A French Hammerklavier

Paul Dukas : Piano sonata in E flat minor, Abel Decaux : Clairs de lune.

Performer : Marc-Andre Hamelin piano.

Some have called Dukas's piano sonata a French Hammerklavier, which it certainly is in length but also in scope and the demands it places on the pianist.

Bach In Early Style

J.S.Bach : Actus Tragicus, cantatas BWV 4, 12, 106, 196.

Performers : Cantus Colln directed by Konrad Junghanel.

Both early and more mature Bach cantatas.

Concertos a la Mode

Prokofiev piano concertos nos 1 and 3 . Scriabin miniatures.

Performer Evgeny Kissin piano, Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Claudio Abbado.

Prok 3 seems the young firebrands go to concerto these days and this was recorded by Kissin back when he was in the young firebrand bracket.

British Pastoral ( English and Scottish )

BBC Music magazine free cover disc.

George Butterworth : The Banks of green Willow, A Shropshire Lad Rhapsody, Two English Idylls.

Hamish MacCunn : Land of the Mountain and Flood, The Ship o' the Fiend.

Performers : BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra variously conducted by Andrew Manze, Osmo Vanska and Martyn Brabbins  and BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by Keith Lockhart.

Caught One More time

Van Morrison : Astral Weeks

Nothing else remotely like it really, despite numerous borrowings to be found in the work of others. Nostalgic in 1968, nostalgia that only grows with the passing years and becomes more powerful.

Agnostic Take On Faith

Vaughan Williams : Sancta Civitas and Dona nobis pacem

Performers : London Symphony Orchestra and chorus, Choristers of St Paul's cathedral, Yvonne Kenny soprano, Bryn Terfel baritone, Philip Langridge tenor. Conducted by Richard Hickox.

Chorus master Stephen Westrop, orchestra leader Vasko Vassilev.

Similarities to VW's opera on Pilgrims Progress which was long in gestation.

Later With Levit

Beethoven : The Late Sonatas

Performer : Igor Levit, piano.

Op 101, 106 ( Hammerklavier ), 109, 110, 111.

Massive early career confidence from Levit.