No division between 'absolute' and 'applied' music -- that's the way it has always been for Manuel de Sica. Here we have the chance to explore the oeuvre of this contemporary Italian composer, best known for his contributions to the world of film; Il giardino dei Finzi Contini, the last track on the release, won an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score.

Much of De Sica's work centres around the themes of pain and suffering, where music is invested with the power to help alleviate the indifference that surrounds so much human grief -- thus pieces such as In memoriam and Kojiki, the latter of which was inspired by the bombing of Pearl Harbour -- look to console and redeem. Also included on the set are the Concerto for violin and strings, which pays homage to two of the most important influences on the composer's style -- Berg and Bartók -- and Una breve vacanza, the leitmotif of the like-named film directed by De Sica's father and, by the composer's own admission, one of his most beautiful melodies. Filmusic, a three-part concertino with a Russian-inspired first movement and swirling tarantella-based finale, completes the line-up.

Performing this music is the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini, one of Italy's most important symphony orchestras and which has appeared under conductors of the calibre of Charles Dutoit, Lorin Maazel and Kurt Masur -- to name but a few. The ensemble provides the background to a wonderfully lively instrumental fantasy in which the harp, violin, viola and piano -- here astutely performed Floraleda Sacchi, Maristella Patuzzi, Anna Serova and Michelangelo Carbonara respectively -- becomes the soloists in a fascinating, wide-reaching musical fabric. Flavio Emilio Scogna conducts.