developed its role as the exclusive producer and publisher of all new recordings by Hesprion XXI, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, Le Concert des Nations, Montserrat Figueras & Jordi Savall. The ALIA VOX 2011 catalogue presents the various productions carried out over these first 12 years: 80 titles from an exceptionally wide repertoire, ranging from the Middle Ages to the present day, including such legendary productions as the soundtrack of Alain CorneauÕs film Tous les matins du monde, all of which are carried out with the unfailing collaboration of the most outstanding performers currently specialising in these repertoires. The extraordinary success of ALIA VOX, with sales numbering more than 2.000.000 CDs to date (December, 2005) and a large distribution network covering more than 45 countries around the world, has been possible thanks to an intense programme of concerts, together with a warm reception from the record-buying public and music critics alike. …”

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Added on: Oct 03, 2011 | Hits: 275