• Happy birthday Bedřich Smetana! This weekend sees the launch of 2024’s Year of Czech Music, established 100 years ago to mark the composer’s centenary and held every 10 years since. For his bicentenary, the Czech Philharmonic has released a stirring recording of Smetana’s masterpiece, Má vlast (My Homeland), conducted by its chief conductor and music director, Semyon Bychkov (Pentatone). Describing the work as a symbol of Czech independence, “like a national anthem or the holy Bible”, Bychkov urges every detail, every surge, swell or sea of tears, from his players.
Luscious harp arpeggios set the tone in the first of six sections. The famous standalone movement, Vltava (The Moldau), is a swirling vision of the river’s journey from distant forest to Prague and beyond. For 40 near-empty bars, two flutes weave, trickle and swirl, until the dam breaks and inundations of melody cascade forth across the orchestra. The dark story of Šárka, Bohemia’s woods and fields, a strong-willed warrior, Tábor, and the victorious finale, Blaník, complete this work, superbly played with matchless understanding and character.
• “Telepathic communication” is how the German countertenor Andreas Scholl expresses the kinship between himself and the baroque ensemble Accademia Bizantina, after two decades of collaboration. Their Invocazioni Mariane (Naïve), directed by violinist Alessandro Tampieri, explores the figure of the Virgin Mary through Neapolitan works from the 18th century (Salve Regina by Pasquale Anfossi, Leonardo Vinci’s oratorio Maria dolorata and instrumental works by Nicola Porpora and Giovanni Battista Pergolesi). The highlight is a work long associated with Scholl, Vivaldi’s restlessly melancholic Stabat Mater. The spiky strings in the Eia Mater, fons amoris, the quicker speeds and subtly different quality of Scholl’s mature voice make this as worthwhile as his original recording of 1995 with Ensemble 415 on Harmonia Mundi. If anything, the urgency here heightens the mood of suffering.
• The Early Music Show, presented by Lucie Skeaping, with guest Clare Norburn, director of the group the Telling, discuss Hildegard of Bingen, Beatritz de Dia and other early composers as part of International Women’s Day. Radio 3, today, 2pm/BBC Sounds.
