Naxos English Song Series on Spotify

"English composers of the 20th century have made some of finest contributions to the song literature. Our English Song Series is an ongoing survey of the best of these works performed by the leading interpreters of our day." - Naxos.com

"In a bold display of commitment to the purveyance of quality British music, Naxos is releasing the English Song Series, seven CDs of works by British composers sung by leading interpreters of song. Observant music enthusiasts may recognise this particular set of recordings; all seven discs debuted on the now-defunct Collins Classics label in the early 1990s. Unwilling for these excellent performances to go to waste, Naxos is breathing new life into the series in 2003. " - Naxos.com

Composers featured in this series so far:

Benjamin Britten, Gustav Holst, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gerald Finzi, William Walton, Arthur Somervell, Roger Quilter, Liza Lehmann, William Alwyn, Ian Venables, George Butterworth, John Ireland, Ivor Gurney.

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Naxos - English Song Series (22 volumes, 582 tracks, total time: 25 hours). Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. See liner notes on Naxos and reviews on Presto.

Naxos 19th Century Violinist Composers Series

"With flushed face, raised shoulders, and groans of delight Brahms belabored the keyboard while accompanying me and was happy that 'such a thing existed in this world." - Joseph Joachim: Ein lebensbild

"Brahms was talking about one of the seminal violin works of the 19th century, and it wasn't Beethoven's magisterial violin Concerto, nor was it Mendelssohn's marvelous light and airy essay in the same genre. Nor was it the great Kreutzer Sonata or the concertos of Saint-Saens. Brahms groaned with delight over the great 22nd violin concerto of Giovanni Battista Viotti, one of the true masters of the violin and the master who opened the door to a flood of great music little remembered today. Rode, Baillot, Kreutzer, Dancla, Alard, Spohr, Beriot, David, Mazas, Godard, Vieuxtemps and many more composers solidified the technique of modern violin-playing at the same time creating a body of music that is truly a buried treasure - now brought to the light of day and made part of our recorded legacy by Naxos. While the concerto form led the way, these composers wrote in a variety of forms: paraphrases of opera tunes, tone-poem descriptions of exotic travel , airs varie based on popular tunes, chamber music, and especially (many were pedagogues) etudes, caprices, and numerous 'violin schools.' This series on 19th century violin music provides a window onto this vast repertoire, mostly written by practitioners of the instrument, and all of it delightful listening." - Naxos.com

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Naxos - 19th Century Violinist Composers (337 tracks, 30 albums, total time: 34 hours). Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. I included a Naxos disk of Viotti's violin works, though it's not part of the series. See Naxos for list of albums in this series and liner notes, and Presto for album overviews.

Naxos: British Light Music Series on Spotify

"Famous for its harmonically unchallenging, smooth and entertaining melodic lines, British Light Music grew from the indulgent and sentimental music of the 19th Century, from composers such as Arthur Sullivan, to become one of the most popular classical musical styles in Britain during the first half of the 20th Century. British Light Music is often referred to as easy listening and usually instantly recognisable. Whilst the genre may not advocate ground breaking compositional techniques, it is not always limited to its convivial facade, sometimes parodying more serious classical music through citation of theme and motif.

British Light Music is, for the most part, a form of programme music, with each piece designed to represent a mood, object, place or event. It was this quality, which made it ideal for broadcast throughout the heyday of radio, leading to the introduction of The BBC Light Programme in 1945, and during the advent of television, where British Light Music featured as the introduction to many early programmes. It was, in fact, these two mediums, which facilitated its success.

The genre's popularity was complemented by its use in film; notably, and amongst many others, in the 1939 version of Goodbye Mr Chips with the soundtrack by Richard Addinsell, and the 1955 World War II classic The Dam Busters, which featured the famous 'Dam Busters's March' by Eric Coates. Although the style has declined since the early 1960s, its use in film has contributed greatly to its longevity.

