New Warner Classics are scarce these days, but when there is one, it's usually something to crow about! That's certainly true of this outstanding release. It has three little known gems by Hungarian composer Erno Dohnanyi (1877-1960), whom you probably know from his very popular Variations on a Nursery Song.

The first selection on this disc, his Spanish influenced suite for orcherstra, is an absolute delight. It's beautifully orchestrated and full of wonderful melodies that will keep you returning to it again and again.

As far as incorporating folk material into serious symphonic music is concerned, you'll find that the next offering, Ruralia Hungarica, is one of the most successful examples of it. When you hear it you'll have to agree that Dohnanyi was certainly right up there with Bela Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly when it came to weaving Hungarian folk ditties into his scores.

The final selection, American Rhapsody was written while the composer was a music professor at Florida State University. He utilizes U.S. folk tunes here in much the same way as he did Magyar in the preceding work.

The performances are electric and the recorded sound is terrific. It'll blow the sox off of all you audiophiles! (Y060715)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)

When you hear this endearing zarzuela you'll wonder where it's been all these years! Jesus Guridi (1886-1961) really outdid himself with this stage work, which is about life and love in an imaginary Basque village.

Based on catchy folk melodies and dance rhythms, there's never an insipid instant in this rustic tale, which is brimful of lilting arias and colorful choruses. The orchestral accompaniment is brilliantly scored and most would probably agree that the prelude to the second act is a symphonic mini-masterpiece. The beautifully crafted finales for each of its three acts are very affecting and guaranteed to move even the most jaded of listeners.

Committed performances and good sound assure this release a special place in the hearts of all light opera enthusiasts. (P060714)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)

Karol Jozef Lipinski (1790-1861) was known as the "Polish Paganini," and in places his four violin concertos (the others are on CPO-999787) do resemble those of the great Italian fiddler. However, there's a substance and sincerity of purpose here that's rarely found in Niccolo's more flamboyant, self-serving fare.

Lipinski's first concerto is very appealing with occasional Slavic and even operatic like passages.

The Polish Rondo for violin and orchestra is a tasty pastry where the interplay between soloist and tutti is very delicately handled.

The Bravura Variations on a Military Romance, also for violin and orchestra, is most imaginative. Here Lipinski uses a martial sounding theme to conjoin several highly individual recitative-like passages for the soloist.

The performances and sound are impeccable. (P060713)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)

While Czech composers Leos Janacek and Bohuslav Martinu were busy turning out works heavily influenced by the folk music of their native country, their compatriot Erwin Schulhoff (1894-1942) was writing a "mystery ballet," as he called it, based on Central American Indian dances. It took him three years (1922-1925) to compose Ogelala, which must certainly rank as one of his masterpieces. It's a brilliantly scored barbaric stage work in the Expressionist tradition with nods to Igor Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. And like that, it had a contentious premiere. As far as modern Czech music is concerned, you'll find it's in a class by itself.

The orchestral suite included here also has balletic connotations when you consider that it consists of six provocative dances. They recall Martinu's jazz inspired works and are very much in keeping with what you would have heard in European dance halls in the 1920s.

The concert concludes with Schulhoff's second symphony, which has a neoclassical simplicity and lucidity that make it most appealing. Like the suite, jazz influences are again rife, particularly in the scherzo, while the specters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven haunt the last movement.

The performances are superb and the sound will challenge even the best of high-end audio systems, particularly when the percussion section erupts in Ogelala. (Y060712)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)

Following their first highly acclaimed Foulds release (Warner Classics 61525), Warner now gives us an even better one.

The Dynamic Triptych is an absolutely spectacular piano concerto and features a number of musical innovations. These include a seven-note, Indian, raga scale as well as occasional quarter-tones played by the strings, which sound like some mischievous child just pulled the plug on your turntable.

April-England is a folk-oriented, pastoral offering that would have turned Percy Country-Gardens Grainger green with envy.

Music-Pictures Group III is a suite of four delicately scored, tiny tone poems in the spirit of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition.

The program concludes with two really haunting occasional pieces, The Song of Ram Dass and a lament that's from Fould's Keltic Suite.

The performances and sound are first-rate with pianist Peter Donohoe in fine form for the first selection. (P060711)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)

Now here's some late romantic music that will appeal to all Francophiles. It's by the lesser known, but truly great French composer Gabriel Pierne (1863-1937).

Music Hall Impressions is a boisterous, in-your-face, Moulin Rouge frolic with Iberian associations. Jacques Offenbach, eat your heart out!

The lovely Basque Fantasy, which highlights the violin, is based on folk songs and music from that area of the Pyrenees Mountains lying between France and Spain.

Izeyl is a an oriental sounding suite drawn from incidental music Pierne wrote for an 1894 play of the same name that takes place in India. It must rank as one of the composer's most gorgeous creations, and by itself justifies getting this release.

The disc concludes with a divertissement that's actually a theme and variations. It begins with a simple pastoral melody that Pierne subjects to some of the most creative transformations you could ever hope to hear. In one of these, those who know his wonderful ballet Cydalise et la Chevre-Pied will detect allusions to that old Goat-Foot.

The performances are excellent and the sound is spectacular making this a must for romantic music lovers as well as audiophiles. (Y060710)

-- Bob McQuiston, Classical Lost and Found (CLOFO.com)