A star is born with Chris Craker

Chris Craker is jumping right into the swing of things at Sony BMG Masterworks. As the recently appointed GM/senior VP of the label’s new international division, he has signed 28-year-old violinist Lisa Batiashvili, who is quickly emerging as one of the most vibrant talents of her generation.

The Munich-based Batiashvili was born and primarily raised in the formerly Soviet nation of Georgia, a struggling country that became embroiled in a bloody civil war during her adolescence. She first came to international attention when she was just 16, after winning second prize in the highly prestigious International Jean Sibelius Violin Competition, which is held in Helsinki every five years. (Batiashvili was the youngest prizewinner in the event’s history.) Since then, she has been invited around the world to perform with such orchestras as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Batiashvili’s first recording for Sony BMG Masterworks is slated for release in September on the Sony Classical imprint. Accompanying the violinist on the record is the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sakari Oromo. The album includes one piece of very standard repertoire — the Sibelius Violin Concerto — and one new work, 49-year-old Finnish composer Magnus Lindberg’s Violin Concerto.

Batiashvili has a special connection to Lindberg’s concerto: She gave this technically grueling work its world premiere last summer at Lincoln Center’s Mostly MozartViolin Concerto festival, in an exhilarating performance conducted by Louis Langree.

Following this first Sony BMG album’s precedent of mixing the tried and true with new music, the label reports that Batiashvili’s future recording projects will include the Beethoven Violin Concerto and a new piece written by fellow Georgian Giya Kancheli.

Batiashvili’s debut recording was made in 2001 for EMI’s Debut series (which highlights notable musicians just beginning on their professional path) and included Brahms’ Violin Sonata No. 1 in G Major, Op. 78; the Bach Solo Partita No. 1 in B minor, BWV 1002; and Schubert’s "Rondo Brilliant" in B minor, D. 895.

Opera’S New Reigning Impresario?

Is Simon Cowell becoming the most important recording producer today on the combined classical charts? He’s certainly a real contender in the "popera" arena; no one can deny Il Divo’s enduring sales power and mass popularity.

But after the finale aired earlier this month of the United Kingdom’s hugely popular show Britain’s Got Talent (another Cowell-created entity), it looks as though Cowell has another gargantuan crossover opportunity on his hands: an unlikely first-place win by a 36-year-old Welsh cellphone salesman named Paul Potts singing "Nessun Dorma" from Puccini’s opera Turandot (along with the song "Con Te Partiro," popularized by another "popera" icon, Andrea Bocelli). Following his TV success, Cowell has signed Potts to a $2-million worldwide recording contract.

It remains to be seen whether Potts’ everyday-guy-makes-good story will generate a fan base to quite the same extent that the ready-made Il Divo has, but Cinderella stories of once-obscure amateurs zooming to international superstardom have certainly worked for American Idol and Pop Idol. And Potts’ triumph proves that operatic repertoire staples like "Nessun Dorma" still move a mass TV audience. — Nielsen Entertainment News Wire


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A star is born with Chris Craker