Famous British Light Music composers include Ernest Tomlinson, Edward German, Haydn Wood, Richard Addinsell and Eric Coates, the last of whom is described as the 'father' or 'king' of British Light Music." - Naxos.com (where you can find liner notes for each album in the series)

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Naxos - British Light Music (539 tracks, 31 albums, total time: 35 hours). Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. It includes some Naxos British light music compilations, and Vintage TV & Radio Classics (including Fritz Spiegl's wake-up music for BBC Radio 4, which was dropped in 2006 after 30 years despite a nationwide campaign to save it), though they are not listed in the series on the Naxos site.

Naxos Liszt Complete Piano Music

"The exciting array of prize-winning young pianists and critically-acclaimed, respected artists playing the complete piano music of Liszt distinguishes the series from other collections currently available in the market. Naxos is honoured to be recording laureates of such prestigious competitions as the Leeds International Pianoforte Competition, the London World Piano Competition and the International Franz Liszt Piano Competition." - Official site

This ongoing series features Liszt's own compositions for piano, including piano reduction of orchestral works; as well as his transcriptions of Beethoven, Schubert, Rossini, Bellini, Verdi, Wagner and many other composers. 35 albums have been released so far, and the whole series became available on Spotify recently.

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Naxos: Liszt Complete Piano Music (387 tracks, total time: 40 hours). Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. Albums are arranged by volume number. Liner notes to every album is available at Naxos. This series is far from completed - Hyperion's Complete Liszt Piano Music took 99 disks to finish. New releases will be added to the playlist when they appear.

Also check out the audiobook on Liszt's life and works from the Naxos Educational playlist. 

Naxos Japanese Classics Series on Spotify

"Since the latter half of the 19th century, Japanese classical composers have taken inspiration from western classical music culture to create a variety of original compositions. However, with the exception of works by a few famous figures such as Toru Takemitsu, such compositions have had a limited audience even within Japan. The Naxos Japanese Classics series rediscovers composers such as Akio Yashiro, Saburo Moroi, Hisato Ohzawa, and introduces what is a rich musical repertoire to a much wider audience than before. Many of the works in the collection receive their première recordings. Each album provides detailed and authoritative liner notes, and is supported by fine performances from distinguished ensembles and conductors." - Official site

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Naxos: Japanese Classics (227 tracks, total time: 23 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view (this series features some of the best cover art from Naxos). All titles in this series are available on Spotify, except for one Japan-only release. Albums are sorted alphabetically by composer name. See the Naxos page for more info, including complete liner notes. Also check out the discussion about this series on Unsung Composers. 

Naxos Schubert Lied Edition on Spotify

"In what is the perfect introduction to Schubert's world of songs, acclaimed pianist Ulrich Eisenlohr accompanies the élite of today's young German Lieder singers to give superior performances in this ongoing recording project of Schubert's Lieder, totalling over 700 songs set to poetry from classical Greece, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, from 18th-century German authors, early Romantics, Biedermeier poets, and Heine. All recordings are supplemented by German and translated English sung texts online." - Official site

Get this edition in one Spotify playlist: Naxos Schubert Lied Edition (672 tracks, 35 volumes, 38 CDs, total time: 41 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. Albums are sorted by volume number. Check out booklets and original German texts with English translation on Naxos.

P.S. The Franz Schubert: Complete Chronological Catalogue D. 1 - 998 has been updated accordingly. Original post here.

Tenor of the Century: Enrico Caruso Complete Recordings (1902-1920) on Naxos Historical

Ever wondered what Corrado "Junior" Soprano was singing in the finale of The Sopranos Season 3? It's a Napuletano classic "Core 'ngrato" ("Ungrateful heart") written in 1911 for Enrico Caruso, whose 1904 recording of Vesti la giubba  was the first million-selling record in history.

I wouldn't normally do playlists for a single performer. I mean, what's the point? You want complete recordings of Emerson String Quartet? Just click that link and put all albums into a playlist by yourself. Tip: you can use Ctrl (CMD) + A and select all tracks at once.

Things are different for elder artists like Miles Davis or Caruso. Their artist pages are polluted by hundreds of rip-off albums that made it impossible for a casual user to find the proper recordings. I say rip-off because though the marginal cost to listen to a recording on Spotify is zero, financially; you still have to spend your time. And every time you listen to an inferior recording, you wasted an opportunity to hear a better one. Copyright laws only protect the master recordings for a certain period of time, which means anyone can "reproduce" archive recordings and sync them to streaming services and make some easy money. Most of them sound worse than the originals, which are already on Spotify. See the Enrico Caruso page and get an idea.

