Originally released in October 1985, ‘Once Upon a Time’ is the era-defining #1 album from Simple Minds. Containing classic hit singles ‘Alive and Kicking’ and ‘Sanctify Yourself,’ it now comes as part of this incredible 5CD box set. Bonus discs include original and extended versions of ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me),’ single edits, 12” mixes, B-sides, unreleased tracks, and the ‘Live in The City of Light’ concert, as well a 36-page booklet with rare photos, interviews, and a track-by-track guide.

Cannonball Adderley, Coleman Hawkins, Art Pepper and more!

This deluxe Medicine Show reissue arrives as an expansive 4xCD box set, collecting 42 Dream Syndicate tracks that span rare live recordings, radio sessions, rehearsals, demos, and previously unreleased material from 1983 to 1984. Alongside it, the original album returns as a standalone LP, all via Down There Records (distributed by Fire Records).

Few composers have stood the test of time as well as Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Exemplary works such as Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, and 1812 Overture have surpassed the classical genre and become fixtures of popular culture, and his artistic influence cannot be understated. On TCHAIKOVSKY, a live recording, the Philharmonie Austin and conductor Mark Dupere embark on a breathtaking homage to the legend, performing Symphony No. 5 and Romeo and Juliet on period instruments, masterfully conveying the colorful orchestrations and vivid emotion that echoes throughout the legendary Russian composer’s oeuvre.

SOMM Recordings is delighted to build upon its critically acclaimed discography with violinist, Adrian Butterfield, and the London Handel Players in a new collaboration featuring the Op. 7 set of six Violin Concertos by the French violinist-composer, Jean-Marie Leclair. The London Handel Players, praised by the New York Times for their “soulful depth” and “consummate skill and musicianship,” have previously released five Handel discs with SOMM, along with recordings that celebrate Geminiani, J.S. Bach, and Telemann. The group’s co-founder and director, period-instrument violinist Adrian Butterfield, has been described as “a marvel” by Gramophone for his recordings of Leclair’s first three books of violin sonatas.

“In the dark night, amongst the trees, between moonlit leaves, is this super-secret, lovely lo-fi, raw, intimate, analogue album made in a cabin deep in the woods…”

Joe Bonamassa Announces B.B. King’s Blues Summit 100, A Landmark Tribute Album Featuring Dozens Of Music Stars To Celebrate The King Of Blues’ 100th Birthday.

How crazy must a band be to recompose and record the work of Jimi Hendrix – a man known for his blisteringly loud, amplified guitars – using only acoustic instruments in a serene church? And yet, it made complete sense to HOT (Het Orgel Trio) to go to church and let Berry van Berkun hit the pipe organ. For Jimi Hendrix wanted to literally feel the sound vibrations in his body, and the pipe organ does just that: being a roaring sound machine of unparalleled dimensions.

This compilation is a brilliant survey of some of the early recorded work showcasing Bob Corritore‘s dedication to recording the real-deal blues by it’s originators. The sixteen tracks were recorded between 1984 and 2007, and include many remixed and previously unreleased gems. Most of the artists featured on this album are no longer with us, but their recordings will live on forever. Bob always had his eye on the prize and took great artists into the studio whenever possible. Once he opened the Rhythm Room in 1991 he realized that there would be a pipeline of amazing artists coming through to play at his nightclub.

Washington, D.C.–based pianists—composer-performer Sam Post and his friend and colleague Ralitza Patcheva—have join forces to reimagine Bach’s iconic Well-Tempered Clavier. Their new recording, The Well-“Tampered” Clavier, Book 1, embraces the expressive possibilities of the modern piano and infuses the music with rhythmic vitality drawn from jazz, ragtime, folk, world music, and twentieth-century classical styles. In the Baroque era, improvising, ornamenting, and reshaping a composer’s original work was standard practice—much like jazz musicians do today. Post and Patcheva lean into that legacy, freely applying rhythmic variation without feeling constrained by the printed page. Post reflects, “Surely this is how Bach felt writing his music—every moment, every note a path chosen, leaving behind equally valid options, but together forming one coherent, human story.”

For over two decades, Matthew Schellhorn has championed the creativity of living composers through commissions and premières, bringing new music to a wider audience. This album draws together a selection of eclectic and captivating piano works united through shared interpretative insights and deep artistic connections.

A prolific, Emmy Award-winning composer and pianist, Michael Whalen's impressive career has spanned numerous genres and platforms, from albums of jazz, classical, varied electronic music, and new age music to work on film scores, television themes, audio books, and commercials. After devoting much of the 1990s to material for the screen and early solo recordings such as 1996’s acclaimed Nightscenes, a collection of ambient electronic vignettes, he increased focus on his own classical compositions. The 2000s brought continued work on television documentaries including the series Nature, as well as eclectic solo albums that traversed instrumental piano pieces, electronic music, and piano jazz.

Intrada announces the 30th anniversary, two-CD set of Hans Zimmer's score for the 1995 political-action thriller Crimson Tide. Zimmer was truly flying high in his career by the mid-1990s. He had successfully made the jump from London to Hollywood and had just won an Academy Award® for his score for The Lion King (1994). His sound was going through an evolution during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it was on Backdraft (1991) that Zimmer fully embraced meshing an orchestra with his trademark synthesizers. It was also the start of the “power anthem” for which Zimmer would become known. Crimson Tide marks the full maturing of this style that would continue to be heard most notably in The Rock (1996) and The Peacemaker (1997). Zimmer won a GRAMMY® for Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture or for Television for Crimson Tide. The main theme of Crimson Tide is a signature power anthem that embodies heroism and bravura, and in this expanded presentation of the score one can fully appreciate how it’s used throughout the narrative. The score is a master class in tension building. Zimmer utilizes atmospheric sounds to build a sonic tomb around the characters. Sounds resembling sonar, metallic colors and puffing woodwinds create sustained tension that slowly rises.

Lynyrd Skynyrd wrote the book on Southern rock with their first album, so it only made sense that they followed it for their second album, aptly titled Second Helping. Sticking with producer Al Kooper (who, after all, discovered them), the group turned out a record that replicated all the strengths of the original, but was a little tighter and a little more professional. It also revealed that the band, under the direction of songwriter Ronnie Van Zant, was developing a truly original voice. Of course, the band had already developed their own musical voice, but it was enhanced considerably by Van Zant's writing, which was at turns plainly poetic, surprisingly clever, and always revealing. Though Second Helping isn't as hard a rock record as Pronounced, it's the songs that make the record…

Classic Hits 1938-52 is a five-disc, 123-track collection of Big Joe Turner's earliest recording sessions before finding stardom with his mid-'50s R&B sides. While this JSP set isn't extravagant, it's a luxury to have Turner's sides for National, Aladdin, Freedom, MGM, and Imperial remastered and together in one collection. The final disc also includes the Boss of the Blues' first recordings for Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun of Atlantic Records: "Chains of Love," "Sweet Sixteen," "Poor Lover's Blues," and "Still in Love (With You)." Turner tackles blues, swing, and fiery up-tempo jump blues, assisted by Pete Johnson, Wynonie Harris, Pee Wee Crayton, Budd Johnson, Dave Bartholomew, Fats Domino, Joe Houstin, Albert Ammons, Don Byas, Art Tatum, and Hot Lips Page. While this is a collector's dream, the casual listener would do better with Big, Bad & Blue: The Big Joe Turner Anthology on Rhino.