East of Eden's second album had to be one of the least commercial albums ever to enter the British Top 30, as well as one of the most stylistically diverse. The term "progressive rock" fit as well as any, yet much of it was rather along the lines of early jazz-rock fusion, with lengthy hard-to-hum instrumental passages. But there was a lot of Eastern influence as well, especially on those pieces that highlighted Dave Arbus' violin and flute. Some of the absurdist humor along the lines of Frank Zappa and the Soft Machine makes itself known too, though East of Eden were more serious than Zappa and less whimsical than the Softs. Indeed, it's a rather sober affair that sometimes approaches gloominess, and like the late '60s/early '70s Soft Machine, it's more oriented toward virtuosic instrumental sections than vocals and lyrics…

Wendy Carlos is an American composer and keyboardist best known for her electronic music and film scores. The same year Carlos finalized the score for A Clockwork Orange, the composer recorded a double album named Sonic Seasonings; it was a complete turn away from the majestic synthesizer soundscapes and classical inspirations that had marked the movie score. Instead, Carlos recorded large amounts of environmental passages to produce a work that cycled through the four seasons. Beginning with bird calls and a thunderstorm to mark "Spring," Carlos phrases the synthesizers only in terms of the nature sounds heard. They rarely interject themselves, and the result is closer to a nature recording with occasional effects than a synthesizer recording with nature sounds…

We are proud to announce the next installment of our popular multi-artist compilation Virtual Dreams II - Ambient Explorations In The House And Techno Age, Japan 1993-1999'. As with Part One, released in 2020, 'Virtual Dreams II' shines a light on house and techno-adjacent music that helped redefine the definition of ambient music during the 1990s.

Wolfgang Muthspiel and his trio with Scott Colley on bass and Brian Blade on drums reaches a new creative peak on Dance of the Elders – the group’s follow-up up to the much lauded Angular Blues, which The Times called a “quietly impressive album”. Here Wolfgang’s successful stride continues, with his unique compositional signature on the one hand and the particularly vibrant interchanges with his trio colleagues on the other. The guitarist’s writing and approach to jazz is heavily folk-induced but equally inspired by classical music – both aspects are presented clearly throughout the album. Brian’s floating percussive injections and Scott’s nimble counterpoint on bass complement Wolfgang’s acoustic and electric playing in fluid interplay over intricate polyrhythms and adventurous harmonic landscapes.

Brian Blade & The Fellowship Band is releasing their first studio recording since the 2017’s Body And Shadow. KINGS HIGHWAY, the bands seventh record, unites drummer Brian Blade with pianist Jon Cowherd, bassist Christopher Thomas, saxophonists Myron Walden and Melvin Butler and guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel. Kings Highway features two cuts that have been the centerpiece of many of the bands live performances (the title track Kings Highway and Migration). The Fellowship create a sound of its own genre, encompassing jazz, gospel and folk music that continues to uplift and inspire listeners worldwide.

Bobby Hutcherson (January 27, 1941 - August 15, 2016) has been an endless source of inspiration for Brian Blade and the LIFECYCLES band members. In honor of Bobby, LIFECYCLES has chosen to record his NOW! album in its entirety, two songs from Bobby’s collaborative history with Jackie McLean and Grachan Moncur III and five original compositions by this stunning septet.

The music of Robert Schumann and the artistry of Sviatoslav Richter are a natural match. Schumann was loathe to use flashy, purely virtuosic elements in his compositions, a fact brilliantly illustrated in the vast majority of his works for solo piano. Rather, Schumann was much more likely to tell a story, paint a picture, or read a poem through his music, although his works were not overtly programmatic. Richter possessed a technique virtually unrivaled during his career and was able to definitively toss off even the most technically demanding works. At his heart, however, Richter was a poet and an artist with profound musical insights and introspections.

Two factors should disqualify this disc immediately. First, the pieces are incomplete and out of order. Second, and arguably more crucially, the pianist misses handfuls of notes in nearly every selection and bucketfuls of notes in some. But some listeners won't care about these things because of the miracle of Sviatoslav Richter. What in another pianist would be grounds for dismissal is here cause for celebration. Check out Richter's Shostakovich: the mysterious colors of his F minor Prelude and Fugue, the fleet virtuosity of his A minor Prelude and Fugue, or the intensity of his E minor Prelude and Fugue.