Melody Gardot's debut recording came two years after she suffered a near fatal automobile accident, the differently able Gardot triumphing in accomplishing what many others, including her, could only dream of. This project has her singing and playing guitar and a little piano, but more so presenting this project of all original material. Gardot has an interesting personal story, but even more intriguing music that straddles the line between lounge jazz, folk, and cowgirl songs. She's part sophisticated chanteuse, college sophomore, and down-home girl next door. Her innocence, sweetness, and light are very alluring, much like the persona of tragic songbirds Eva Cassidy and Nancy LaMott. Feel empathy for Gardot, but don't patronize her - she's the real deal much more that many of her over-hyped peers…

Many believe that all starts from a certain hit record by one of America’s pioneering and premiere ‘garage’ bands. Yes, it all kicked off with the raucous sound of ‘Louie Louie’ by The Kingsmen, a smash hit back in 1963. A combination of teenage angst and an insidious ‘hook line’ ensured the number would become a classic and inspiration to future generations of rockers. The Kingsmen came from Portland, Oregon and were headed by singer Jack Ely and guitarist Mike Mitchell. ‘Louie Louie’ was their debut single, written by Richard Berry and recorded by him way back in 1957. The Kingsmen’s version got to Number 2 in the US chart and proved a Top 30 hit in the UK in 1964. Although the group was the subject of internal dissent after their first big hit, they went on to enjoy more chart success with such songs as ‘Money’ and ‘The Jolly Green Giant’, both included on this 20 track compilation.

Art Forland has in recent years escaped from classical differentiation with the concept of virtual music. He has done this without having given up the popular aspect of this work with which this demanding search for new music began. At the center of the title of this work is the expression of the dream, which is that virtuality which man has always opposed to reality. A contemporary way of being as sound space.
"Virtual Music" - a musical philosophy stands behind this phrase which merges the rationality of electronic music with the sensuality of the inner psyche. The "Virtual" is the original sense pf the unreal. Electronic code enables the virtual spirit to be made physical reality, and thus arrive at the purest form of music…

Das Vokalensemble Cantus Cölln unter der Leitung von Konrad Junghänel gehört heute zu den renommiertesten Formationen seiner Art. Die über 30 CD-Einspielungen von Cantus Cölln wurden mit zahlreichen internationalen Preisen ausgezeichnet und umfassen musikalische Raritäten ebenso wie wegweisende Interpretationen von "Klassikern" des barocken Repertoires.

Composed against a cataclysmic backdrop of Stalinist oppression and the Second World War, Shostakovich's Symphony No.8 is a deeply affecting poem of suffering. The composer described it as, ''an attempt to reflect the terrible tragedy of war,'' and it contains some of the most terrifying music he ever wrote. Here, Gianandrea Noseda conducts the London Symphony Orchestra with intensity and understanding, allowing the music to tell its own story as it travels from darkness into light, yearning more for peace than for victory.

In their general layout and their style, the three quintets recorded here illustrate Boccherini’s formal variety and freedom: whether first violin and first cello are deliberately highlighted, or the roles are distributed in more balanced fashion, this composer had an unrivalled ability to use the group of instruments to create a limpid, shimmering soundscape, traversed by fleeting zones of shadow and sudden bursts of light.

Jon Anderson joins conductor Nigel Warren-Green and his London Chamber Academy for orchestral arrangements of new material and old favorites on Change We Must (and that sound you hear in the distance is the small army of Anderson's detractors crying "This time he's really gone too far"). But far from being the exercise in self-indulgence that some would charge, Change We Must proves to be a lovely setting for Anderson's compositions. Expertly produced by the vocalist and Tim Handley, the disc finds Anderson's voice in harmonic balance with a wonderful landscape of orchestral sounds. The combined effect is, in a word, lovely. Beginning with the Jon & Vangelis chestnut "State of Independence," the singer and orchestra achieve a natural beauty that the previous pairing aimed at but rarely captured…