Catalog

FIGMENTS 2, which follows the success of 2016’s FIGMENTS, is a compendium of chamber music that sparks the imagination. The album features the works of Yuan-Chen Li, Peter Dayton, Hans Bakker, Navid Bargrizan, and Charles Corey—innovative composers whose works draw inspiration from the world around them, be it the tribal dances of indigenous peoples, art history, 16th-century keyboard music, the science of acoustics, or the idiosyncrasies of language.

With EXHALING SPACE, Alejandro Rutty and his cast of remarkable performers create one hour of fresh, captivating music combining Latin and world music styles with the classical tradition. With tracks like the futuristic tango Martian Milonga and the meditative More Music for Examining and Buying Merchandise, Rutty composes the album like a breathing exercise, taking in an anxious pace in one movement, and then in the next, letting the melodies exhale gently through the piece.

Miguel Zenón composer and alto saxophone José A. Zayas Cabán soprano saxophone Ryan Smith tenor saxophone Casey Rafn piano EL PAÍS INVISIBLE “happened by accident,” says composer Miguel Zenón, like it was “almost meant to be.” Serendipitously, the project developed when Zenón was wrestling with critical questions about [...]

DEDICATION, a compilation of newly recorded works by composer Howard Quilling, features two sonatas for violin and piano, a suite for saxophone and wind orchestra, and a trio for violin, cello, and piano.

Fall immersed into a collection of innovative stories and sounds on David Colson’s CONVERSING WITH SPIRITS. Colson’s distinctive push-and-pull textures are both an inviting and invigorating in the aptly named Un raz-de-marée de terreur et de joie (A tidal wave of terror and of joy) for bari sax and marimba, a welcome that drifts into a call back to classical trumpet repertoire: the long lamentations and surges of havoc discovered within Duo for Trumpet and Piano. This being closely followed by Ghost Music, a virtuosic marimba solo featuring Matthew Coley, a composition most reminiscent of uncanny whisperings in shadowy atmospheres—no doubt with a touch of whimsy, and a whimsy that is no stranger to the nature of cats, or more specifically, Cat Tales, a touching tongue-in-cheek collection of saxophone and piano vignettes invoking the personality of eight cats familiar to Colson. The River within Us concludes the collection, an at-once bubbly and fluttering two-movement work featuring the Western Michigan University Percussion Ensemble. Treat yourself to CONVERSING WITH SPIRITS, and enjoy the endless surprises it has to offer.

New from Navona Records is saxophonist José Antonio Zayas Cabán’s CENTENNIAL, an album of cutting-edge solo and chamber music reflecting on the shortcomings of the 19th Amendment during its 100-year anniversary. Rather than celebrating, this album urges listeners to recognize the significant work that remains in achieving global equality.

CAUSAL DUALISM, Keith Kramer's second full-length release on Navona, is a celebration of dichotomy and relationships between all things. Duality, for soprano, saxophone, bass trombone, and string quartet, explores the interaction and relationships of the ensemble; Causality represents the string orchestra's journey of expression and highlights the action and reaction that permeates through all events; Flame of Attention, for soprano saxophone, the beginning of a long-term collaboration between the composer and Gottfried Stoger.

A stroll along the Seine - Notre Dame reflected in the waters below - the Eiffel Tower illuminated in evening skies - bistro conversations echoing in the streets of the Left Bank. Parisian scenes such as these come to mind when listening to the nuances of pianist Kathryn Goodson's debut Navona Records release, BELLE NUIT, a collection of works from the La Belle Époque and beyond, with arrangements for piano and wind instruments.

How can something as intimate as a musical moment shared between two people open up the door to endless possibilities? Discover the answer in ART FOR TWO, a collection of works by acclaimed composer Arthur Gottschalk and performed by Italian woodwind extraordinaires Sauro Berti and Mario Ciaccio, accompanied by the skilled hands of pianist Naomi Fujiya. In each piece, the performers call listeners into the moment as they traverse art music inspired by sources from traditional Jewish hymns to Frank Zappa.