Study Music Deluxe

Consolations No. 3 in D Flat Major, S. 172

The 50 Most Romantic Piano Pieces

3 Songs, Op. 7: No. 1, Après un rêve

Waltz in a Minor, Op. 34 No. 2 (Choir Rendition)

Cellist Péter Somodari and pianist Nicolas Costantinou present Hedra, an album that takes the listener through key repertoire for cello and piano, from sonatas by Beethoven and Debussy and individual pieces by Fauré to a world-premiere recording of the Cello Sonata No. 1 by contemporary Greek Cypriot composer Contantinou Y. Stylianou. 

The word ‘hedra’ (Greek: ἕδρα) refers to any side or face of a three-dimensional geometric shape. Any given face is not only connected to its neighbours, but together they contribute to and are part of the final shape. Similarly, every musical masterpiece is interconnected with those that follow, as it inevitably contributed to their formation, and this is reflected in the relationship between the works gathered together on this release. Beethoven pioneered the modern cello sonata, and from first to last his five cello sonatas chart a huge development in the genre. The Fourth, as recorded on this album, spans dark chromaticism, improvisatory freedom and extrovert exuberance in a manner that paved the way for later composers. 

Fauré’s amiable Sicilienne was composed as part of the incidental music for Molière's play, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, while his Élégie was originally conceived as the slow movement of an abandoned cello sonata. The Élégie was described by composer Patrick Castillo as honouring “grief as a multifaceted thing”, relating it to this album’s theme. Written late in his life while he struggled with illness and the impact of the First World War, Debussy’s Cello Sonata is founded on principles inherited from Beethoven and his contemporaries; Debussy said that his sonatas were composed “in the old supple forms (without the bombast of modern sonatas)”, and that the Cello Sonata is “almost Classical in the best sense of the word”.  

Stylianou’s Sonata for Cello and Piano in C major is a further continuation of the question of the sonata form and whether it is still relevant today. The work was composed during spring 2020 and in the words of the composer: “I decided to channel all the fear and frustration of the pandemic in creating a work that deals with those aforementioned questions but in a personal way. It would be impossible to avoid feelings of that period seeping into the work, but at the same time, I wanted it to be a creation in pursuit of inner balance, which is after all what the sonata form is meant to be. Whatever the opposition of two musical ideas (or more) might be, in the end, it must find a resolution of some sort.”

Péter Somodari and Nicolas Costantinou have been performing together since their student days. Currently serving as the principal cellist of both the Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Péter Somodari has collaborated with such artists as Leonidas Kavakos, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Alexei Lubimov, Truls Mørk, Miklós Perényi, Boris Pergamenschikow, Christian Tetzlaff, Tabea Zimmermann, composer György Kurtág, and the Toyota Orchestra. He is currently a visiting professor at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna

A regular collaborator with Odradek Records, Steinway Artist Nicolas Costantinou has a doctorate from the Royal College of Music in London and is renowned for impressing audiences with his daring selection of repertoire old and new. Costantinou has previously recorded the music of Constantinos Y. Stylianou on the Odradek releases Metavasis and Past Forward. Stylianou studied and now lives in London, and his music has been performed by the Philharmonia, Bruckner Symphony Orchestra, Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra, Jeunesses Musicales World Orchestra and the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, in prestigious venues such as Wigmore Hall in London, the King’s Theatre in Edinburgh, St David's Hall in Cardiff, Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, ORF concert hall in Vienna, Megaron Concert Hall in Athens, the UNESCO Headquarters and the Cathédrale Saint-Louis des Invalides in Paris.

Gabriel Faure - Sicilienne, Op. 78

Kneeling Before Giants

Air from Suite No. 3 (Johann Sebastian Bach)

Classical Spa Music

Dolly Suite, Op. 56: I. Berceuse (Transcr. for Piano by Alfred Cortot)

Thirteen miniature journeys, each a complete world in ninety seconds.

In this new album, Samuel Hamish Gray continues his exploration of spontaneous composition — music created entirely in the moment, unpremeditated yet intricately formed. Each piece was conceived, performed, and completed in a single take, bound only by one strict parameter: a duration of exactly one minute and thirty seconds.

Within that constraint lies astonishing freedom. The result is thirteen concise piano works — cinematic, lyrical, sometimes fragile, sometimes dramatic — each a distilled emotional narrative. Gray’s playing moves from shimmering introspection to bold, cinematic resonance, his improvisations sculpted by instinct and refined by long experience in both classical and jazz idioms.

Listeners familiar with his Sirius Suite (2025), a meditation on loss and love, will recognize the same immediacy and tenderness, but here the focus is on compression: each piece a single breath, a fleeting vision, a self-contained journey.

Gray is known for his fully spontaneous solo piano performances in Norway, New Zealand, and beyond, and for his forthcoming long-form work Norgesvenn (2026), recorded as one continuous arc. These new miniatures reveal another side of his artistry — concise, pure, and perfectly balanced between composition and improvisation.

Perfect for reflective playlists, film and documentary use, or simply quiet listening, each piece can stand alone, loop seamlessly, or fade into thought — small universes of sound, carved from silence.

Untitled V

Fight Song - Rachel Platten (Piano Arrangement)

kid cudi-  Erase Me (piano cover)

The Gift of Soothing Piano

Johann Sebastian Bach – Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1 - Prelude No. 1 in C Major, BWV 846

Purejunk’s reworking of Saint-Saëns’ Le Carnaval des Animaux – Aquarium (Mouvement No. 7). A wicked fused-up electro version of this classical masterpiece by Saint-Saëns from the 1880s. The single is a taster of the Purejunk “Class Acts” album full of classical mashups which will be released in September 2015. 

SPOTIFY: https://sptfy.com/a0nc
BANDCAMP: purejunkmusic.bandcamp.com/album/class-acts

Purejunk vs. Camille Saint-Saens: Le Carnaval Des Animaux - Mouvement No. 7 - Aquarium

soundcloud:tracks:2212017911

3 Songs, Op. 7: No. 1, Après un rêve

Katya Kramer-Lapin

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