German guitarist Franz Halász displays a fine sense of tone and pacing in this revealing overview of Takemitsu's solo guitar music. Takemitsu wrote for the concert stage in an original avant-garde idiom, created over 100 film soundtracks, and produced arrangements of Japanese folk tunes and Western popular music. This range, except for the soundtracks, is represented here. The title tracks are from the concert work All in Twilight – Four pieces for guitar (1987), inspired by Paul Klee's painting of the same name. Here Halász's beautiful touch is shown in contrasting and subtle timbres on the composer's rich, jazz-like harmonies, sometimes brooding, sometimes in quickly flowing passages like those of the third movement. Next, the first six of "12 Songs" introduces some technically challenging, but aesthetically straightforward arrangements – Sammy Fain's classic Secret Love, four tunes by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and George Gershwin's Summertime in which Takemitsu spectacularly manages to reduce the best orchestral parts to the limits of the guitar and to improvise in a free-flowing manner.

The strength of these pieces by American composer Keeril Makan is that they fall outside the boxes of minimalism, abstract electronic music, and world-influenced styles. The word visceral keeps coming up in his descriptions of his own music, which revels in sheer sound and proceeds in large, physical gestures with, Makan says blithely, "no formal logic other than careful attunement to what the ear and body dictate." Paradoxically, though, it's full of surprises. The three works on the album all fall loosely under the chamber music banner and are all recognizably by the same composer, but each has a different method.

Based in Montréal (Québec, Canada). Blituri are an instrumental chamber rock six-piece founded in 2013 by multi-instrumentalist Vincent Lachambre, who is also the main composer. Their self-titled debut album was released independently in October 2014. Dedicated to the creation of a unique musical style, the ensemble offers original compositions combining harmonic sophistication, rhythmic density and caustic intensity.

To say this barrier-breaking string quartet plays modern music is an understatement. All of the five composers showcased on this audacious recording were born in the 20th century. Minimalist Philip Glass is among the best known of the five, whose works cannot possibly be mistaken with anything from the baroque or classical periods. This particular foursome illustrates the grace, beauty, and even power of a string quartet, but goes well beyond. In the words of first violinist and leader David Harrington, "I've always wanted the string quartet to be vital, and energetic, and alive, and cool, and not afraid to kick ass and be absolutely beautiful and ugly if it has to be." The album-ending cover of the Jimi Hendrix classic "Purple Haze" must be heard to be believed.

Hosianna Mantra is the third album by German band Popol Vuh. It was originally released in 1972 on the German record label Pilz. The album saw the band blend elements of Western classical music, Asian music, and space rock. For the release, bandleader Florian Fricke abandoned electronic synthesizers and instead employed acoustic instruments such as piano, oboe, and tambura. Prominently featured are Korean vocalist Djong Yun and electric guitarist Conny Veit.

Nonesuch Records releases an album of songs written and performed by Caroline Shaw and Sō Percussion, Let the Soil Play Its Simple Part. The musicians, who have known each other since their student days, were presented with three days of gratis studio time and decided to experiment with ideas they had begun putting to tape during the sessions for their January 2021 Nonesuch release Narrow Sea. With Shaw on vocals and Sō—Eric Cha-Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski, and Jason Treuting—filling out this new band, they developed songs in the studio, with lyrics inspired by their own wide-ranging interests: James Joyce, the Sacred Harp hymn book, a poem by Anne Carson, the Bible’s Book of Ruth, the American roots tune “I’ll Fly Away,” and the pop perfection of ABBA, among others. The album is co-produced by Shaw, Sō Percussion, and the Grammy Award–winning engineer Jonathan Low (The National, Taylor Swift).

In literary criticism, we throw around our fair share of arbitrary terms. Yet one I stand by, and of which I am especially fond, is “intertextuality,” which refers to the borrowing, shaping, and influence of texts on other texts. Similarly, one can say many things about Hungarian composer György Kurtág. He is a “master of the miniature,” a microscopic craftsman. His language implodes with a hermetic (im)precision. His wit is boundless, unassuming, and unabashedly lyrical. And so forth. But in the end, his sound-world is nothing if not intertextual.

Gyan Riley is a virtuoso guitarist and composer living in Brooklyn whose unique work expands the rich legacy of classical guitar music with influences from minimalism, flamenco, bossa nova, and the folk-jazz sounds of John Fahey and Leo Kottke. His second CD for Tzadik, recorded during the pandemic lockdown, is his best yet'a breathtaking and fabulous collection of music for solo guitar. Fluid, compelling, and beautiful, this is music you will return to again and again.