Mastered directly from the original master tape by Ryan K. Smith at Sterling Sound.
From the wreckage of Free came Bad Company, a group fronted by singer Paul Rodgers and featuring his drummer bandmate Simon Kirke, Mott the Hoople guitarist Mick Ralphs, and King Crimson bassist Boz Burrell. The latter is something of a ringer, suggesting an undercurrent of adventure in the band, but as the group's eponymous 1974 debut decidedly proves, the band is proudly not progressive. If anything, Bad Company excise the excesses of Free - there are no winding jams and very little added color by way of pianos or even air in the production; those two tricks are evident on their title track/rallying call "Bad Company," and the details make a difference, as do the pastoral acoustics of the closing "Seagull" - reducing their rock & roll to a strong, heavy crunch…

Howlin' Wolf's first and second Chess albums are essential listening of the highest order. They were compiled - as were all early blues albums - from various single sessions (not necessarily a bad thing, either), and blues fans will probably debate endlessly about which of the two albums is the perfect introduction to his music. But this CD reissue renders all arguments moot, as both album appear on one disc, making this a true best buy. Wolf's debut opus – curiously tacked on here after his second album - features all of his early hits ("How Many More Years," "Moanin' at Midnight," "Smokestack Lightning," "Forty Four," "Evil," and "I Asked for Water [She Gave Me Gasoline]"), and is a pretty potent collection in its own right. But it is the follow-up (always referred to as "the rocking chair album" because of Don Bronstein's distinctive cover art) where the equally potent teaming of Willie Dixon and Wolf produced one Chicago blues classic…

Ray Brown was in at the beginning of the Concord Jazz record label in the early '70s, and starting with Brown's Bag in 1975, he recorded a dozen albums as a leader for Concord before departing for Telarc Records in the early '90s. This two-disc compilation, with a running time of almost two hours and 20 minutes, presents 24 selections drawn from 19 Concord Jazz albums recorded between 1973 and 1993, including live performances at the Concord Jazz Festivals, recordings by Brown's trio and the L.A. 4, and a Brown duet with Jimmy Rowles, among other configurations. As a bass player, Brown only rarely solos, so one usually notices the horn players (Harry "Sweets" Edison, Red Holloway, Plas Johnson, Richie Kamuca, Blue Mitchell, Ralph Moore, and Bud Shank), the pianists (Monty Alexander, George Duke, Gene Harris, Art Hillery, and Rowles), or other frontline musicians…

Hiatus present a reissue of Narnia's Aslan Is Not A Tame Lion, originally released in 1974. Narnia's acid folk masterpiece from 1974 remains one of progressive rock's most inspired and enchanting rarities. Narnia emerged from the Christian rock scene with bands such as Parchment, merging their faith with a modern rock format. Pauline Filby and an early incarnation of After The Fire were both established names in their own right, but joined forces in 1974 to record this classic album. Playing alongside acts such as Blodwyn Pig, Budgie, and Savoy Brown, Narnia were about to take evangelist Britain through a major shift and Aslan Is Not A Tame Lion is an incredible testament to this chapter in both Christian music and British acid folk rock. Includes five bonus tracks from Pauline Filby's 1969 solo album Show Me A Rainbow, including the rare single cut "I'm Hungry". Professionally remastered; includes background liners and rare archival memorabilia.

If OMD's debut album showed the band could succeed just as well on full-length efforts as singles, Organisation upped the ante even further, situating the band in the enviable position of at once being creative innovators and radio-friendly pop giants. That was shown as much by the astounding lead track and sole single from the album, "Enola Gay." Not merely a great showcase for new member Holmes, whose live-wire drumming took the core electronic beat as a launching point and easily outdid it, "Enola Gay" is a flat-out pop classic - clever, heartfelt, thrilling, and confident, not to mention catchy and arranged brilliantly. The outrageous use of the atomic bomb scenario - especially striking given the era's nuclear war fears - informs the seemingly giddy song with a cut-to-the-quick fear and melancholy, and the result is captivating…

During his years at Weimar Bach made a number of keyboard arrangements of concertos and instrumental movements by other composers. His arrangements of concertos by Vivaldi, six of them for harpsichord and three for organ, remind us of the strong influence Vivaldi exercised over Bach's Instrumental compositions. The sixteen arrangements for harpsichord include a keyboard version of an oboe concerto by Alessandro Marcello, a violin concerto by Telemann and three concertos by Prince Johann Ernst of Saxe-Weimar. The six concertos transcribed for organ also include arrangements of two concertos by Duke Johann Ernst. The latter was a nephew of Bach's employer and a pupil for keyboard and for composition of Johann Gottfried Walther, organist of the Weimar Stadtkirche. His principal instrument was the violin and Telemann wrote for him a set of six sonatas for violin and clavier. Johann Ernst died in 1715 at the age of nineteen, leaving nineteen instrumental works. Of these six concertos were published posthumously by Telemann in 1718.

