If you believe Charles Burney, the English music scholars and European travelers in terms of music, then was hard to determine what was miserable, the Italian harpsichords or the Italian harpsichordist in the 1770s. But an exception in his polemical verdict he would certainly have done with Baldassarre Galuppi (1706-1785), whom he visited in Venice in 1770. Galuppi was not only an excellent opera composer, but also devoted to keyboard instruments truly enchanting music that was like his Opere buffe Europe estimated. The famous Italian harpsichordist Luca Guglielmi has recorded for Accent nine of his sonatas on four different types of keyboard instruments (harpsichord, clavichord, organ and fortepiano) Italian origin - a successful and very entertaining vindication for Italian harpsichordist and their instruments.

Perhaps not amongst the best known of Haydn's quartets, these three from Op. 50 really turn out to be a pleasant surprise, although all of this composer's music is quite outstanding with nothing that can be honestly described as second rate! The Lindsays bring their usual panache and sense of style to proceedings, continuing to confirm their status as one of the finest quartets around.

‘Perhaps the best of all my works’, said Gluck of his Armide. But this, the fifth of his seven ‘reform operas’, has never quite captured the public interest as have Orfeo, Alceste, the two Iphigenies and even Paride ed Elena. Unlike those works it is based not on classical mythology but on Tasso’s crusade epic, Gerusalemme liberata. No doubt Gluck turned to this libretto, originally written by Quinault, to challenge Parisian taste by inviting comparison with the much-loved Lully setting. Its plot is thinnish, concerned only with the love of the pagan sorceress Armide, princess of Damascus, for the Christian knight and hero Renaud, and his enchantment and finally his disenchantment and his abandonment of her; the secondary characters have no real life.

Taking their name from the scheming, parasitic lawyer in Charles Dickens' 1850 novel David Copperfield, Uriah Heep is a progressive rock institution who, alongside bands like Deep Purple, Queen, Black Sabbath, and Led Zeppelin, helped lay the foundation for the United Kingdom's vibrant hard rock/heavy metal scene. Founded in 1969 by powerhouse vocalist David Byron and guitarist Mick Box, the group went through a prodigious number of members over the next four decades – nearly 40 different musicians passed through the group over the years. Originally operating under the moniker Spice, Byron and Box eventually recruited guitarist, keyboardist, and vocalist Ken Hensley, bassist Paul Newton, and drummer Nigel Olsson, and made the transition to Uriah Heep – fans often refer to the band as simply Heep. Single Collection is a compilation album of the legendary British rock groop Uriah Heep, released by CD-Maximum in 2000.

Discipline performs some of its better known progressive art rock epics on this 2-disc live recording. Discipline are an independent rock band from Detroit (not to be confused with the moniker that Robert Fripp used pre-Discipline with King Crimson). Since forming in 1987, the band (formed by lead singer and keybordist Matthew Parmenter) have performed and recorded together in a strictly DIY fashion via their indie label, Strung Out Records. The band's debut album, 1988's Chaos Out Of Order saw the band (with Parmenter and guitarist Jon Preston Bouda) laying down the foundation for the sound that would be at their peak with both their 1993 CD Push & Profit and 1997's Unfolded Like Staircase.

With a special surprise the German power metal band Rage rewards its fans for their loyalty and patience during the long waiting period due to the pandemic: In time for the big co-headlining tour with Brainstorm in October and November 2022 and as an appetizer for what will be heard there, singer/bassist Peavy Wagner and his band mates Jean Borman, Stefan Weber (both guitar) and Vassilios "Lucky" Maniatopoulos (drums) will release an EP 'Spreading The Plague' with three previously unreleased new songs and three worthwhile bonus tracks.

These are two of the most formidable soloists on the Scottish scene, pretty much in straightahead mode.
Saxophonist Smith, as he has demonstrated with the American Joanne Brackeen, is a good duo collaborator with pianists, his more languorous Jan Garbarek-like aspect in other settings put aside in favour of a surging, hard-swinging style. But his formidable range, particularly in sustaining a remarkable purity on long, high sounds, is fully unwrapped on this collection of 11 standards old and new, including traditionals such as Billy Strayhorn's Lush Life, and Steve Swallow's Ladies in Mercedes - the latter opening with an abstractedly Monkish piano intro from Kellock…

With jazz – lite and trite, near and drear, pretentious and tendentious – seemingly on the increase, the reissue of five “classic” Parker Verve albums (even in truncated form) is to be welcomed. Newcomers (if any exist) to his latter-day recordings as well as devotees (still alive) will find much to enjoy in this Avid compilation.

From the timeless plainchant Veni Emmanuel via Jonathan Harvey to a riotous Jingle bells: Owain Park presents a programme of Christmas treats which effortlessly spans the centuries.

Off the heels of Grammy-nominated album, Heart of Brazil, comes jazz clarinet icon Eddie Daniels' new project, Night Kisses. Paying tribute to the world-renowned Brazilian musician/composer Ivan Lins, it brings Daniels together with legendary jazz pianists Dave Grusin and Bob James, plus top-shelf trio-Josh Nelson, Kevin Axt, Mauricio Zottarelli - and the Grammy-winning Harlem Quartet. Features songs from Lins' classic `70s/'80s albums and new arrangements by Kuno Schmid and Josh Nelson.

This is an exceptionally accomplished debut recording from cellist Laura van der Heijden, winner of BBC Young Musician of the Year in 2012. It includes Soviet composers’ irritated and defiant responses to the Communist regime’s 1948 decree on what they could write. Prokofiev’s 1949 Sonata is a blistering, angry work, performed here with passion and guts. Myaskovsky’s 1948 Sonata, which, ironically, went on to win the Stalin Prize, harks back to the Romantic age—the richness and depth of van der Heijden’s tone is a thing to behold. The final, melancholy Lyadov Prelude is an aching portrait of Russian despair.