As part of his final year as Music Director and following a two-season celebration of the Orchestra’s 125th anniversary, Peter Oundjian and the RSNO here present their second recording of music by John Adams, with the exceptional participation of the Doric String Quartet. Written for a large orchestra including six percussionists, keyboard sampler, and amplified steel-string guitar, Naive and Sentimental Music is a sweepingly symphonic masterpiece, full of contrasts and clashes. It reflects the dichotomy between ‘naive’ and ‘sentimental’ poetry as analysed by Friedrich Schiller in his 1795 essay Über naive und sentimentalische Dichtung, as well as the ‘bipolar’ musical life of Esa-Pekka Salonen, the dedicatee of this piece, who conducted the first performance with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1999. Absolute Jest is a large-scale scherzo for amplified string quartet and orchestra, heavily inspired by the music of Beethoven, which Adams has always deeply admired. The quartet of soloists, a late addition to the score, emphasises the echoes of Beethoven’s music (mainly his string quartets) and facilitates a ‘hyperspace rate’ of virtuosity, which the Doric String Quartet here perfectly demonstrates.

2nd album from the truly impressive USA Prog Rock band founded by the talented multi-instrumentalist/composer/producer/engineer Shane Atkinson! EVERSHP are a league ahead of much of the new Prog bands we get to hear these days – with influences from the divide that crosses between GENESIS, YES, KANSAS and QUEEN, this band are something SPECIAL! The EVERSHIP sound just oozes quality - The keyboards are melodic and symphonic, yet edgy and dramatic at the same time; the guitars range from powerful to sensitive and the rhythm section – much in the same way as YES – runs the gamut of tight and driving to sensitive and atmospheric. The standard of musicianship is high; the compositions are classy with quality production, ranging through melodic, hook-laden songs with incredible anthemic choruses and gentle ballads, with plenty in the way of bombastic, complex arrangements with extended instrumental arrangements going on in-between.

Oltre ad essere un’interprete di livello, la cantante Maria Pia De Vito ha al suo attivo progetti sempre interessanti e originali. Ricordiamo Il Pergolese, omaggio jazz alla musica del compositore settecentesco, e il recente Coraçao dedicato alla musica brasiliana con i testi tradotti in napoletano (ne abbiamo parlato in occasione di Umbria Jazz Winter 2017/18). Stavolta la musicista recupera la forma della moresca, antica danza di origine araba con i testi generalmente di carattere grottesco. Nella Napoli, città di origine della solista, questa forma fu molto popolare: uno degli artefici della sua riscoperta in tempi moderni è stato Roberto De Simone che l’ha inserita nella sua Gatta Cenerentola, ma al tempo stesso vari gruppi vocali (King’s Singers e Orlando Consort) la propongono nel loro repertorio.

Vespero got together as a quartet (Arkady Fedotov - vocals, bass, flute, synths; Valentin Rulev - violin, synths; Ivan Fedotov - drums, percussion; Alexander Kuzovlev - guitar, bass, synths) in Astrakhan (south of Russia) 2003 on the common interest in playing psychedelic music. Later Natalya Tjurina (vocals) joined, and the band moved into more progressive rock-related areas. As their Moscow fellows Kaftan Smekha, Vespero are deeply influenced by avant theatre and experimental poetry. Since the very first demos their sound has been influenced by Gong, early Pink Floyd, Faust and related bands from that era. Highly recommended for all fans of these (and beyond!).

Sarajevo in 1994 was a city under siege. Mortars and grenades rained down on the city, killing indiscriminately every day. Amongst the madness, would it be possible to persuade a global rock star to come and play a show for local fans? Scream for Me Sarajevo is the soundtrack to the amazing and astonishing documentary film story of the most unlikely of rock concerts, performed by Bruce Dickinson and his band Skunkworks in 1994, in the midst of the Siege of Sarajevo. This is a film about extraordinary people defying the horrors of war, and the musicians who risked their lives to play a show for them. Featuring footage from the historic gig, the film also meets those that made it to the show and made the show happen; determined to keep living their lives despite the atrocities going on around them. Interviews with the band, crew and security bring home the reality of the situation that was not only dangerous, it was barbaric.

…And Justice for All is the fourth studio album by American heavy metal band Metallica, released on August 25, 1988, through Elektra Records. It is the first Metallica studio album to feature bassist Jason Newsted after the death of Cliff Burton in 1986…

One of the finest pop albums of its time, Walls Have Ears remains one of many overlooked gems from the new wave era. This mysterious trio wrote pure and unabashed pop songs heavily influenced by the '60s and '70s and dressed them up in '80s clothing. Guitars float and shimmer above a synth foundation, allowing vocal harmonies (and some bits of brass) to roam freely in and out of each song. The haunting "Say You Will" is drop-dead gorgeous with its acoustic guitar riff and pained vocals. "Yo-Yo" could have been a massive hit with its classic hook bouncing around the room. "Remember Me and You," "Tell Me Baby" and "Love Me Too" contain all the elements that make pop music so enchanting and enticing. When BOS get all gooey on ballads such as "Lovers," "Close to Me" and "Photograph," the effects are mesmerizing. An album to love and embrace your whole life through. – AllMusic Review by Stephen Schnee

Hard to find LP from New Zealand 80s pop group.

