It's too late now to order a classical music CD or DVD for Christmas, but why not take the New Year as a cue to freshen up your musical tastes?
Here are some recent releases guaranteed to broaden your horizons, care of Reuters' European arts and lifestyle editor Michael Roddy:
I. So you think nobody needs to hear another recording of Ravel's Pavane pour une infante defunte (Pavane for a Dead Princess)? Think again. Orchestre de Chambre de Paris, with violinist Thomas Zehetmair playing and conducting (Naive V5345), takes you into the music in such microscopic detail that you feel you're almost inside the instruments. The glorious playing and luminous sound extend to Ravel's equally overplayed Le Tombeau de Couperin (Couperin's Tomb) which sounds as fresh as when it was first performed. Another marvel is the harp playing of Emmanuel Ceysson on Debussy's Danses Sacrée et Profane, plus soloist Zehetmair giving his all in Ravel's Tzigane--inspired by Romanian and Hungarian gypsy music heard in Paris during the composer's lifetime.
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