Now the good news: Naxos Historical "...is devoted to keeping the great recordings of the past alive and accessible. Naxos uses the services of the finest transfer engineers, such as Mark Obert-Thorn and Ward Marston, to produce restorations of outstanding quality." (Naxos site) Their 12-volume catalogue of Caruso recordings is a crowning achievement of historical vocal recordings restoration. According to WSJ, "Naxos has Caruso on 12 CDs, artfully transferred in what is the best historically respectful version currently available".

Get this collection in one Spotify playlist here: Enrico Caruso: Complete Recordings (1902-1920) on Naxos Historical (250 tracks, total times: 14 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in album view. Look up Naxos's official site for detailed tracklists and liner notes. Also check out the previous playlist Naxos Educational: An Index for a fascinating 4-hour audiobook Enrico Caruso - A Life In Words And Music.

Not in this playlist: my favorite song about the tenor: The Night I Heard Caruso Sing sang by Ben Watt of Everything But The Girl.

Halloween Playlist: Music for the Zombie Apocalypse

Naxos released some digital only releases with boldly tasty titles like Bleeding Chunks of Wagner and Music for the Zombie Apocalypse. Read more about their newest adventure on this detailed LA Time article.

The playlist Naxos compiled for Zombie Apocalypse feature ten more tracks than the digital compilation, It is a weird but timely playlist that demonstrates the great range of Naxos's catalog, which offers a great sampling of music people both know (Fauré Requiem, Schnittke quartet etc, but presented in a new context) and don't know (beware, you will never forget the sound of a Gloria Coates symphony or Michael Gordon's Timber once you hear it, not just on Halloween).

Here's the Spotify playlist from Naxos: Music for the Zombie Apocalypse (30 tracks, total time: 2 hours). Read more about the compilation/playlist here on ZombieHub.

Guest Post: Playlists From Naxos

It's my great pleasure and honor to introduce you Collin from the prominent Naxos label, who created some excellent playlists with Naxos and some of their distributed labels' contents, and would like to share on here with classical fans and Spotify users. Naxos has always been a pioneer in both expanding the recorded repertoire, and experimenting with new distribution tools - one year ago they were among the first classical labels to offer free sampler album on Amazon MP3 Store, and of course, they are also the first leading classical label to embrace Spotify. Hope you enjoy these playlists as much as I do, and stayed tuned for more awesome Naxos playlists to come.

Simply Ballet (150 tracks, total time: 7 hours)
Just a small selection of what Naxos has to offer in the realm of music for ballet. Of course some very well-known works here as well as some not so known gems.

Medieval Sounds (100 tracks, total time: 5 hours)
An excellent selection drawn from the Naxos "Early Music/Alte Musik" collection. A nice introduction to this period of music.

The New American Classics (127 tracks, total time: 17 hours)
Drawn from the Naxos American Classics series this playlist could really be ENDLESS however I just decided to focus on the really key releases. This shows there that are many different sounds and styles coming out of the current American Classical Music scene. This list is very fluid and will continue to grow and to morph in coming months.

Monster Music: Classic Horror Film Music (146 tracks, total time: 6 hours)
As the title implies this is music drawn from the Naxos Film Music series and features scores from some wonderful Hollywood films plus one Hammer studios film and of course Beauty and the Beast.

Naxos 18th Century Classics On Spotify

Most Naxos albums are available on Spotify USA in their entirety, so I share this as the first playlist after the US launch. Quote from Naxos:

"Together with music publishing house Artaria, Naxos brings to you its 18th Century Classics series aimed at the rediscovery of music by Haydn's lesser known and sometimes forgotten contemporaries.

The series' two cycles focus on the symphony and concerto in the 18th century. Thanks to this innovative project, recorded works of composers such as Beck, Dussek, Kraus, Hofmann and Vanhal are now made accessible to a wider audience worldwide."

