Buriedtreasure

Trumpeter Simon Höfele shares three rarities from his own collection

Bitter Fruit Works by Coperario, King Henry VIII et al

Vivid Consort Freifeld Tontraeger 030

I never usually listen to music older than the Renaissance, and this definitely goes way beyond that; I don’t know the composers well, or in some cases at all. The combination of the three recorder players is so uplifting and completely unexpected. I’m fascinated by the lovely, simple, yet complex sound they make and it’s just like travelling back to a different time.

Kancheli Night Prayers for Soprano, Saxophone and String Orchestra

Jan Garbarek (soprano saxophone); Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra/dennis Russell Davies ECM 449 1982

This piece is not like a concerto for soloist and orchestra, where the soloist goes crazy and the orchestra is just in the background. This is one spherical sound, the soloist being a part of it as much as the orchestra. I think this music is one of a kind; it’s like contemporary film music but has so much depth. Kancheli’s music is always so grounding; you feel small when you hear it – a human being in a big world where there is so much suffering going on. It’s very melancholic and emotional. Christian Jost Dichterliebe

Peter Lodahl (tenor); Horenstein Ensemble/christian Jost DG 483 7046 This is Schumann’s Dichterliebe recomposed. Christian is a fantastic composer and I know this is really dear to his heart – his late wife sings the Schumann on the other disc. He uses a male singer and small orchestra for his version; the music floats between worlds, not really there, not really here. You turn it on and you love it, even if you don’t know anything about it, and then you love it more when you learn the story behind it. Simon Höfele’s album Standards is out now on Berlin Classics