A close contemporary of Buxtehude, Johann Pachelbel was, by all accounts, an outstanding keyboard player himself, and his compositions provide a fascinating stylistic bridge between early-Baroque composers such as Frescobaldi and Froberger (both of whom influenced him) and the later music of J.S. Bach and his contemporaries.

Here is Anita O Day in excellent vocal form joining forces with Billy May, one of the most prolific arrangers of the Hollywood recording studios in the 50s and 60s. To back her, May led three big-sized groups staffed by top musicians, and provided the swinging, tasteful charts in these two excellent albums dedicated to the songbooks of Cole Porter and Rodgers & Hart. Miss O'Day treats this handful of great evergreen songs in her usual compelling manner and with innate musicianship. She was gifted with a wide vocal range and a level head: that is to say, she sang smoothly without panic or strain at either extreme of her range, and remained consistently impressive in projection, phrasing, and flexibility. There is much to groove within this set and, be it for pop or jazz fans, listening to this great singer is sure to be an incomparable musical pleasure.

Sergio Gallo performs this selection of earlier and lesser-known versions of Liszt's masterpieces.

The French Baroque composer Jean-Philippe Rameau wrote three books of Pièces de clavecin for the harpsichord. The first, Premier Livre de Pièces de Clavecin, was published in 1706; the second, Pièces de Clavessin, in 1724; and the third, Nouvelles Suites de Pièces de Clavecin, in 1726 or 1727. They were followed in 1741 by Pièces de clavecin en concerts, in which the harpsichord can either be accompanied by violin (or flute) and viola da gamba or played alone. An isolated piece, "La Dauphine", survives from 1747.

The Stenzl brothers, Hans-Peter and Volker, invite you on a special kind of European journey with their new GENUIN album. In celebration of the anniversaries of Erik Satie, Maurice Ravel, Moritz Moszkowski, and Dmitri Shostakovich, they have recorded suites and individual pieces by these great composers, who often humorously look beyond their own cultural horizons. With sophistication, elegance, care, and emotion, they weave dances, melodies, and stories from all corners of the world into their music. As a distinguished German duo performing internationally for more than 30 years, they present these little treasures with a keen eye for both the larger musical narratives and intricate details - genuinely cosmopolitan!

For centuries, the tragic tale of the mermaid or water nymph falling in love with a human has been told around the world. On his new GENUIN album, pianist Clemens Müller interprets this story of love and death through piano works from six centuries. The oldest piece by Jan Sweelinck predates the piano itself, while the newest was completed just days before the recording. At the heart of the album is a triptych featuring three settings of the psalm “By the Waters of Babylon”: from the perspectives of three different religions, Thomaskantor Johann Sebastian Bach, Jewish piano virtuoso Charles-Valentin Alkan, and Iranian composer Shadi Kassaee each reflect on this famous hymn about longing for a lost homeland.

The album includes works by Jean-Fery Rebel, Francois Couperin, and Marin Marais, along with new pieces by Calliope Tsoupaki, Willem Wander van Nieuwkerk, and Torben Klaes. Three of the pieces are world premieres.

There is in the Grateful Dead repertoire a song so legendary as to often be only referred to as "IT" by dedicated dead heads. The Dead have been playing this song in concert sporadically for a quarter of a century now, often using it as a vehicle for musical travels far beyond the predictable. When Phil Lesh asked me to plunderphonicize the Dead's music, this song seemed to be the obvious place to start. With the invitation of the band I've had the opportunity to comb through the (also legendary) Grateful Dead Vaults and to listen to all the performance recordings of this piece on file.

In the Upper Austrian Schlägl Abbey there are numerous instrumental instrumental concertos, mostly for solo violin, but often also for harpsichord. The demands on the violin soloist are enormous. There must have been a very talented violinist on site. Ars Antiqua Austria has brought some of the concertos back to life. An exciting journey into the still unknown past.

Over time, the memory of the brilliant virtuoso that was Eugène Ysaÿe (Liège, 1858 - Brussels, 1931) ended up supplanting his status as a composer in the collective memory. It should be remembered, however, that Eugène Ysaÿe created, through his works, a fundamentally new and original genre, distinguished by a science of writing and harmonic richness. This album brings together concert works by Eugène Ysaÿe which, with the exception of the Saltarelle carnavalesque, have never been recorded in their orchestral version. It therefore invites us on a unique journey into the composer's sound universe, from his first to his last compositions written for soloist(s) and orchestra.

Three musicians from diverse European backgrounds present an innovative album with GENUIN that unites classical and contemporary repertoire, breaking free from rigid genre constraints. Lisa Florentine Schmalz (soprano), Boglárka Pecze (clarinet), and Mariana Popova (piano) intertwine romantic texts by Sara Teasdale and Emily Dickinson with modern street language, creating a dialogue between the present and the eternal. Songs by Johannes Boris Borowski (*1979) and George Crumb (1929–2022) meet the works of the Romantic composer Louis Spohr. With utmost focus, the three performers create a powerful tapestry of connections and expressiveness in a program of remarkable musical depth.

For Record Store Day this year Rhino releases this limited edition two piece box including four 180gram LPs. Limited to 7,700 copies.

Sir John Barbirolli (né Giovanni Battista Barbirolli; 2 December 1899 – 29 July 1970) was a British conductor and cellist. He is remembered above all as conductor of the Hallé Orchestra in Manchester, which he helped save from dissolution in 1943 and conducted for the rest of his life.

A pupil of the famous Nicolas Lebegue, Nicolas de Grigny quickly dazzled his peers with the daring complexity of his writing. His compositions, veritable Baroque gems, captivated even Johann Sebastian Bach, who meticulously copied his entire organ book. The singular work of the former organist of Reims Cathedral is restored in all it's splendour by Michel Bouvard and Francois Espinasse on the keyboards of the Great Organ of the Chapelle Royale.

Nuvole is a jazz trio that seeks to revitalize the genre by fusing historical inspirations with contemporary musical concepts to create a fresh sound with a certain timeless character. This duality is also evident in their artwork, which creates charmingly childlike pieces that manage to be both sophisticated and adult at the same time.