The Grammy Awards Nominees for Classical Music

The Grammy Awards organizers have now announced the nominees for the gala which will be held on February 12^th, 2012. There are, as one might already know, several categories for the Classical Music Grammys. Conductors: Andrew Davis, Gustavo Dudamel, Nicholas McGegan, Marek Janowski and Jiri Belohlavek are nominatedfor Best Orchestral Performance.

The Best Opera Recording award winner is to be decided between modern opera recordings - Doctor Atomic by John Adams, Billy Rudd by Benjamin Britten and Kaivos by Einojuhanni Rautavaara, the baroque opera Ercole Su'l Termodonte by Antonio Vivaldi and the well-known La Traviata by Verdi starring Renee Fleming.

For Best Classical Instrumental Solo the nominees are flutist Michala Petri for the CD - East meets West: Chinese Recorder Concertos, pianist Yuja Wang for the album which included works by Sergei Rachmaninoff, pianist Leif Ove Andsnes also for interpreting pieces by Rachmaninoff, percussionist Christopher Lamb for his interpretation of the Joseph Schwantner Concerto For Percussion and Orchestra and pianist Ursula Oppens for interpreting pieces by John Corigliano.

Joyce di Donato, Marianne Beate Kielland, Nathalie Dessay and Andreas Scholl are up against each other for the Best Classical Vocal Solo award, while Robert Aldridge, George Crumb, Jefferson Friedman, Steven Mackey and Paul Ruders are nominated for Best Contemporary Classical Composition.

British Composers Awards

The British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors (BASCA) presented the 2011 British Composers Awards last week. The event is at its 9^th edition and this year the BASCA received almost 300 submissions of works premiered between April 1^st, 2010 and March 31^st, 2011. Julian Anderson was the star of the evening, scooping two prizes for the Orchestral and Liturgical categories for his works Fantasias and Bell Mass. Amongst the well-known names were Anthony Payne, who won in the Chamber category for his String Quartet No 2, William Sweeney, whose Sonata for Cello and Piano triumphed in the Instrumental Solo or Duo category and Graham Fitkin, taking the new Outreach award for his vocal and orchestral work PK, commissioned for the 2010 BBC Proms.

Also honoured were Lucy Pankhurst in the Wind or Brass Band category for In Pitch Black, Huw Watkins in the Vocal category for Five Larkin Songs - lyrics by Philip Larkin, Orlando Gough in the Stage Works category for A Ring A Lamp A Thing, and John Barber who received the Community or Educational Project award for Consider the Lilies.

Sarah Rodgers, Chairman of BASCA and Chair of the British Composer Awards, said: "The British Composer Awards juries are consistently looking for contemporary classical music which shows flair, originality and power of communication. The outcome of their deliberations is never predictable and this year's results give accolades to a wonderfully wide sweep of British and international talent."

I Fagiolini - 25^th anniversary

An unique force in the world of music, bringing forth a style filled with energy and enthusiasm. This is how one could describe the I Fagiolini, a British solo-voice ensemble specialising in Renaissance and contemporary music, who are celebrating their 25^th anniversary this year. I Fagiolini was founded in 1986 at Oxford University and has since released seventeen albums and two DVDs. The band gives about 50 concerts a year from the BBC Proms and major European festivals, to further afield such as the United States, Far East and Africa. Over the last 25 years, I Fagiolini have delighted audiences with their particular brand of serious music-making, humour, and innovative stagings.

To celebrate their quarter-century, they brought together Renaissance masterworks such as Monteverdi's peerless lament Incenerite spoglie, a new staging of Clement Janequin's Bird Song story and Benjamin Britten's 8 Sacred and Profane Medieval Lyrics. The anniversary concert will be held in London at the Shorenditch Church. It is called I don't mean a thing and is part of the Spitalfields Winter Festival. I Fagiolini is the only early music ensable ever to be awarded the Royal Philarmonic Society's Ensable Prize. Their latest album has also received the Gramophone and Diapason awards for Early Music. I Fagiolini's concerts are presented by director Robert Hollingworth, who also writes and presents programmes for BBC Radio 3.