I arranged the albums by composer names alphabetically, according to the Naxos page, where you can find reviews and album booklets like this. A sampler disk, The World of 18th Century Classics was placed at the beginning, to offer an overview.

Here's the Spotify playlist: Naxos 18th Century Classics (483 tracks, total time: 1 day) It looks better in Album view.

Naxos Guitar Collections on Spotify

"In 1994, NAXOS undertook to create the world's largest catalogue of recordings of the classical guitar. Produced under the artistic supervision of renowned guitarist, Norbert Kraft, with co-producer Bonnie Silver, the collection today numbers more than 70 titles, a clear realization of the company's aim.

Using the finest microphones in a magical acoustic, perfectly suited to the guitar's subtle nuances, and the latest digital technology, the recordings capture all the intimate detail and dynamic depth of the guitar's voice.

The Guitar Collection focuses on three repertoire streams:    

* The 'Complete Works' editions include the entire output of the instrument's important composers from the 19th and 20th Centuries. The works of Sor, Giuliani, Rodrigo, Torroba, Lauro, Ponce, Brouwer, and Barrios are among the many represented here.    

* The 'Laureate Series' features recent competition winners - stars of the future - in recital programmes displaying the artistry of these exciting young players.     

* Our 'National Series' presents music indigenous to various countries, mostly Latin American, in which the guitar is an integral part of the cultural fabric.  " - Naxos page for this series.

Here's the Spotify playlist: Naxos Guitar Collection (850 tracks, total time: 2 days) Press Ctrl (CMD on Macs) + G to browse in album view.

P.S. I updated my personal appeal post,  put the books that are cheaper in the UK store into a UK store wishlist.

My Guesswork On What's Going On Between Naxos And Spotify

Yesterday I read an unexpected and dreadful news that Naxos and ECM were threatening to leave Spotify. If it happens, the classical library of Spotify would be savagely damaged: both labels are specialized in their sub-genres and offer the only available recordings for many (often unfairly) obscure works.

Here are some facts: 1, Spotify is now making more money for rightsholders than Apple's iTunes Store, according to label sources, including UMG and Sony Music in Sweden. 2, Yesterday Spotify CEO Daniel Ek announced that they now have 750,000 paying subscribers. The number is tripled since Naxos joined Spotify. 3, By doing a few searches in Spotify, you will see that Naxos is clearly the most popular classical label in Spotify. I guess this has something to do with the fact that Naxos use the composer names to tag their recordings. A curious layman who wants a taste of Beethoven might not be able to choose between Kleiber and Karajan, but more likely to pick up a Beethoven symphony played by "Ludvig van Beethoven".

Hence raises the question: why Naxos is unhappy then? To be more precisely: why Spotify is not making enough money for Naxos in Sweden, like they are doing for UMG and Sony?

I guess the possible reasons are: 1, Spotify never revealed the details of how they pay the labels. If I spend 80 minutes to listen to a four-movement (track) symphony on Spotify, then I listen through a 5-track math-rock EP in 20 minutes, how do Spotify split my money for these two labels? 80:20 or 4:5? This is a very crucial element for classical labels, and if Spotify is using the latter paying mode, by all means they need to change.

2, Classical music still holds an amazing 5.5% market share of the recorded music sales, if Naxos and other classical labels could get 5.5% of Spotify's whole payout to labels, I guess they would be happy. But I'm afraid even if the paying mode is adjusted correctly by listening time, they might still not be getting that share. Why? A curious listener might buy a Naxos Best Of Chopin on a whim, so he contributes to the 5.5% share, but it's also very likely that he listens to the Naxos disk through once and then plays the new Kanye West album which he bought with the Chopin, all day long. It is a hypothetical example, but it might not be far from the truth. Popular music fans are more likely to give repeated listens to the music they purchased, than casual classical fans. When this comes to Spotify, it simply means that no matter how you calculate the royalties, classical labels would get less share than they have in physical sales. Classical music's identity crisis is the result of our music education, not the fault of Spotify. And you can only make the situation worse if you choose to make your music less accessible on technically the best music service in the world.