The CD + Blu-ray Box contains Clutching At Straws (2018 Andy Bradfield & Avril Mackintosh Re-mix), Live at the Edinburgh Playhouse 1987 (2018 Michael Hunter Mix) and Clutching At Straws (1999 Remaster Demos + Previously unreleased Demos) on the CDs and on the BluRay ‘Clutching At Straws (2018 Andy Bradfield & Avril Mackintosh Re-mix)’ 48/24 PCM Stereo Remix,48/24 LPCM Master Audio 5.1 Mix and 48/24 DTS Master Audio 5.1 Mix, “The Last Straw” Clutching At Straws Documentary, Promo films 3 tracks, Clutching At Straws (Original 1987 Album Mix) plus 3 Bonus audio tracks.

BLACK PAGE were formed in the mid 1980s as a Japanese rock quartet by Bunmei OGAWA (keyboards), Itsufumi OGAWA (guitars), Kozo SUGANUMA (drums), and Tsuneo KOMINE (bass) - already all of them had been musically professional. Regardless of their sense of humour cultivated in Osaka, they had played lots of gigs with their astonishing technique - featuring Itsufumi's complex guitar play much influenced by Alan Holdsworth, Bunmei's Emerson-ish thrilling keyboard explosion, aggressive drumming by Kozo called 'Tekazu-Oh' (in English, The King Of Full Speed … sorry no appropriate expression here), and Tsuneo's strictly precise bass-quake. In 1986 BLACK PAGE released their one and only album 'Open The Next Page', in that their terrific technical approaches could be remarkably approved by progressive freaks all around the world, but sad to say, they were disbanded soon after that.

The Wizards come from Bilbao in Spain. They were originally formed in the spring of 2013. After having recorded a four-track demo the band started gigging for earnest in February 2014. Since then The Wizards have released two studio albums and toured mainly in Spain but also in France, Portugal and Germany. Rise Of The Serpent is the band's third album. The band's slogan is "Occult Heavy Metal Warriors", what's that supposed to mean and how would The Wizards describe their overall musical style? "What we play is a totally unconscious mix of styles we all share and like. There definitely is a strong and obvious heavy metal background in our music, but if you scratch the surface you will also find some 1970s hard rock, a piece of the doomy element and even some punk.

Plamp, a Swiss band only named after the first names of the musicians involved, came from the city of Chur and were around since the mid-70's as a quintet, Mario Giovanoli played flute and saxophone, Peter Toenz was on electric guitar, Peter Streiff on Hammond organ and piano, Louis Streiff on drums and Andrea Thoeny on bass, while all members contributed on the vocal parts.For their only release ''Und ueberhaupt …'', pressed privately and released sometime during year 1978, they were joined by Fortunat Froelich on cello and piano and Marc Keller on acoustic guitars. Plamp used the nearby Kraut Rock qualities in a lighter version to produce their own personal sound, obviously influenced by Folk, Jazz and Psychedelic Rock, and it's really amazing why the band remained so obscure, they were propably at the wrong place at the wrong time.

"Tres Momentos" describes a section of the infinite spiral, in which disorder and structure, the sacred and the profane, life and death are mutually dependent. Drone sounds connect three composed moments for string orchestra. The composition's lyrical tones contrast with multi-layered noise elements, which ultimately dissolve into a waltz. With this release, Sven Helbig departs from his previously preferred rigorous tonal harmonies, and the electronic components become more prominent.

Happy Xmas, Eric Clapton's first Christmas record in a career that's spanned over four and a half decades, certainly bears its share of seasonal charm, but it's also of a piece with the warm, amiable music he's made in the 2010s. Like Old Sock and I Still Do before it, Happy Xmas relies on songs from other songwriters (he wrote only one tune, the slow-burning "For Love on Xmas Day") and cooks to a cozy groove that's grounded in the blues but also encompasses soul, reggae, rock, and a bit of vaudeville shuffle ("Xmas in My Hometown"). This homey atmosphere is certainly suited for the season, even if it rarely sounds like a typical holiday record.

Karl Amadeus Hartmanns work is very difficult to attribute to any particular compositional school. Although he was not a revolutionist in terms of notation or performance forces, he was able to creatively subordinate all the achievements of modern musical language to innovative formal approaches. Hartmann wrote with extraordinary verve, creating artistic phrases with a broad ambitus, at the same time he could masterfully juggle short motifs, subjecting them to elaborate variational and contrapuntal transformations. In terms of harmonics, Hartmanns music is tonal, though strongly chromatic, which deprives the listener of a secure sense of anchoring in a specific key.