Catalog

Stephen Page saxophone Alexandre Maynegre-Torra piano Saxophonist Stephen Page returns to Navona Records with EARTHLY ROUND, a selection of chamber works that showcase the saxophone's capacity to traverse diverse styles, emotions, and cultural influences. The title piece from composer Miriama Young serves as a poignant musical meditation on [...]

PAS DE TROIS explores the possibilities of unique instrumental combinations for oboe, violin, viola, and piano within the intimacy of chamber music. The title work, Pas de Trois, is a playful yet challenging neo-romantic work featuring Ned Rorem’s lyrical melodies and a tonal language all his own, blending American boldness with French influence. Hans Gál’s Trio for Oboe, Violin, and Viola, Op. 94 is a lush late-Romantic work and an homage to his beloved adopted home, Scotland. The final piece, Dorothy Howell’s Air, Variations and Finale features exquisite, expressive phrasing and intricate interplay between the three solo instruments.

The name for Bruce Stark's album VIBRANT could not be more aptly chosen: if ever there was the acoustic equivalent of fireworks in solo piano music, this would be it. Interpreted to perfection by Indonesian pianist Isabella Jie, virtuosic sparks fly and rich colors blossom. The apparent formality of Stark's compositions — a sonata, a kind of suite, a set of dances, a toccata — betrays the innovation that lives and breathes within these pieces: there's a similar spirit at play here as in the works of Prokofiev or Takemitsu. The language is tonal, yet never commonplace; but most striking is the level of energy, with a firepower that is off the charts. An exhilarating experience.

Not long ago, the West developed an overwhelming love for all things Korean: cuisine, romance dramas, pop groups. Much less notorious is the emerging Korean scene of serious music composers. Internationally-acclaimed pianist Eun-Hee Park aims to shed light on its abundance with her new release, KOREAN SOUNDSCAPES.

It’s a rare treat to hear exceptional recordings of double reed ensembles; no trio could know this better than bassoonist Kristin Wolfe Jensen, oboist Andrew Parker, and pianist Collette Valentine, who’ve accomplished a delightful performance on their new release, MARIE DE GRANDVAL’S GRAND TRIO. A popular composer in her day, de Grandval’s works are given a breath of fresh air, handled delicately in a collaboration with remarkable natural blend. Jensen’s warm treatment of the song-like bassoon passages highlights the elegant pizzicato oboe passages serviced by Parker, the fluttering and dramatic musicality in Valentine’s piano playing tying the ensemble together with a bow.

Composer Kevin Wilt’s TAVERN MUSIC is an evocative collection of chamber works performed by pianist Irena Kofman and the Amernet String Quartet. Wilt’s compositions employ vivid musical color and texture across a variety of styles. The title piece draws on Celtic and Gaelic traditions, blending classical technique with folk-inspired melodies; it emulates the sounds of a jam session in a local pub, with friends and their fiddles gathered around a table sharing a pint. Out in the Storm captures the drama of a South Florida thunderstorm, while Silver Nitrate Reverie is a nostalgic reflection on classic cinema. TAVERN MUSIC is an uniquely inviting collection of chamber works.

Pianist Gerry Bryant returns to Navona Records with THE COMPOSERS VOLUME 2, the long awaited second installment in a series dedicated to amplifying the voices of underrepresented Black classical composers. Bryant breathes fresh air into compositions by Florence Price, Margaret Bonds, Betty Jackson King, L. Viola Kinney, Nathaniel Dett, and S. Coleridge-Taylor in this release. Price’s Fantasy No. 2 for Violin and Piano, arranged by Mark Cargill, carries on her legacy as a pioneering symphonic woman composer. Other highlights include Dett’s Dvořák-inspired pieces and Coleridge-Taylor’s celebrated suite of five pieces for piano. Bonds, Kinney, and King also shine, blending classical forms with Black spirituals and cultural heritage. These compositions, born from resilience and artistry, transcend the prejudice that once obscured them, inviting reverence for their rightful place in the classical tradition.

MOZART COMPLETE SONATAS AND VARIATIONS by Christina Petrowska Quilico and violinist Jacques Israelievitch on Navona Records honors the tenth anniversary of Israelievitch’s death. While enduring late-stage cancer, he rallied his strength to finish these recordings just months before he passed away. The progression from the early sonatas that favor the piano through the later sonatas that highlight the violin is brilliantly captured by these two extraordinary musicians. These performances are a proud entry in Israelievitch’s and Petrowska Quilico’s recorded catalogs and stand as a powerful testament to the human spirit.

