Mock Morris, Molly on the Shore and Shepherd’s Hey are edgily chipper. When Grainger is in this vein he looks in the direction of Frank Bridge’s Sir Roger de Coverley – a Britten favourite - and in this case there is a hint of Capriol too. Died for Love is out of the same green meadow as Moeran’s two pieces for small orchestra. Delightful. The Love Verses and the slightly chilly Early One Morning bring home parallels with Balfour Gardiner’s April and Philomela (long overdue for revival). Youthful Rapture (Tim Hugh, cello) has also been recorded by Julian Lloyd Webber who takes more time than Hugh and this piece can bear the slower tempo.

Boris Giltburg has set out to study and film all of Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas by the end of 2020. The project started as a personal exploration, driven by curiosity and his strong love of the Beethoven sonatas. These performances display Giltburg’s customary spirit and technical finesse, and also convey the electric atmosphere of the live recording.

April Lawton's short rock & roll moment in the sun takes a better turn on Ramatam's second attempt, In April Came the Dawning of the Red Suns. Acoustic ramblings like "Excerpt From Guitar Concerto #1," where she plays solo for 44 seconds, are more inviting than much of what was on the group's self titled debut. Since her prowess was a big part of the hype, why those introspective glimpses weren't extended is the mystery. There's also a pretty interlude, "Rainy Sunday Evening," which comes between two awful moments on side one, "Betty Lou" and "I Can Only Love You," proving the previous point.

Consummation. This is what the piano music of Arnold Schönberg (1874-1951) and Franz Schubert (1979-1828) have in common, the bridge that Thomas Larcher brings to this welcoming solo recital, his first for ECM. To underscore this point, he shuffles Schönberg’s Klavierstücke op. 11 with Schubert’s posthumous Klavierstücke D 946. By turns halting and didactic, the opening pairing opens into the fresh air of Schubert’s precisely syncopated revelry. The contrasts between the two composers are obvious to the ear, but to the heart Schönberg is an extended exhalation to Schubert’s inhalation. Where Schönberg plots slow, jagged caverns, Schubert runs furtively above ground in the sunshine. Yet both seem so urgent to tell their stories, offering lifelong journeys from relatively young minds.

A great surprise to discover the work of this Mexican musician, who somehow managed to invite for this album some of the best musicians of the genre, from representative and even legendary bands. The music is difficult to categorize in a few words, as it is full of changes not only in time but also in style, genre or mood. We can find Zeuhl, Math, RIO, Jazz, Symphonic or Rock riffs. Influences from names like Zappa, Present, Magma, etc. To stop to analyze each track would be a crazy task, because the ideas come and go in a frenetic way, leaving barely space to breathe to the listener. One of those albums that we are thankful for because they never stop trying to surprise us at every second. And for glorious moments it really succeeds.

The Argentine countertenor Franco Fagioli, with his mighty voice, has always been easy to imagine as one of the castrati with whom Handel contended at the height of his operatic career. He brings both power and flair to fast passagework, and that doesn't change here in such arias as Venti, turbine, prestate, from Rinaldo, HWV 7a. What's different this time is the expertise Fagioli brings to the slow numbers. For the most part, Fagioli does not essay unusual repertory here, except in the final Ch'io parta?, from Partenope, HWV 27, which elegantly ends the program on a question and frames the whole thing nicely with the opening aria from Oreste, HWV A11. For the most part, though, Fagioli sticks to familiar territory, and he lays claim to it. Sample the intense but understated performance of Ombra mai fu, from Act One of Serse, HWV 40, which seems to allude to its suppressed emotion rather than laying it on the line.

In the six years that had passed since 1953, and her first recording of Lucia di Lammermoor, Callas’s voice had maybe become less robust,but her singing had become still more perceptive. As Gramophone said: ‘Mme Callas has refined her interpretation of the role, and made it more exquisite, more fascinating,musically and dramatically more subtle – in a word, more beautiful.’

John Eliot Gardiner is one of the leading conductors in the active authentic performances movement in England, performing Baroque music but also extending his range into later repertoire. He first conducted at the age of 15, and after finishing school he studied at King's College, Cambridge. While still an undergraduate, he conducted the combined Oxford and Cambridge Singers on a 1964 tour of the Middle East and founded the Monteverdi Choir, which has consistently performed on his recordings since.

On their acoustic album, Make The Most Of It, New Found Glory tackles the last year head-on with their most cathartic collection of songs to date. Written in the wake of guitarist, Chad Gilbert's cancer diagnosis and mixed by Mark Trombino (blink-182, Jimmy Eat World), MTMOT is a rumination on what it means to grieve, to live, to approach every day with appreciation and a sense of fulfillment. Coral Springs, Florida band New Found Glory broke into the mainstream as part of the early-2000s wave of pop-punk acts, rising to the upper tier of the genre alongside Good Charlotte and Saves the Day. Their breakthrough third album, Sticks and Stones, peaked at number four on the U.S. charts in 2002, only to be bested two years later by their Top Three effort Catalyst.

Johan Joachim Agrell (1701-1765) was in many ways a traveller between the worlds: in Uppsala, the Swede's great talent was recognized by the Hessian envoy, which resulted in Agrell being summoned to a court near Kassel in Germany. He later went as municipal chapel-master to Nuremberg. Musically, Agrell was a brilliant Baroque composer in whose works many of the new early Classical trends were anticipated.

This is Volume 2 in the series of orchestral works by Alfredo Casella, performed by the BBC Philharmonic and Gianandrea Noseda, with the pianist Martin Roscoe. The disc also forms part of the ‘Italian Series’ on Chandos, in association with Ricordi Music and the BBC Philharmonic. International Record Review said of the previous volume: ‘Anyone with more than a passing interest in this fascinating composer needs to have this remarkable disc.’

In the 1950s these recordings would have given a very up-to-date impression, I imagine; the playing is extremely clean there's never a hint of sentimental violin slides or over-use of the sustaining pedal. But nearly half a century later, perhaps we're more conscious of the old-world virtues Schneiderhan's beautiful legato bowing and gentle vibrato, Kempff's full, unforced tone, and a flexible approach from both artists, with finely graded ritardandos and subtle variations of tempo.