The partnership of Alina Ibragimova and Cédric Tiberghien needs no introduction to Hyperion collectors, having been responsible over the last sixteen years for authoritative readings of much of the major repertoire for violin and piano. February’s Record of the Month is their latest collaboration, bringing compelling accounts of the three Schumann Violin Sonatas—passionate, intense works inspired by the calibre of musicians with whom Schumann associated in the early 1850s. But however distinguished those early performances by Joseph Joachim and Clara Schumann may have been, it’s difficult to imagine they could have surpassed these: this is a duo which can always be relied upon to produce rather special results.

If the Italian piano concerto is an elusive creature, largely absent from the standard repertoire, in War Silence – Rare Italian piano concertos pianist Roberto Prosseda helps redress such neglect in a programme consisting of no fewer than four of them. Written between 1900 and 2015, works by Guido Alberto Fano, Luigi Dallapiccola, Silvio Omizzolo and Cristian Carrara (whose concerto gives the album its arresting title) will be new to most listeners: two are first recordings and all are worth discovering in such committed performances as they receive here. The London Philharmonic Orchestra is conducted by Nir Kabaretti. With Guillaume de Machaut: A lover’s death The Orlando Consort concludes its magisterial survey of the secular music of France’s great fourteenth-century composer-poet, a survey which has greatly enhanced our understanding and appreciation of an extraordinary figure. The themes of this final instalment are familiar—the fleeting joys and lasting sorrows of courtly love, and the narrator’s near obsession with his lover, the desire for whom ‘Love in my heart has set ablaze / And stoked’ (to quote the vigorous opening motet).

A new recording from Decca Classics brings the super-abundant talents of Christian Li fully to the fore: the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto holds no fears for this prodigy of our time. The concerto enjoys backing support from the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko, while pianist Nicola Eimer joins Christian for some rather lighter encore fare.

On the streets and in the sky & other works by Jonathan Dove is the latest fruit of the composer’s long relationship with the Sacconi Quartet. The title comes from Dove’s String Quartet No 2, commissioned by the quartet, and the programme also includes an enigmatic song cycle for baritone (Philippe Sly) and string quartet and a work for piano duet (performed by Charles Owen and Katya Apekisheva), before the final Vanishing gold, again for string quartet and inspired by a curious pair of now-extinct animals …

The London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Sir Antonio Pappano have recorded Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé, the wordless voices of Tenebrae adding a touch of the ethereal to this performance captured live in the Barbican in April 2024 by the engineers of LSO Live. First performed in 1912, this is one of Ravel’s most mighty works and—as with Stravinsky’s epic ballet scores from the same period—has become a thrilling concert work in its own right.

The title may sound innocent enough, but Vivaldi Opus 8 Volume 1 hides a most astonishing new recording of The Four Seasons, violinist-cum-director Adrian Chandler leading La Serenissima on a whirlwind traversal which demands to be heard. Four further violin concertos, one a double concerto, complete this new Signum album.

Sun moon stars rain takes its title from a poem by e e cummings and is an enterprising programme of choral works—predominantly composed in the last decade or so—responding to mankind’s perennial fascination with these most primal of natural phenomena. Christopher Gabbitas conducts the singers of the Phoenix Chorale and the album comes to us from Signum Classics.

New from historical piano label APR we have Cécile Chaminade and her contemporaries play Chaminade. Included are some of the very earliest recordings of all (Chaminade herself, captured on disc in 1901), while the set as a whole reminds us how fast-changing fashions can allow a block-busting composer to be consigned to the shadows almost overnight, awaiting ‘discovery’ decades later by new generations of enterprising artists.

A Plastic Theatre & other choral works by Joanna Marsh is a new showcase on Signum Classics for this most vigorous of composers. Featuring electrifying performances from I Fagiolini—as well as contributions from The Lyons Mouth, Stile Antico and Voces8—the thrilling title work was recorded live by mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnston and the Liverpool Philharmonic Youth Choir and Orchestra under conductor Ellie Slorach.