Description

ATMA Classique is pleased to present Richard Strauss / Arvo Pärt — the label’s first recording project with I Musici de Montréal and the ensemble’s first album in ten years. Richard Strauss / Arvo Pärt is also the first album under the direction of Jean-Marie Zeitouni, who was the ensemble’s Artistic Director until June 2021.

Composed in response to the devastation of World War II, Strauss’s Metamorphosen is a major study for 23 soloists and features each of the orchestra’s instrumentalists. The piece is paired with Arvo Pärt’s “Los Angeles” Symphony No. 4, a work the composer described as “a bow to the great power of the human spirit and human dignity.”

Recorded several months apart thanks to lockdown restrictions triggered by the global pandemic, the two works on this album assume special resonance: they succeed in touching listeners deeply with their homages to beauty and their timeless messages of hope.