Enjoy new music with our classical music chart for this week. Our weekly selections are based on sales numbers and simply what albums we love and think you NEED to hear.
For the complete top 20, tune into Classical Chartz with the New Classical FM’s Mark Wigmore every Saturday from 3-5 p.m. Find the full Top 20 list here.
The Toronto Symphony Orchestra’s meteoric climb up the Classical Chartz continues, and it takes over the No. 1 position this week with The Miraculous Mandarin. They displace the Bridgerton Season 4 Soundtrack, which falls to No. 2.
Christopher Tin’s Turandot: Christopher Tin Finale rises up from No. 5 to take over the No. 3 spot, and Hauser’s The Swan marches up from No. 7 to No. 4.
With a lot of shuffling up and down in between, the lone newcomer to the Classical Chartz Top Ten this week is Olivia Belli’s new release Daimon. The album sits at the No. 10 position after making the leap from No. 16 last week.
Pianist and composer Olivia Belli is based in the Marche region in central Italy. As a pianist, she trained at local conservatories, and earned a Master’s degree in piano summa cum laude from the Giovanni Battista Pergolesi University in Fermo. She also attended masterclasses with artists such as Alexander Lonquich, Boris Petrusansky, Lazar Berman, Jörg Demus, and Andrzej Jasinski.
Along the way, she realized she has a special affinity for 20th and 21st century music, including composers such as Ligeti and Stockhausen, Cage, Reich, and Glass.
She also began composing her own music while still a student, but up until fairly recently, described it as a “private thing” rather than work for public consumption. Nonetheless, she also trained in composition alongside with her piano studies.
In a statement for XXIM Records, she says, “I feel like, as an artist, most of what I do is to observe — the nature around us, how it changes and how the people interact with it. I spend as much time outside as I can. I try to capture the metamorphosis of nature in my music, and how the experience of living in this environment makes me feel.”
As a pianist, she toured Italy, Spain, and the US, and released a series of albums by contemporary composers such as Philip Glass and Max Richter.
She released her first album of original music in 2020, titled Mater, with husband and collaborator Enrico Belli. The music for ensemble was released to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, and the profits were donated to a charity, Global Wildlife Conservation.
Daimon, her latest release, is inspired by the stories of Homer’s Odyssey. Daimon means “calling” in Greek, and she’s referring to Odysseus’ determination to return home from the Trojan War, no matter how many obstacles he had to face along the way.
As she writes in the album notes, “It was Odysseus’ fate to return to his homeland Ithaca,” says Olivia Belli. “That’s where his wife and son were — everything that defined him.”
Life is a journey, whether we’re talking about ancient Greek or modern times.
The album is recorded with a string orchestra, and the musical style is also inspired by Italian Baroque music.
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