Concertgoers and critics alike rave about Silke Aichhorn's entertainingly moderated concerts, and her goal is nothing less than the redefinition of the image of the harp! Active as a soloist and chamber musician, Aichhorn is one of the most sought-after and versatile harpists of her generation. Following her release featuring Eichner's harp concertos, she now interprets for cpo three harp concertos by Johann Wilhelm Hertel, a composer regarded as one of the most important representatives of the empfindsamer Stil during the German preclassical period. His concerto oeuvre comprises some fifty solo concertos, and seventeen harpsichord concertos by him are known today.

This album contains a collection of classic tracks from Lita Ford's back catalogue. Seventeen killer cuts from the original glam-metal, rock chick - dark, deadly and dangerous to know! One of two solo stars to spring from the ashes of the '70s all-girl hard rock band the Runaways, Lita Ford has long been a more frustrating, contradictory proposition for critics than former colleague Joan Jett. Ford is subtly feminist in her musical approach, displaying guitar heroics on the level of any male metal hero; the mere fact of her existence in the otherwise testosterone-driven heavy metal genre has made her a hero to some, but her persona has often been criticized as calculated to appeal to male adolescent sexual fantasies, simply embodying the standard wild-girl stereotypes of many male metal artists' lyrics. When she has the material to back her up, though, Ford is inarguably capable of rocking out aggressively and assertively.

Unified Past is a power progressive rock band from Syracuse, New York. Their new recording, “Shifting the Equilibrium”, was released on September 15, 2015 and has been receiving rave reviews in the progressive rock circles. The recording contains 6 power prog compositions,clocking in at 56 minutes. The addition of grammy award winning vocalist Phil Naro show’s that the band is continuing to grow and evolve and that they are a band that prog rock fans should really get to know. Guitarist Stephen Speelman possesses a master’s degree in classical guitar performance, bass player Dave Mickelson is currently a member of Joey Belladonna’s Chief Big Way and thunderous drummer Victor Tassone has appeared on several independent artist releases as well, including Corvus Stone and Andy John Bradford’s Oceans 5.

Ameen Saleem, surely one of the most promising bass players in the world, knows the simple but elusive rules that make up a groove album, and this debut as a bandleader stands out between the crowded ranks of modern jazz. Innovators, conservatives, revolutionaries—all of them are sometimes connected by the one thing that Saleem boldly cites in the title of his album. You might know the Roy Hargrove Quintet, and if you do, you might have noticed the rhythm section, chances are that you have appreciated the great work done by Saleem at the bass.

Musical settings of the Requiem understandably encompass a vast expressive gamut, from Mozart's fear and trembling to the seraphic gentleness of Fauré. But the focus in Brahms's German Requiem–his first large-scale work–is not so much on the departed as on those left behind and the work of memory. In lieu of the traditional Latin liturgy, Brahms uses texts culled from the Lutheran Bible that range from despair at our mortal condition to the solace offered by faith. John Elliott Gardiner and his forces here attempt to replicate the orchestral sound and style of Brahms's own time, using period bowing practices for the strings and mellow Viennese horns, to cite a few examples. The result is a magnificent and deeply moving performance that features excellent integration of the orchestra and chorus.

This compilation spanning a period of 37 years features Burnt Friedman's releases and edits thereof from vinyl-only labels (Latency (FR), Marionette (CA), Dekmantel (NL) amongst others) plus 4 hitherto unreleased tracks, making them available on digital formats.

Shovels & Rope’s Busted Jukebox Volume 2 is the second installment of the collaborative effort between critically acclaimed duo Shovels & Rope and some of their favorite musicians and friends. The ten-song collection again finds the band covering well known songs or tracks they have either performed or arranged with other artists in the past. The album features collaborations with Brandi Carlile, John Moreland, Hayes Carll, Nicole Atkins, Rhett Miller and more.

Arriving with plenty of laid-back swagger and street-smart lyricism, indie rock outfit QTY offer up their Bernard Butler-produced debut via the Dirty Hit label. Formed in 2014, QTY grew out of the partnership of singers/guitarists Dan Lardner and Alex Niemetz, two New York natives who had already cut their teeth together in another band, Grand Rapids. After recording some demos with a friend in San Francisco, they were quickly signed to U.K. indie Dirty Hit Records (Wolf Alice, the 1975) which urged the duo to take their time and continue honing their already stripped-down tunes.

