Classical Canada

Welcome to our celebration of Canadian classical talent, featuring — at the top of the list — the sublime and eccentric piano of Bach specialist Glenn Gould: The Goldberg Variations of 1955 was his first major recording, but here we draw on the more introspective 1981 version. B.C.-born tenor Ben Heppner wraps his mighty lungs around "Nessun Dorma" from Puccini's Turandot, while the great Igor Stravinsky heads up the CBC Symphony Orchestra on Symphony of Psalms. We roll out the brass, as you progress to Next Steps.

The Canadian Brass — founded in 1970 — has been widely credited for raising the global profile of brass music: here the celebrated quintet takes on J.S. Bach's "Fugue in G Minor, BWV 578" (a.k.a. "The Little Fugue") originally intended for organ but specially arranged to suit the demands of tuba, trombone, horn and trumpet. And there's more adapted Bach, in the form of Liona Boyd's sublime guitar rendering of "Air ('On a G String')," first written for piano and violin. The modernist compositions of Barbara Pentland feature among our Deep Cuts.

Up to this point we've been focussing on great classical performance talent with a strong Canadian connection — whether its the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra doing Gershwin or Québecois conductor Bernard Labadie taking charge of Handel's Water Music. But here we also salute compositional genius, with several outstanding pieces by avant-garde genius Barbara Pentland drawn from the Symphony for Ten Parts and Disasters of the Sun.

Some of the greatest pieces of classical music, rendered by Canada's finest conductors and musicians — that's what these Essentials are all about, as we offer up a collection of varied delights that takes you from Schumann (as interpreted by master-pianist Anton Kuerti) to Shostakovich (via the St. Lawrence String Quartet); from the cultured violin of Lara St. John (in Bach Sonata territory) to the grandeur of the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra (performing Mozart's famous Singspiel, The Magic Flute). Whatever your classical fancy, we're sure you'll find it here, bearing the Canadian seal of quality and approval.