News
April 2022
We released our fourth CD – a double album of Schubert lieder by bass-baritone Jeremy Leaman and pianist Beate Toyka.
December 2021
We travelled to Blackburn to record (and photograph) the cathedral’s J W Walker / Wood organ for a new multi-channel Hauptwerk sample set that will be released by Llannerch Organs later in 2022. Please visit their website for more information.
September 2021
We’re delighted that the FS Records catalogue is shortly to be available in record shops worldwide thanks to a new partnership with Willowhayne Records. A Ceremony of Psalms (FSR191) and November Journeys (FSR201) will both receive physical distribution via the Naxos network, and all FS Records releases will still be available on all good digital platforms, including Apple Music, Spotify etc, beginning on 19th November. Titles will be unavailable to stream temporarily whilst the switch-over takes place.
July 2021
We were delighted to be asked to record two live concerts for the Nottingham Chamber Music Festival on 15 and 18 July in the beautiful surrounding of St Mary’s Church in the city centre’s Lace Market district. More details available at nottchamberfest.com
June 2021
We signed a distribution deal that will make all of our catalogue more widely available both in record shops and online. More details will be available soon.
May 2021
We visited the Aladdin’s cave that is Turner Violins in Beeston for a video shoot, the first of what we hope will be several collaborations with Nottingham Chamber Music Festival. Husband and wife team 2 to Link performed a two-movement work by Sterkel for an online film that will première on 13 July as part of the 2021 festival programme.
April 2021
We were delighted to be back on location at Trent College recording the first in a two-disc set of Schubert’s lieder with bass-baritone Jeremy Leaman and pianist Beate Toyka. Sessions for Winterreise took place in the school’s beautifully-appointed chapel. Stay tuned for more details of this double album, which we hope to release on disc and online as a FLAC download later this year.
March 2021
We undertook our first long-form video recording project, producing a film of Reinhard Keiser’s Markuspassion at St Mary’s in the Lace Market, for release on the church’s YouTube channel. The work was performed by the 18th Century Sinfonia and St Mary’s Consort. The complete performance is available to view here.
On the last day of the month, we undertook our first live-stream video recital. Bass-baritone Jeremy Leaman and pianist Beate Toyka performed Schubert’s Winterreise in aid of the Child Poverty Action Group. More information (including the video) can be found here.
February 2021
We began a collaborative project with St Mary’s in the Lace Market producing a series of online organ recitals, available to view here.
October 2020
We had the privilege of recording the Villiers Quartet at St Mary’s in the Lace Market in a concert of works by Purcell, Beethoven & Haydn as part of the Nottingham Chamber Music Festival.
September 2020
Our September 25th release November Journeys was played on the UK’s only specialist brass radio show, CYMK’s Sounds of Brass on 9 September, 12-2pm.
July 2020
We are delighted to announce that A Ceremony of Psalms (FSR191) is now available on Apple Music, Spotify, iTunes, and other digital partners. You can still also buy the CD through the FS Records web-shop, or on Amazon.
With the resumption of public worship, we have been broadcasting services at St Mary’s Church, Nottingham live on the streaming platform Mixlr.
April 2020
We began to offer studio master FLAC downloads of our output through our online shop. Francis continued to produce, edit and master virtual services for St Mary’s in the Lace Market, and editing work continued on November Journeys: Works for brass ensemble by Paul Drayton & George Lloyd, which is now scheduled for release on 25 September 2020.
March 2020
We recorded a live performance of Liszt’s Via Crucis for The Nottingham Baroque Soloists given at St Peter’s Church in Nottingham. The concert, interspersed with readings, also forms the basis of a service broadcast by St Mary’s Church, Nottingham on their website on Good Friday.
Throughout the month, Francis, in his capacity as Assistant Director of Music, has been delivering live and pre-recorded ‘virtual’ service broadcasts for St Mary’s in the Lace Market, Nottingham’s civic church, as well as re-mastering the church’s archive of choir recordings.
February 2020
We travelled to Newquay in Cornwall to finish the recording of our forthcoming release November Journeys by Abbey Brass. George Lloyd’s virtuosic Symphony No 10 will complete a programme of music for various sizes of brass ensemble by Lloyd and Cornish composer Paul Drayton. The record is expected to be released in June this year.
November 2019
FS Records launched our second release, A Ceremony of Psalms. The disc contains a mixture of British music for voices, brass and organ, performed by Cornish ensembles St Mary’s Singers and Abbey Brass.and features heavily the works of Paul Drayton, including the first recording of his Three Places in Old Cornwall for trumpet and organ and his five-movement work A Ceremony of Psalms.
Recording continued for a forthcoming disc of English brass music by Paul Drayton and George Lloyd, played by professional ensemble Abbey Brass. The disc will feature several first recordings of Drayton’s music, as well as the first recording in some 30 years of Lloyd’s Symphony No. 10 ‘November Journeys’, a tour-de-force of symphonic brass writing and scored for a 13-piece ensemble that includes piccolo trumpet, flugelhorn & euphonium as well as the more usual orchestral brass instruments.
May 2019
Francis provided a variety of technical support and advisory services for the extensive live-streaming operation undertaken at the Cornwall International Male Choral Festival 2019 held in Truro Cathedral.
Francis recorded the chamber choir Albarosa at their come-back concert Winter Nights on 10 May at the Collegiate Church of St Endellion in North Cornwall.
November 2018
After over 12 months of work, FS Records produced its first release – an album of mostly little-known lute music from the early 16th century, played by the lutenist and lutemaker Martin Shepherd (Francis’s father). The album is available on CD and on iTunes, CD Baby, Amazon Music & Google Play.