This disc pairs together the soundtracks for the Italian erotic comedies L'Amica Di Mia Madre and Lingua D'Argento, both of which were composed by Italian composer Alberto Baldan Bembo. Although the films these scores were penned for have a comedic bent, the music itself is no laughing matter: Bembo skillfully mixes jazz and soul elements with the smooth melodicism of easy listening to create an entrancing lounge delight. Good examples of this approach include "Tema Di Barbara," which layers soothing strings and a jazzy trumpet over a gently funky bossa nova rhythm, and "Pedro Come," which builds from a single acoustic guitar line into a full-blooded slice of cocktail jazz that pits rollicking piano riffs against a dreamy string arrangement…

Euripides wrote The Trojan Women in 415 B.C., but his tragic play about the aftermath of the fall of Troy continues to resonate many centuries after it was first performed. Eleni Karaindrou, best know for her film scores for Ulysses' Gaze and Eternity and a Day, composed this score for a 2001 production of The Trojan Women after being struck by the parallels between the ancient Greek story and the recent situation in the Balkans. Although she chose to use various folk instruments from around the Mediterranean, such as the lyre, an ancestor of the modern violin; the lauto, a Greek form of the lute; and the ney, an end-blown flute, her stark compositions are not folkloric recreations. Instead, she blends the ancient timbres of the instruments with a vocal chorus to create a sound that is not quite modern but not archaic either. Perhaps the best word to use in describing Karaindrou's austere, beautiful music is timeless.

Live at Club Mozambique was, according to Bob Belden's liner notes, rumored to exist for decades in Blue Note's Grant Green discography, but was never released. His explanation as to why is satisfactory – Green's star had waned considerably – and makes some sense, but the label had 15 unissued albums by the guitarist by 1971. This date recorded at the famed Detroit jazz club (Green was living in the city at the time) is the second such set of grooves to be issued from the club floor – Lonnie Smith's was the first. The band consists of Idris Muhammad, Ronnie Foster, Houston Person, and the all but unknown Clarence Thomas, and the two tenor saxophonists (Thomas also played soprano here) laid out heavy, deep funk on the tunes that were chosen.

Jackie McLean was a hard-bop alto saxophonist with a fiery tight tone, who recorded extensively in the ‘50s and ‘60s mainly with Blue Note Records. Although his forays with an organ was confined to two albums with Jimmy Smith Open House and Plain Talk, Cory Weeds’ decision to use an organ on this session does not stray off the mark. Condition Blue accomplishes the band’s intention, to acknowledge a saxophonist who had an exploratory vision. In a set list of either McLean originals, or compositions associated with him, this tight-knit band delivers the goods in firm, yet flexible style. The key players in this session in addition, to the cooly effective altoist Weeds, are Mike LeDonne, a B-3 player of energetic disposition, and creative guitarist Peter Bernstein. Also along is drummer Joe Farnsworth who is a propulsive player.

This recording demonstrates, the Lindsays still continue to make the same sort of expressively intense and interpretatively aggressive recordings the group produced for the past three decades. And it must be admitted that the current Lindsays are every bit as willing and able to bend tempos, push phrases, and exaggerate dynamics as the original Lindsays. Indeed, in the group's need to prove its potency, it is now even more willing and there are times when the Lindsays' approach is too powerful for Haydn's music. Listen to the climax of the Largo assai from the G minor Quartet: if you like the sound of Peter Cooper's stabbing violin rending the tempo and texture of the music, you'll love the rest of the recording. If you don't, you won't. ASV's sound is nicely detailed, but slightly too reverberant.

The J. Geils Band were one of the most popular touring rock & roll bands in America during the '70s. Where their contemporaries were influenced by the heavy boogie of British blues-rock and the ear-splitting sonic adventures of psychedelia, the J. Geils Band were a bar band pure and simple, churning out greasy covers of obscure R&B, doo wop, and soul tunes, cutting them with a healthy dose of Stonesy swagger. While their muscular sound and the hyper jive of frontman Peter Wolf packed arenas across America, it only rarely earned them hit singles. Seth Justman, the group's main songwriter, could turn out catchy R&B-based rockers like "Give It to Me" and "Must of Got Lost," but these hits never led to stardom, primarily because the group had trouble capturing the energy of its live sound in the studio. In the early '80s, the group tempered its driving rock with some pop, and the makeover paid off with the massive hit single "Centerfold," which stayed at number one for six weeks. By the time the band prepared to record a follow-up, tensions between Justman and Wolf had grown considerably, resulting in Wolf's departure, which quickly led to the band's demise. After working for years to reach the top of the charts, the J. Geils Band couldn't stay there once they finally achieved their goal.

A few years later of “Vamos A Comer” EP (2010 © Lovemonk) and the “Unexpected Tapas” (2011 © Lovemonk) album releases, the Basque-German DJ & music maker, Mikel Makala, and the producer and director of the Gasteiz Big Band, Jimmy Bidaurreta, join forces again to create a new album called “Descarga Libre” (2019 © Orrua Diskak). Now the Basque duo strikes with the same purpose to rescue those Latin, Jazz, Funk and Descarga to Nuyorican Salsa sounds of labels like Fania, in combination with club & dancefloor rhythms. In the beginning of 2019 they’re back with a new album containing 7 originals songs, giving continuity to that brilliant sound they have signed together & have already obtained remarkable admiration from some international reputed DJs, producers and radio hosts.