Best Requiems

Tuscan tenor Andrea Bocelli was already an international superstar (for Romanza, Aria, and Sogno) when he made his first album of arias and sacred music. "I have known these pieces since childhood," he explains, and it's clear that he loves them all.

The title song is gorgeously enough performed to be worth the album's asking price, the tenor's voice ringing out with great clarity and beauty, and the selection from Rossini's Stabat Mater is even more thrilling, with its ascent to high D flat near its close.

4 in E Flat; Rondo for Horn and Orchestra in E Flat; Serenade in G "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik"; Divertimento in D , and more, conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy, Georg Solti; Neville Marriner, and more.

4 in E Flat; Rondo for Horn and Orchestra in E Flat; Serenade in G "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik"; Divertimento in D , and more, conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazy, Georg Solti; Neville Marriner, and more.

Its hauntingly simple and hypnotic sound has attracted many followers, and Universal is determined to find the real masters of this music to perform a 21st Century version. "the musical structure of chanting can have a significant and positive physiological impact ... studies also demonstrate that such practices have been shown to lower blood pressure, increase levels of the performance hormone DHEA as well as reducing anxiety and depression." "It's a pretty safe bet that very few of Universal Music's recent signings count Pope Benedict XVI among their fans.

This description might also say that the program contains some of the best and best-loved Christmas choral pieces of all time, presented in a pleasing mix of familiar carols and lesser-known original works. Other notable highlights are Peter Cornelius's "The three kings" and the lively Willcocks arrangement of "Tomorrow shall be my dancing day."

does its best to cover both well-worn classical favorites (Bach's "Air on the G String," Pachelbel's "Cannon," Debussy's "Clair de Lune") and some eclectic left-field choices (an excerpt from Gerick's Symphony No. does its best to cover both well-worn classical favorites (Bach's "Air on the G String," Pachelbel's "Cannon," Debussy's "Clair de Lune") and some eclectic left-field choices (an excerpt from Górecki's Symphony No.

From time to time pianists have experimented with recording on less than full-sized instruments and/or on especially well-preserved or reconditioned pre-modern Steinways. And here is another.As Leif Ove Andsnes tells us, Grieg's model B Steinway of 1892 sits 'in the high-ceilinged, wood-floored and wood-panelled drawing room at Troldhaugen', the villa on the outskirts of Bergen now preserved as a Grieg museum. This is partly a feature of the instrument itself, with its absence of excessive resonance, its harp-like bass, nut-brown middle register and bell-like treble; and it's partly that the open perspectives of the recording allow you to imagine the surroundings of pure Norwegian air.As with all the best early-piano recordings, this means that the instrument can be pushed to the limit without screaming blue murder. 38 Andsnes can pedal richly without endangering clarity; the resulting halo effect is one that composers of Grieg's time knew well but that the modern piano struggles to re-create.The same instrument played by a less-than-comprehensively equipped pianist might not occasion any special comment.