Violinist Gidon Kremer and his namesake chamber orchestra present works by three composers on this delightful Nonesuch recording. The CD opens with a version of Aarvo Pärt's Tabula Rasa that comes across as a more expressive, less "mystical" arrangement and interpretation than previously encountered. Kremer and Tatjana Grindenko play the solo violin parts, Reinut Tepp plays the prepared piano, and conductor Eri Klas leads the chamber orchestra in this work, which was originally dedicated to and premiered by Kremer, Grindenko, and Klas in 1977.

Fragoso’s music, influenced by Fauré and Debussy, shows a strong individual voice, intimate, lyrical and original. His complete output of chamber music is represented on this recording. Performed by excellent Portuguese soloists. New recording, world premieres! The death of António Fragoso (1897–1918) at the age of 21 robbed the Iberian Peninsula of a composer of great potential, the second within a century, following the Spaniard Juan Arriaga who died at the age of 20 in 1826, having displayed extraordinary promise.

Vivaldi’s op.6 concertos first appeared in print in Amsterdam in 1719. However, this edition was unreliable in the extreme. Scoring was incorrect, the number of works indistinct, random movements separated from their correct work, and a host of other errors. What is clear though is that these concertos are a decisive step forward from the works found in opp. 3 and 4. For example, all follow the fast-slow-fast pattern of the three movement concerto. The solo violin has prominence, so we are moving away from the concerto-grosso style. These recordings are the world premiere of the new critical edition by Alessandro Borin, Istituto Italiano Antonio Vivaldi, Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice.

Thierry Lancino’s background includes extensive periods of research at IRCAM and elsewhere, but his recent work concentrates on a lyrical and bold freedom of style embracing ideas of both seduction and spirituality. Inspired by a scene of historical impact, his Prelude and Death of Virgil dramatizes the demise of a daunting genius.

Gidon Kremer's technical brilliance, inward but passionate playing, and commitment to both new works and new interpretations of old works have made him one of the most respected violinists in the world today.

DG has put together a very smart reissue here. "Concerto grosso 1" and "Quasi una sonata" for violin and chamber orchestra were originally released in 1989. "Concerto grosso 5" has been rescued from its original 1993 release back-to-back with a Glass piece, and is now united with the other Kremer performances of Schnittke.

The music of Mieczys?aw Weinberg continues to be issued, and continues to impress. Like his British counterpart, York Bowen, Weinberg was a composer trapped in time and place, and it is good that their very different musics are now coming to the fore with such regularity. One of the wonderful things about this disc, aside from the committed, intense playing of the instrumentalists, is the sound: crisp and clear, with only a very little reverb, which brings the sound of the instruments into sharp focus and makes the listener pay attention to the music.

I have already reviewed three new versions of the Franck Sonata this year, and have few reservations in placing this splendidly polished CD at the top of the list, especially whilst taking into account the sensible coupling. As it stands the Chung/Lupu Decca LP would be a little expensive if transferred without additional works to the CD format, since the Debussy performance lasts for only 15 minutes or so. Their performances are more musically impressive than the newcomers; in the Franck Chung displays greater temperament than Mintz and certain passages are handled with greater expressivity for instance, the obbligato episode in semiquavers in the third movement.

Deutsche Grammophon's Simply Anne-Sophie is touted as "a unique collection of Anne-Sophie Mutter's incomparable Deutsche Grammophon recordings," it is simply one of several – Mutter Modern, Romance, and The Great Violin Concertos are among others Deutsche Grammophon has compiled from its extensive Mutter holdings from over the years. Simply Anne-Sophie has a greater chronological range than its predecessors as its earliest entries date from 1992 recordings made for the hit disc Carmen-Fantaisie and stretches through to some selections from Mutter Mozart: Violin Concertos, recorded at Abbey Road in 2005.

This has the look of a career-making recording from Scots violinist Nicola Benedetti, putting her up against difficult repertory that diverges from the crowd-pleasing fare that formed the basis of her career up to this album. It would have been hard to predict just how well she pulls off her task here; few could have heard the profound interpreter of Russian music in the Italia and Silver Violin collections from earlier in the 2010s. The Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 99, is an emotionally thorny work in five movements anchored by a tense passacaglia in the middle. The composer withheld it from publication during the period of renewed Stalinist repression in the late 1940s. It was premiered in 1955 by David Oistrakh, and in endurance and elevated tone even if not quite in lyrical grandeur, Benedetti brings that master to mind. Sample the Stravinskian "Burlesque" finale for a sense of how Benedetti gets outside herself here. The Glazunov Violin Concerto, Op. 82, is a more stable work, rooted in pre-WWI conservatory traditions, and Benedetti's reading is nothing short of letter-perfect.

Despite the deceptive titling format on the CD, this is a CD by Latvian violinist Gidon Kramer, not featuring the playing of Astor Piazzolla. All but four of the songs on the album are compositions by Piazzolla, but performed by Kremer and his group, along with Piazzolla's guitarists Sergio and Odair Assad. The album is definitely in tribute to the leader of the nuevo tango, as the lengthy liner notes describe in three languages.

This disc is a reissue in DG's 20/201 Echo series, with recordings of Nono's last two finished works from December of 1990, first released in 1992. Nono died in May 1990, and "La lontananza" had been written for and with Gidon Kremer in 1988 and 1989. Nono taped Kremer playing a variety of pre-arranged sounds on violin, and then electronically altered them – the final piece results from Kremer playing solo, responding to taped sequences.

If one did not know that French violinist Renaud Capucon had gotten married just two days earlier, one might almost have guessed it from these extraordinarily joyful recordings he made of Beethoven's and Korngold's violin concertos. Capucon was already well known among classical music cognoscenti from his many chamber music recordings for his supple phrasing, effortless lyricism, sweet tone, and big sound.

At the time of writing, this CD has been on the market for 22 years, and it must be said from the outset that its technical side does not and cannot match up with the standard of later high-bit recordings, nor indeed, to be honest, with the 80's recordings made, for example, by Andreas Glatt for the Accent label in Belgium: the instruments can, indeed, be clearly heard, but there would have been a good deal of room for more spacious use of stereo technology, and possibly the microphones could have been just that little bit nearer to the musicians.

On her new album entitled Tutta Sola, violinist Rachel Podger plays solo repertoire from five European composers who all lived to celebrate new year’s eve in 1700. It is a wonderful baroque programme of selected solo violin pieces, preludes, dances and fugal movements. One person, at least with regards to the repertoire for Baroque violin, springs immediately to mind: Johann Sebastian Bach. But the German composer was not the only composer to experiment with ‘senza basso’ – music without accompanying bass –, and neither was he the first.