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Igor Markevitch, born in 1912 in Kiev, is undoubtedly one of the most influential conductors of his generation, but as a composer, he is virtually nonexistent in today's concert life. He shares this fate with many "stateless" composers who, amid the political turmoil and disasters of the 20th century, were condemned to a multinational existence, ending up in the no man's land of music history – Darius Milhaud encapsulated this with his remark about the "young Russian with no ties to his homeland." This first recording of Markevitch's music since the release of the Arnhem Orchestra series in the 1990s features four works that reveal Markevitch's extraordinary stylistic development during the brief period of his compositional activity, from the 1920s to the 1940s, showcasing him at his most captivating: an invitation to rediscover an exceptional composer, hailed by Jean Cocteau as "the angel of the new."