Charles Ives's idiom is in Hilary Hahn's American blood - which her fierce and fitting playing shows. Her partnership with pianist Valentina Lisitsa models what two singular artists can accomplish in the interests of a common cause. Quirky, peculiar, rich with Charles Ives's idiosyncratic notion of melody, peppered with dissonance yet also logical - Ives's works for violin and piano turn familiar musical expressions upside down. They are an alternate universe of aesthetic pleasure.

"A pure voice that flows as easily as burnished notes from a muted trumpet, impeccable musicianship, pellucid phrasing, the ability to swing an up-tune and infuse a ballad with simmering passion." -- Huffington Post "Polished and pure." -- Rex Reed, New York Observer "This listener can't recall in years so smashing a solo CD debut as this winner ... Kole inhabits each [song] with a thoroughness and emotional authenticity that belies her young years." -- All About Jazz "She communicated with warmth and intimacy. Completely involved in her rich expressiveness, she pulled her listeners into the experience with her. Songs such as Wilder's too-rarely heard `Blackberry Winter' and Irving Berlin's touching `What'll I Do?' emerged as definitive examples of the rich poetry in American song." -- Los Angeles Times

* Thirteen newly-recorded tracks; over an hour of music. * It's refreshing to hear a great voice accompanied only by the elegant sounds of the world's greatest jazz pianists. * Includes "It's Always You," a vocal duet with Freddy Cole.

The two-time Grammy winning violinist releases the world-premiere recording of Jennifer Higdon's 2010 Pulitzer Prize winning concerto, paired with the popular Tchaikovsky concerto.

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Though at first glance these two concertos seem an odd coupling, Hilary Hahn offers convincing reasons for pairing them in her scholarly but rather chatty program notes. For the listener, the most important one is her avowed love and affinity for the music, which speak through every note of her performance. At 22, Hahn has developed from an arresting teenage prodigy into a formidable violinist. Her technique is equal to all challenges and so effortless that one forgets about it. Her tone has the directness and intensity of a laser beam and the unblemished purity of fine-spun crystal. This carries over into her style: clear and straightforward, without fuss, external effects, or exaggeration--there is hardly a slide on the whole record. If her playing is rather cool, it's also noble and emotionally so genuine that she can make a popular warhorse like the Mendelssohn sound fresh and new. She takes few rhythmic liberties, but freely changes tempo for mood and expression: the second theme of the first movement is much slower than the rest. The Shostakovich, too, sounds new and different. A repertory staple of all great Russian violinists, it is usually played with a lush tone and unbridled emotionality. Hahn captures the work's bleak, lamentatious despair, the obsessiveness and sardonic irony, but her playing has the sort of fire that burns ice-blue rather than red-hot. It projects a sense of restraint, of pent-up tension and excitement that finally burst out in the cadenza. It is a riveting performance. The orchestra is very good, but often too loud in the Mendelssohn. --Edith Eisler

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