Saxophonist Adam Estes and pianist Adrienne Park share transcriptions of master works by Beethoven, Chaminade, Burhans, and Saint-Saëns on their LYRICAL BARITONE, VOL. 1. Borrowed from the flute, bassoon, and cello repertoires, this album celebrates this captivating music reimagined for baritone saxophone and piano duo. While the lowest note of the cello and the baritone saxophone is the same, the common playing range isn’t: the cello’s stretches an entire octave further, rendering literal transcriptions fiendishly difficult to play. This considerable challenge seems to pose no difficulty to Estes and Park at all: with great lightness and delicacy, they navigate calmly and confidently through even the most treacherous musical waters. A virtuosic feat and feast.

Water, as a concept, has a mystical quality: It is ever-changing, able to take on almost any form from trickle to deluge, and while at times intimidating and destructive, it is a prerequisite for the sustenance of life. The adventurous and virtuosic Canadian pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico, who championed Ann Southam's seminal water-inspired work Rivers, decided it was time for a continuation and commissioned a sequel from composer Frank Horvat: a suite of seven solo piano pieces titled MORE RIVERS. The idea was to bring Canadian minimalist music to Canadian audiences, but Petrowska Quilico and Horvat may well have exceeded their goal. With glimpses of impressionism, of Prokofievian harmonies and Pärtian spirit, textures reminiscent of Messiaen, and of course the pianist's impeccable interpretation, MORE RIVERS is wonderfully timeless and universal.

Step into a musical world where tradition meets innovation in GALANTERIES, a groundbreaking collection of solo piano works from composer William C. White, brought to life by the brilliant young virtuoso Joseph Vaz. This album turns the traditional mentor-protégé dynamic on its head, as Vaz’s fervor for White’s music inspired the composer to craft these demanding and imaginative pieces specifically for his protégé’s remarkable talents. The music of GALANTERIES is a kaleidoscope of musical styles and influences, from Baroque elegance to Romantic drama to world folk traditions. In Vaz’s masterful hands, these pieces transcend their classical roots to create something entirely new — a perfect synthesis of composer’s vision and performer’s interpretation. The result is a collection of works so personally tailored to Vaz’s artistry that they feel less like compositions and more like musical effusions, making this album an extraordinary document of artistic collaboration at its most inspiring.

The melting pot of American music has a rich history of bending and transforming genres, and Harry Bulow’s PIANO WORKS continues this tradition with expressively modern flair. Five pieces for piano explore the effects of time and play on compositions, showcasing how tweaks and changes to work over the years expose new elements, like a river carving through stone, revealing new layers of textures and vibrant colors. Bulow’s style draws from Copland, Beethoven, pop, jazz, and minimalism to create much more than an eclectic menagerie. PIANO WORKS thoughtfully captures a portrait of the composer’s catalog, spotlighting a fresh and vibrant sound honed by decades of experience and a serious knack for incorporating genre into new work.

Highly-acclaimed pianist Daniel Linder makes his Navona Records debut with PIANO SONATAS, presenting three offerings of masterworks by Alban Berg, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Aaron Copland. Berg’s Piano Sonata, Op. 1, demonstrates the young composer’s mastery of chromaticism and atonality under Schoenberg’s tutelage. Beethoven’s Sonata in A Major, Op. 101 is a testament to his late-period experimentation, blending Classical forms with expressive lyricism and cyclic structure. Copland’s Piano Sonata fuses his American populist style with jazz-inspired rhythmic motifs and open harmonies, encapsulating the expansive, introspective qualities of his mid-century work. Together, these pieces offer a rich study in contrasts and an inquiry into the celebrated tradition of the sonata form.

SONATA FOR FLUTE AND PIANO by Timothy Schmalz is a vibrant and eclectic three-movement piece. This technically-demanding sonata incorporates a wide range of musical styles, inspired by Schmalz’s years spent studying works from the classical and pre-Romantic periods as well as the 20th and 21st centuries. The musical vernacular of the work is at once daring and playful, with the final movement representing a full “dream cycle.” Likened to a “musical children’s book” by the composer, this piece — Schmalz’s first foray into sonatas for small chamber ensembles — invites listeners young and old into the realm of imagination.

It's admittedly rare to hear contemporary classical music that delivers a shot of energy and drive like a cup of coffee: strong enough to wake you up, but in a way that is still pleasing to the senses. ADOLPHUS HAILSTORK boasts exactly this rare and invigorating combination — and the energetic performance by The Harlem Chamber Players adds an extra boost on top. Hailstork’s music blends African, American, and European traditions; there are parts that positively sound like something Shostakovich or Prokofiev might have written, perhaps echoes of Hailstork's studies with Nadia Boulanger in the 1960s. There are moments of contemplation, but if this album is anything, it's invigorating and profound.

