Music for a While: Baroque Melodies Anne Sofie von Otter (DG Archiv)

This delightful collection sees Anne Sofie von Otter juxtaposing the high drama of the Italian Baroque with the cooler homegrown style of England's Dowland and Purcell. Von Otter, superb throughout, is obviously at ease with the latter, and at her most flamboyant in the astonishing swoops and swoons of Benedetto Ferrari's "Amanti io vi so dire". HHHHH

Coleridge-Taylor/Somervell: Violin Concertos BBC Scottish SO, Marwood, Brabbins (Hyperion)

The son of a black African doctor and a white Englishwoman, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was an outsider in the Edwardian world. But, as his Hiawatha and engaging Violin Concerto prove, he was very much part of the English musical tradition. This is a coupled with another rarity, the 1930 Violin Concerto by Sir Arthur Somervell. HHHH