The New York Trio, consisting of pianist Bill Charlap, bassist Jay Leonhart, and drummer Bill Stewart, have created quite a stir in Japan, as they have entered the studio regularly to record for the Japanese Venus Jazz label at the start of the 21st century. Their sixth CD for the label, Thou Swell draws from the songbook of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, a composer/lyricist combo who wrote many songs that became standards. As a result, a number of these songs have been frequently recorded by jazz musicians and seem in danger of overexposure. But Charlap is a thoughtful arranger, playing "My Funny Valentine" complete with the usually omitted verse that sets up the song while playing it at a very deliberate tempo, resulting in a stunningly different take…

Undoubtedly the most versatile of all instruments, the guitar’s unrivalled cross-cultural popularity has made it synonymous with musical genres far and wide. From Congolese soukous to Calcutta slide guitar, this collection features kindred creative spirits who have harnessed its limitless expressive potential.

The guitarist, a Toronto native, played with Prince as part of 3RDEYEGIRL and the New Power Generation. She was also working with him in a fusion jazz collective that he set aside to concentrate on his solo piano performances before his death in April 2016. And Prince would have served as producer on Diamonds & Dynamite, an eight-track set that takes Grantis back to the improvisational fusion roots she was exploring before joining the Prince universe.

For more than five decades, John McLaughlin has deployed his peerless guitar technique, compositional gifts, and imagination in service of a deeply personal higher calling, forging a vast legacy unmatched in improvised music. Now as the world reels from the toll of the ongoing viral-induced global lockdown, McLaughlin reflects on both the perils and potential of this challenging moment with 'Liberation Time'.

Rhino Records asked producer Brian Ahern to select his favorite tracks from the Emmylou Harris albums he helmed – he produced her first 11 studio offerings for Reprise Records. That's quite a daunting task when you consider that some of those recordings were Elite Hotel, Luxury Liner, Quarter Moon in a Ten Cent Town, and Pieces of the Sky, just to name a few. But Ahern rose to the task and put together a solid, aesthetically perfect set here, highlighting many different aspects of Harris' career at the time: from her trademark, utterly pure singing voice, to her song selection, to the sound of her band and the studio she recorded in, this is a top-notch set from start to finish and serves as an excellent introduction to her early work for the newcomer…

Hailing from Israel comes Trespass, a symphonic progressive rock trio whose second album Morning Lights is a continuation of the classically inspired style they showed on their 2002 debut In Haze of Time. With similarities to classic bands like ELP, The Nice, Triumvirat, and Gentle Giant, Trespass use their keyboard heavy sound to create five epic sounding pieces here that are highly enjoyable.

Chillout albums were all the rage during the early 2000s, but despite the attention, no one had made a record quite like Funki Porcini's Fast Asleep since the glory days of ambient techno, when the Orb's "A Huge Ever-Growing Pulsating Brain That Rules From the Centre of the Ultraworld" merged Tangerine Dream, the Mad Professor, and Larry Heard into a collage of pastoral bliss. Fast Asleep, though obviously functional in a variety of contexts, wasn't designed to soundtrack trips back from the clubs or lazy nights at home with friends, and as such, it neatly side-steps the conscious hipness that usually compromises chillout records. James Braddell, a downbeat veteran stretching back more than a decade, crafted Fast Asleep to move in and out of its framework, with lengthy transitions introducing - or deconstructing - virtually every production…

The young Egyptian soprano Fatma Said, praised for the luminosity and rich colours of her voice, makes her recording debut for Warner Classics with El Nour. Her enticing and absorbing recital programme crosses cultures, combining art songs by French, Spanish and Egyptian composers with Egyptian folk songs and popular songs from the Middle East. As she explains, “‘El Nour’ in Arabic means ‘the light’, and this album sheds light on how music that has been interpreted many times can be perceived in a different light. The idea is to connect three cultures – Arabic, French and Spanish – and to show how much, despite cultural, geographical and historical differences, they have in common when it comes to music”.

Singer and songwriter Susi Hyldgaard has, with the help of Dickon Hinchcliff (Tindersticks) and Steve Argьelles, created a very personal and touching album. Recorded in London, Paris and Copenhagen, Blush is Hyldgaard's fourth recording and the first to be released in North America. While her previous recordings were well received both in and outside her native Denmark, Blush is undeniably her finest and most personal effort to date, and signals the arrival of an innovative new voice in music. The release also offers two bonus tracks, remixes created by DJ Opiate (Björk) and Matthew Herbert.

The Legendary Pink Dots exist in the fields of experimental and psychedelic music. The band is fronted by Edward Ka-Spel, who doubles as singer and chief lyric writer. Phil Knight (The Silverman), Erik Drost, and Raymond Steeg make up the current lineup of the band…

Kerry Livgren is an American musician and songwriter, best known as one of the founding members and primary songwriters for the 1970s progressive rock band, Kansas. "Seeds of Change" is his first solo album. Released in 1980 while he still was a member of Kansas, it features guest appearances by three fellow Kansas members: Steve Walsh, Phil Ehart and Robby Steinhardt. Singer Ronnie James Dio and members of LeRoux, Jethro Tull, Ambrosia, and Atlanta Rhythm Section are also featured. It resembles his band's output of the time: one foot in watered-down radio rock and one foot in dramatic American prog. In 1996, "Seeds of Change" was reissued by Renaissance Records with an interview with Livgren as a bonus track.

Chicago has toured continuously for more than 50 years, helping make the legendary “rock band with horns” one of America’s most successful groups. Rhino spotlights that legacy with two stellar live collections, one that captures the band’s early days, and the other recorded just last year.

The Man Who Sold The World David Bowie’s landmark entry into the 1970s not only began the collaboration with guitarist Mick Ronson that would continue with such Bowie classics as Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane, it kicked off a 10-year run of indispensable albums stretching through 1980’s Scary Monsters.

Squarewave's music has always had ambiance to spare, drawing as it does on elements of folk, psychedelic rock, and electronic music, often rendered in meticulous hi-fi detail. The Wisconsin band's founding members, multi-instrumentalists Jeff Jagielo and Patrick Connaughty, often balance out their lush arrangements with triumphant hooks or Krautrock grooves. But on Squarewave's new album, Hazy, they slow down and let the atmosphere seep to the foreground, creating some of their most restrained and moody songs yet.

Mozart did, it's true, "authorize" the performance of some of his piano concertos by piano and string quartet, as the notes to this Analekta release point out. But, as a Vienna freelancer in uncharted territory, he could hardly have done otherwise, and to suggest, from the perspective of 21st century Canada and its social safety net, that this indicates anything about the desirability of such a performance is questionable. Truth to tell, these two concertos from 1782, although their wind parts are not as prominent as those in some of the later ones, still sound a bit bare in their contrasts between solo and tutti here.