If one could have recorded an ancient culture, how would it have sounded? Croatian conductor Antoaneta Radočaj-Jerković and two all-female choirs under her lead pursue this question. The result is HORIZON, a haunting performance of the eponymous work by contemporary composer Dalibor Bukvić. HORIZON is meant to evoke the ambiance of the prehistoric Vučedol culture, which flourished between 3000 and 2200 B.C. in what is now (mostly) Croatia. And in this endeavor, it succeeds with unsettling precision: Bukvić's work and the choirs' impeccable performance conjure images of hermetic settlements, starry skies, pagan rituals, and an ever-present consciousness of impending extinction. An ethereal experience.

Outside of Russian ballets and Mozart symphonies, the oboe is an instrument that generally does not get a lot of credit. But on FROM THE SEA TO THE STARS, the instrument is thrust into the spotlight it deserves. The driving force? Accomplished American oboists Lindsay Flowers and Andrew Parker. Center stage, it turns out, is a surprisingly merited place for the oboe and its bigger sister, the English horn — especially in contemporary composition. Flowers and Parker have curated a moody selection of beautiful, minimalist pieces that allow the respective instruments to shine on their own — accompanied only here and there by a pleasingly subtle piano. Delicate, lyrical, and utterly charming.

Inspiring curiosity, cultural interaction, and deep listening, INK TRACES reflects violinist Julia Glenn’s 15-year journey exploring Chinese culture and interactions between Chinese language and music, fueled by frequent trips and three years living in China. This Navona Records release reflects a greater interdisciplinary approach seen in Chinese arts - one that blends poetry, dance, painting, calligraphy, and music and shows fascinating interchanges between gesture and sound. The title, inspired in part by Pan Kai's Ink Traces of Sigh for solo violin, is a nod to such interplay. The album explores three threads: probing the musical-linguistic play possible in the music of Chinese speakers, broadening perspectives on Chinese music, and fostering cultural dialogue between China and the United States. It features works by Chinese and Chinese-speaking composers, stretching traditional Western musical boundaries to create rich, imaginative soundscapes and processes.

The cello-piano duo is justly hailed for its tremendous expressiveness. Cellist Juliana Soltis and pianist Ruoting Li remarkably demonstrate this setup's emotive power on AMERICAN WOMAN while championing a noble cause — highlighting underrepresented women composers. Featuring works by Mary Howe, Amy Beach, Margaret Bonds, Helen Crane, Dorothy Rudd Moore, and Florence Price, AMERICAN WOMAN sheds light on a treasure trove of rarely heard gems of cello-piano literature. The general tone is sweeping, romantic, expressive, at times fierce and energetic, then again tender and delicate. Soltis and Li show extraordinary ability not only in bringing out the unique style of each composer, but also in uniting them all in a great artistic effort.

Eric Schultz’s masterful clarinet playing speaks in new and known tongues on POLYGLOT, a concept album celebrating music as a language of cultural identity and the self. A strong advocate of living composers, Schultz opens with an engrossing performance of Iván Enrique Rodríguez’s Sonata Santera, exploring the development and evolution of three Caribbean Santeria rituals. Schultz captures the enchanting, mystical nature of the rituals between the rhythmic, driving movements, occasionally accompanied by percussive elements.  Schultz follows with Críptico no. 9: DAVЯTHAN, an interpretive piece that centralizes language and text-setting at the core of its composition. Shortly followed is Johnny Navarro’s romantic Danzón, a nostalgic work punctuated by fleeting moments of sensuality. The same intimacy is carried into Chiayu Hsu’s Summer Night in a Deep Valley, showcasing meditative episodes on the natural beauty expressed in Guo Xi’s Chinese landscape paintings. Likewise, Gabriel Bouche Caro’s Escenas explores a meditation on self-identity and its existence as a product of culture, the clarinet never languishing in melancholic passages, but always remaining reflective and curious. POLYGLOT culminates with the Brahms Trio, Op. 114, a composition inspired by the clarinet playing of friend Richard Mühlfeld, an inspiration so strong it served to pull the composer from retirement. To Schultz, a quarterfinalist for the 2025 GRAMMY® Music Educator of the Year, music is a hallmark of metamorphosis that drives cultural change across history, the performer and composer working in tandem to create something inspired and new — speaking each other’s language, you might say.