Perfect peace

Once dinner is over and the dishes are cleared, we settle on the sofa to unwind. Elgar’s Mina is playing; gentle string melodies emerge, furnished with delicate percussion. Jaws unclench and muscles r

Symphony No. 5; Swanwhite Suite etc Christian Tetzlaff (violin); Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra/Nicholas Collon Ondine ODE 1468-2 77:16 mins One of the features of Finland’s impressive music educati

Complete Suites and Other Music for Keyboard Cristian Sandrin (piano) SOMM Recordings SOMMCD0702 61:09 mins In the first complete recording of Purcell’s eight keyboard suites on the modern piano, Roma

Gargantuan in scope and scale, Busoni’s Piano Concerto is ferociously complex – demanding both virtuosic solos and expansive accompaniment from its pianist – and structured in a way that makes Beethov

Krystian Zimerman (piano), Maria Nowak (violin), Katarzyna Budnik (viola), Yuya Okamoto (cello) Deutsche Grammophon 486 4650 77:10 mins Brahms’s Second and Third piano quartets tend to be overshadowed

Bruch: Violin Concerto No. 1; Erkki-Sven Tüür: Violin Concerto No. 2 Hans Christian Aavik (violin); Odense Symphony Orchestra/Gemma New Orchid Classics ORC100380 51:39 mins It was an audacious move to