Prokofiev's Piano Sonatas Nos 6, 7 & 8 hardly lack for great recordings—their performance history includes accounts from such past titans as Sviatoslav Richter—but Steven Osborne has few rivals from any age in this most iconoclastic of composers. February's Record of the Month—celebrating Osborne's thirtieth album for Hyperion, no less—is guaranteed a very special place in the Prokofiev pantheon. It was in 1990 that the idea of The Romantic Piano Concerto was born and if proof were needed that the series is still in rude health thirty years later, it's amply provided by volume 80: Dupont & Benoit Piano Concertos. Howard Shelley, stalwart of RPCs past, present and future, performs his usual dual role, dispatching virtuoso solo parts with ease and conducting the Sinfonieorchester St Gallen in these attractive works dating from late nineteenth-century Belgium.

The latest in a line of eminent contributors to another Hyperion series, the distinguished soprano Julia Kleiter makes a welcome appearance on the label with volume 6 of The Complete Liszt Songs. As throughout, accompaniments (inadequate as that word may be in conveying the technical and musical demands required of the pianist) are provided by Julius Drake. And the Leonore Piano Trio continues to demonstrate an unerring talent for rescuing first-rate music which has fallen by the wayside. The abundance of Gallic charm offered by Litolff Piano Trios Nos 1 & 2 will have listeners wondering where these works have been for the last hundred and seventy years.

The Ash Wednesday service at St John's College Cambridge in 2019 was broadcast live by the BBC. This Signum recording of the event, captured by the college's own permanent microphone set-up, presents this most solemn of Evensongs in full, with music by Byrd, Weelkes and Bach, as well as Allegri's famous Miserere. Andrew Nethsingha conducts.

The National Symphony Orchestra (Washington DC) this month inaugurates a new label of its own with a programme of Copland's Billy the Kid & Dvořák Symphony No 9; Gianandrea Noseda conducts a performance 'From the New World' thrillingly alive to the thrusting cultural diversities which so inspired its composer over a century ago.

Dvořák String Quartets Nos 8 & 10 have been recorded for Signum by the Albion Quartet, this dynamic new quartet's second foray into this composer's repertory, and an opportunity to savour anew two of the works that saw Dvořák propelled into the premier league of most-sought-after musicians.

New from The Hallé Orchestra's own label this month we have the long-awaited completion of a magisterial cycle: Sir Mark Elder conducts Symphonies Nos 4 & 6 by Sibelius, two of his most personal and characteristic works, and both regarded as indispensable to an understanding of the composer.

Alessio Bax makes a return to the studio for Signum Classics with Italian inspirations, an imaginative confection of works by Bach, Rachmaninov and Liszt, as well as a more unexpected foray into the music of Luigi Dallapiccola, while David Goode has recorded a thirteenth volume in his highly regarded Complete Bach Organ Works series.

From LSO Live we have the second album in Sir John Eliot Gardiner's latest series with the London Symphony Orchestra: Schumann Symphonies Nos 1 & 3, travelling from glorious fanfare to dream-like wistfulness with the lively 'Spring' and 'Rhenish' symphonies. Also included is the heartfelt and elegant 'Manfred' overture.

From Contrapunctus and Owen Rees this month we have an opulent exploration of 'Josquin's Spanish legacy'. Aptly titled Salve Salve Salve, this new Signum album includes music by Victoria, Guerrero and Morales, as well as the glorious five-voice Salve regina by Josquin himself. Taking as its theme the deep-rooted power of communal singing to express wider events both political and cultural, Finding harmony sets The King's Singers on a heartfelt journey from Elizabethan England right up to the present day.