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Mark Swed's best classical moments of 2014

Baroque bad boys: Two of the most radical Baroque composers had anniversaries little noticed in our neighborhood. The record companies, however, were on the case. The most startling among many fine new Rameau releases was conductor Teodor Currentzis» «The Sound of Light,» showing Rameau as a composer of indescribable pleasures. Clavichordist Jocelyne Cuiller devised a C.P.E. Bach disc with various French friends that features such surprises as queasy settings of Hamlet’s «To be or not to be» and of Socrates» hemlock-intoxicated final soliloquy. Some the strangest Shakespeare and Plato settings ever are joined by equally astonishing keyboard and flute sonatas.

Mark Swed | Los Angeles Times

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