So what should Spotify do to comfort Naxos and ECM? It's really a big question for the Spotify team. I think at least they should try to make the payment method more impartial to the labels if need be, and transparent to the users (surely Spotify are not obligated to do so, but as an inovative start-up based on a totally new business model, it might a good move to let the users know how they benifit the music makers exactly, becuase when you keep it as a secret, the immediate assumption is often "not so good"), and ask the labels to be a bit more patient. If they chose to join Spotify when they only had 250,000 paying subscribers, there's no reason for them to leave now. Actually, I think Naxos should cherish the fact that their recordings beat all those full-price major classical labels in popularity on a free platform, Spotify, where the Naxos disks' price advantage means nothing. People now love you for the quality and broad range of your music, Naxos, don't fail us, please.

BTW, here's the Spotify playlist: Alex Ross 2010: Most Memorable Recordings (131 track 14 hours). Half of his choices are available. The Nico Muhly recording is another "hidden" album that you cannot find under the composer's name on Spotify. Original New Yorker post here. Enjoy, and looking forward to hear your opinions on the Naxos crisis.

Naxos Early Music Collection

"This collection focuses on music from the early Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Enjoy our albums and listen to early music from Italy, France, Flanders, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Finland, England, among others, performed by outstanding ensembles and soloists playing on authentic or modern instruments." from Naxos' official page.

Here's the Spotify playlist: Naxos Early Music Collection (1659 tracks, total time: 4 days) The recordings are arranged alphabetically by composer names, just like in the Naxos page, and I put the sampler disk An Introduction To Early Music at the beginning.

For those of you who think that mp3 downloads is still necessary, Amazon is now offering Very Best of Naxos Early Music for free.

Made In America: Naxos American Classics On Spotify

Before I go for the annual company trip tomorrow, I want to post the longest playlist I created so far. It consists of all recordings from Naxos' American Classics series available on Spotify, 271 of them in total.

"Our highly-acclaimed American Classics series boasts a unique catalogue of both well-known and rarely recorded masterpieces. This landmark series features the greatest American composers both familiar and unfamiliar: Romantics like Louis Moreau Gottschalk and Edward MacDowell; visionary modernists such as Charles Ives and John Cage; buoyant spirits like Sousa, Joplin, Ferde Grofé; figures at today's cutting edge such as John Adams, Philip Glass, John Corigliano, Paul Moravec, William Bolcom and Michael Torke."

The recordings are arranged by composers alphabetically, the same as Naxos' official page, which also provides back covers, composer biographies, album details, and even librettos of the operas. I put the American Classics Sampler at the beginning and the 2-CD set The Story Of American Classical Music at the end.

Here's the Spotify playlist: Naxos: American Classics (3665 tracks, 1.7 weeks) And here's an interesting discussion on this series: Third Rate Music? Personally I like many American composers' works, and feel that they are vastly underrated and underappreciated. On Youtube there's no Rorem symphony, no Zwilich violin concerto, even no decent performance of Barber's wonderful piano concerto. Thanks to Naxos and Spotify we can explore so many new music at ease.

Best Place To Get Started: Naxos Educational

"Naxos sees it as its mission to promote the appreciation and understanding of classical music and has produced a wide range of educational texts and recordings.
There are the lives and works of the great composers; analyses of the most important works of classical music; introductions to all the most popular operas; A-Z of Classical Music and A-Z of Opera; an introduction to the instruments of the orchestra; and many others." - Naxos.com

The Naxos Educational series offers a very informative and enjoyable listening experience for both the new comers to classical music and veteran concert goers.


Here's the playlist: Naxos Educational: An Index (81 tracks from 81 albums). One track off every album, so that the list won't get too long. You can click the album title in the list to access any of the full album. In the A To Z of  Pianists, You can hear the pianist who had heard Chopin himself play and played with Liszt, the French master Francis Planté who was born in 1839, playing piano, not on a roll! The Classic Explained and Life And Works series by Jeremy Siepmann(official site, his Spotify catalog) are surprisingly charming, you got to hear him sing the opening of the Pastoral Symphony.

Happy listening.