GRAMMY® Award-winning tenor Nicholas Phan’s thoughtful and probing recital program Fellow Citizens delves into stories of immigration and migration through compositional voices ranging from the 19th century to the present day. Nick explains, “The ‘wanderer’ has been a trope at the centre of song repertoire since the advent of the art form fostered by travelling troubadours; through the migrant journeymen protagonists of Schubert, Mahler, and their contemporaries; to today’s itinerant singer-songwriters.”

Fellow Citizens, with Nick’s fellow GRAMMY® Award winner pianist Myra Huang, is bookended by works of composers who migrated during their lifetimes. The album opens with “God Bless America,” Irving Berlin’s musical prayer of thanksgiving to the nation that gave him refuge as a child fleeing pogroms in Russia. In the closing set of songs are by Robert Owens and Florence Price, each of whom followed the path of America’s Great Migration in the twentieth century, whilst Rebecca Clarke’s relocation to the United States was prompted by the Second World War.

Songs by British-American composer Rebecca Clarke and British composer Errollyn Wallen CBE, alongside works by Franz Schubert and Ralph Vaughan Williams, explore the act of traveling from one place to another. Folk-song arrangements by Béla Bartók and Antonín Dvořák — both of whom spent extended periods in America — sit alongside an arrangement of the folk-gospel tune Poor Wayfaring Stranger by Ohio-born composer Steven Mark Kohn. Ruth Crawford Seeger’s striking setting of Chinese-American poet and actor Hsi Tseng Tsiang’s Chinaman, Laundryman, is juxtaposed with Schubert’s expansive setting of Franz von Schober’s poem romanticising the figure of the homeless wanderer as a kind of eternal pilgrim. Mohammed Fairouz’s setting of W. H. Auden’s poem, Refugee Blues, recounts the plight of Jewish refugees during World War II, who found themselves denied entry at nearly every port as they sought to escape the Holocaust.

The title track comes from a song by Chicago-based composer Eric Malmquist, an eloquent setting of Carl Sandburg’s poem of the same name. The world premiere recording of Shawn Okpebholo’s cycle, The Beautiful, responds to Sandburg’s poem, meditating on the question of who are our fellow citizens as Americans, through settings of poems by Margaret Noodin, Carl Sandburg, Claude McKay, and Tsitsi Jaji.

Booklet art features historical images of immigrants passing through Angel and Ellis Island, as well as scenes from the Great Migration. In the year of America250, Fellow Citizens reflects on two enduring narratives in American history: one that asserts America is for Americans and another that celebrates the country as a Nation of Immigrants.

When Christoph Met Christopher

A magical, musical meeting of minds occurred when Swiss cellist Christoph Croisé and Canadian composer Christopher Tyler Nickel first connected. Christopher already had a cello concerto in the works, and in Christoph he found the perfect partner to interpret his composition. Christoph’s passion for new music aligned with his admiration for Christopher’s modern yet clear aesthetic.

The composer elaborates, “One of the joys of working with Christoph was that he understood the emotions [of the concerto] right from the start. He’s such an intuitive player and I knew immediately that he understood what I was after. What more could a composer ask for?”

Christopher is no stranger to the concerto genre, having penned many for winds and brass. But this is his first for a stringed instrument, a challenge he relished and enjoyed – with Christoph’s input – as he explored the variety of colours, timbres and harmonic possibilities of the instrument.

Their collaboration led Christopher to compose two new works for Christoph, for cello and piano. The intimate, seven-movement Reflections on Requiem draws on melodic themes from the composer’s Requiem. The two miniatures Echoes of Tranquility were inspired by a suggestion from Christoph to compose accessible modern music for today’s listening lifestyle. Without any artistic compromise, Christopher delivered what Christoph calls “beautiful little masterpieces”.

GRAMMY® Award winners Apollo’s Fire and founder / director Jeannette Sorrell present a fresh, intimate, and intense interpretation of J. S. Bach’s Mass in B Minor that draws the listener into an exceptionally emotional journey.

