The German soprano, Meike Leluschko, received clarinet, piano and organ lessons from an early age. She studied singing privately with Edeltraud Blanke and at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold with Professor Gerhild Romberger and Professor Heiner Eckels. She completed her singing studies in 2006 with a graduate recital. Among her most important teachers was also Caroline Stein. Master-classes and studies with, among others, Ute Trekel-Burkhardt, Ralf Popken, Ingrid Figur, Christoph Prégardien and András Schiff proved to be particularly inspiring. She won a prize at the Federal Competition Berlin in 2002 and First Prize of the NRW German Musicians Association. She won scholarship of the Werner Richard - Dr. Carl Dörken Foundation (2007), the Mozart Society and the Bertelsmann Foundation "New Voices" for a master-class (2007).

Russian composers have made a significant contribution to the repertoire of music for cello and orchestra. Tchaikovskys Variations on a Rococo Theme, deftly scored for an 18th-century orchestra, reveals his admiration for Mozart whereas the Pezzo capriccioso is full of ripe charm. In the year of Tchaikovskys death, Rimsky-Korsakov composed the attractive Serenade, Op. 37 and his student, Glazunov, both absorbed and continued the great Romantic lineage with his own sonorous and beautiful Concerto ballata, the poignant Chant du ménestrel, and the Iberian evocations of the Sérénade espagnole from Deux Morceaux.

Liszt’s Études d’exécution transcendante enshrine the spirit of High Romanticism, embodying extremes of expressive drama and technical virtuosity. His encyclopedic approach to technique is shown at its most dazzling in this cycle, heard here in the 1852 revision which Liszt himself declared ‘the only authentic one’. Integration of musical and technical elements is absolute, and the music’s narratives are supported by dramatic physicality, an orchestral richness of sonority, and an exceptional colouristic quality.

Schubert’s eight “spontaneous inventions” from 1827 are character pieces that are among the best known and most popular works for piano. Full of rich lyricism, they are much more than trifles or whims, as the title suggests.

William Byrd’s oeuvre stands out above all by virtue of the diversity of its genres and structural principles. This is clear particularly in his exceptional keyboard music. The influence Byrd exerted on the continental development of clavier music is also remarkable. With Hornpipe, this program of keyboard works from Friederike Chylek finally ends, the key element of which is William Byrd’s oeuvre. From Byrd to Byrd! Friederike Chylek was born in Starnberg near Munich. She studied harpsichord at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel.

“Ozawa may be entering a glorious Indian summer of creativity” Gramophone

"They Call Me Mud", the album from singer Mud Morganfield, son of the legendary blues icon, Muddy Waters. Produced by Mud Morganfield and Rick Kreher (who also plays guitar on the CD and was a guitarist in the Muddy Waters band), They Call Me Mud was recorded at Joyride Studios in in Mud’s Chicago hometown. Mud penned 10 of the album’s 12 songs, with two others coming from his illustrious father’s catalog, “Howling Wolf” and “Can’t Get No Grinding.”