Digitally remastered and expanded edition of this album from the Rock singer, songwriter and guitarist. First album Children of the Future was produced by Glyn Johns at Olympic Studios in London, and released in April 1968. The five-man line-up featured Steve Miller on guitar and vocals, Boz Scaggs on guitar and vocals, Lonnie Turner on bass, Tim Davis on drums and Jim Peterman on keyboards. The original side one of the album features a suite of linked psychedelic songs, while side two starts with two Boz Scaggs originals before culminating in a selection of blues cover versions. The bonus track is the non-album single side 'Sittin' in Circles'. The booklet of this Special Digipak Edition contains all the lyrics, a brand new booklet note by San Francisco journalist Joel Selvin, based on 2012 interviews with Steve Miller himself, and photos from Steve's own collection.

Joseph Calleja, one of the world’s leading tenors, announces ‘Ave Maria’ – his first ever sacred album. Here, Calleja is joined for the first time on record by the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra, with no less than four Ave Marias – by Mascagni, Massenet, Schubert and Andrea Bocelli. The album also features guest appearances by Daniel Hope on violin in (title) and French baritone Étienne Dupuis in the famous duet from The Pearl Fishers.

The Wiener Streichsextett, founded in 1981, probably is one of the most famous ensembles of all time in its genre. In these recordings they present the rarely performed — but highly acclaimed — String Sextets of Johannes Brahms. The ensemble shines with perfect interplay and rousing emotionality.

Franz Tunder is known as Buxtehude s precursor as the organist of St. Mary in Lübeck. His works offer the image of a multifaceted musician and composer, whose compositions were obviously influenced by the northern German tradition. This is reflected by the selection of rare compositions presented on this CD.

Ultimate Prince is a 2006 greatest hits compilation album featuring the work of Prince. The two-disc set contains a disc of some previously released hits (some in single edit form; only "My Name Is Prince" has not been on a previous hits collection), and another of extended remixes of hits and a B-side, most of which have only been previously released as vinyl 12-inch singles.

2016 three CD collection. As that noted hipster Plato once observed, when the mode of the music changes, the walls of the city shake. And there was certainly a whole lotta shakin' goin' on in 1967. A distended Summer of Love saw psychedelic pop emerging from the underground clubs to infiltrate the home-grown music scene mainstream, with the vast majority following in the footsteps of perennial market leaders The Beatles in surrendering to the new genre. As the year progressed, it seemed that more or less every element of the British pop world had been swept up in the blissed-out UFOria. Beat boom survivors, R&B stalwarts, sharp-suited mods, Swinging London soul revues, earnest acoustic folkies, Denmark Street hustlers, traditional pop acts… all abandoned or refined their previous identities to make music that reflected the ubiquitous influence of psychedelia in it's myriad paisley-patterned guises. Across four hours and eighty tracks, the all-singing, not-much-dancing Let's Go Down And Blow Our Minds anticipates the 50th anniversary of the Summer of Love to chronicle a tumultuous twelve-month period of music-making within the British Isles.

Antal Dorati was a veteran ballet conductor and a personal friend of Stravinsky. His recording of The Firebird was a legend in its own time, and its reappearance on CD, sounding better than ever, immediately reestablished its supremacy. All of Stravinsky's complete ballets–as opposed to the suites– have "dead spots," moments when the music sort of stops and lurches about, illustrating something happening onstage. That's why the composer made the suites in the first place. However, many of his most fascinating orchestral ideas occur precisely in these "dead spots," which is why many conductors and audiences prefer the works complete. Trust Dorati: he's the most reliable guide to this music, and his orchestra gives him a virtuoso response.

Miriways met with enthusiasm when rediscovered after 284 years in 2012. 'That the score of Miriways…is such a…delight to hear owes…to the Austrian conductor Michi Gaigg and her L'Orfeo Baroque Orchestra…' (J. Gahre in Das Opernglas). Mir Wais was an Afghan tribal prince who led several revolts to liberate Kandahar from Persian rule, a very current political subject when staged in Hamburg in 1728, and now. Telemann's music is colorful, lavishly instrumented, and richly Oriental in color.

Just in time for the 20th anniversary of the self titled Melodic Power Metal masterpiece, the debut album of Masterplan is finally available again!
Helloween alumni Roland Grapow and Uli Kusch made the best of their quarrelsome ousting from the German power metal pioneers, quickly getting right back into the thick of it with a new band project called Masterplan. Surrounding themselves with fellow veterans of the power metal community like Ark vocalist Jorn Lande and Iron Saviour bassist Jan S. Eckert only helped speed up their trajectory, and a record deal and debut E.P. soon set the stage for 2003's eponymous debut. And to their credit, Masterplan have concocted a remarkably memorable album, one which displays surprising variety and creativity within a severely over-crowded sub-genre with, let's admit, very little experimental wiggle room…