Jeannette Sorrell, the pioneering founder and director of baroque orchestra Apollo’s Fire, always has unique vision for her interpretations of the classic repertoire. And so it is with this recording of J. S. Bach’s Mass in B Minor that draws the listener into an equally fresh, intimate and searing emotional journey – from the anguished opening outcry through to moments of joy, pathos, triumph, and ultimately, a vision of peace. Jeannette explains, “While music is always an emotional journey, I feel that Bach’s Mass is an exceptionally cathartic and healing one for our time”. Aiming to emulate the intimacy of Bach’s own performances of the B Minor Mass, which the composer completed in the year prior to his death, Jeannette utilises twenty-four instrumentalists and twenty-two choristers, including the five soloists.

As summed up by Chicago Classical Review, which named Sorrell’s and Apollo’s Fire’s live performance one of the Best 10 Concerts of 2025, “Easily one of the most memorable concerts of recent years … the vocal ensemble was inspired throughout … The instrumental consort was in brilliant form, playing with unimpeachable balance and intonation … and a sensitivity to the dancelike elements of the mass. Presiding over it all was Jeannette Sorrell, who with understated grace led her charges on a moving traversal of Bach’s unsurpassed canvas”.

A proliferation of programmatic music infuses Winter Night, composer Elena Ruehr’s seventh release on AVIE, the result of a particularly close collaboration with the international members of the Boston Trio – violinist Irina Muresanu and cellist Mihai Marica, both Romanians, and Korean pianist Heng-Jin Park –who are joined by native New Yorker violist Marcus Thompson in Elena’s piano quartet.

Emotions, energy and the natural world abound in the world premiere recordings of the album’s four works. The title track, Elena’s Piano Trio No. 3, is a four-movement narrative that is by turns lyrical, graceful and melodic. The joyful Piano Trio No. 4, subtitled “Ski, Kayak, Bike”, recalls childhood sports enjoyed with her father, the work’s dedicatee. The three movements of Piano Trio No. 5, “Troubled Times”, confront emotional responses to challenging personal circumstances, yet also seem especially appropriate now given the state of the world’s current events. Piano Quartet No. 2, “Maple”, is an homage to an ancient tree that has stood the tests of time, much like the Stradivarius instruments that were made using the beautiful, dense wood. Elena’s music appropriately references composers working at the same time as the famed luthier, Bach, Pachelbel and Vivaldi.

I first heard The Boston Trio almost 30 years ago at a concert in Jordan Hall in Boston.  I was deeply impressed by their musicianship and wanted to write a work for them.  Over the years I became close friends with both the pianist, Heng-Jin Park, and violinist, Irina Muresanu.  I went to many of their concerts and composed a number of works for them, including one concerto each and a lot of chamber music.  But I always wanted to write a trio specifically for The Boston Trio and to work with them on a recording.  This disc represents a compilation of works and the realization of a dream. It features Irina Muresanu, Heng-Jin Park, Mihai Marica and guest violist Marcus Thompson on the piano quartet.

“…a wonderful new work by Lindberg, who shows that it is possible to wed lyricism and virtuosic display with bracingly fresh sounds and musical ideas of substance.” – Boston Globe

“…a mesmerising landscape of icicle sharp glissandi and shimmering crushed glass punctuated by reverberant woodwind chorales… A masterpiece for our times.” – The Scotsman

Sebastian Bohren’s magisterial interpretation of Magnus Lindberg’s First Violin Concerto – available exclusively as a digital EP – sets a new benchmark for “a masterpiece for our times” (The Scotsman).

Swiss violinist Sebastian Bohren leans into Magnus Lindberg’s First Violin Concerto, proving to be a passionate advocate for the Finnish composer’s singular synthesis of luminous colour, harmonic depth, and rhythmic complexity. Available exclusively as a digital EP, Bohren – who is backed by Sergej Bolkhovets conducting the Swedish Chamber Orchestra – sets a new benchmark for Lindberg’s “standout work” (Gramophone) that The Scotsman has called “a masterpiece for our times”.