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As the title and subtitle imply, this is a kind of greatest-hits album, with music selected by ECM label producer Manfred Eicher from the 12 albums on the label devoted to the music of Arvo Pärt. Pärt's music is so malleable that people tend to make their own versions of it rather than collect it, but if you wanted an anthology as a starter box, this would be the one to choose. Eicher has worked closely with Pärt since the 1980s, and he has indeed made a sensible "sequence" out of works that do …
The 1984 ECM album Tabula Rasa was the vehicle that introduced the revolutionary music of Arvo Pärt to audiences outside Eastern Europe and initiated what was to become one of the most extraordinary musical careers of the late 20th century. Like many of the first generation American minimalists, he limited himself to diatonic harmonies and generated pieces by setting processes in motion, but the radical simplicity he achieved was the result of religious contemplation that was at least as, if not…
The closely affiliated Black Saint and Soul Note labels were established in the 1970s by Italian jazz lover Giacomo Pellicciotti, and together they released some of the most forward-thinking jazz recordings on the market during their four decades of independent existence (both labels were acquired by another company in 2008). In 2011, the labels' new owner began releasing a series of budget-priced box sets documenting the complete output of particular artists, each individual disc housed in an L…
CD version. The album Premonition is a masterpiece of spiritual jazz, and reflects the spiritual awakening of a natural musical genius, Umlah Sadau Holt. In the 1970s, Holt was involved in all kinds of jazz, reggae, and world music projects in the San Francisco Bay Area. Over time he absorbed the global rhythms that can only come from extensive involvement with a variety of international musicians, and he integrated them into his own developing ideas of jazz. When his friend Emmanuel Nado return…
* 2021 stock * Steve Reich's landmark Music for 18 Musicians is perhaps Steve Reich’s most popular, if not most important, piece of music. Defining characteristics of Music for 18 Musicians piece include an ethereal, trance vibe, pulsating bass clarinets, a consistent beat, and slowly developing chord progressions unfolding over the length of approximately one hour. Steve Reich’s genre-defining minimalist compositional tool, phasing, is demonstrated in full force here. We will dive deeper into …
Michael Ranta has collaborated with Takehisa Kosugi, Toshi Ichiyanagi, Jean-Claude Eloy, Conny Plank, Mike Lewis, and Hartmut Geerken, just to name a few. He was also assistant to Harry Partch and performer in the Gate 5 Ensemble in the 1960s. Additionally, Ranta performed in Stockhausen's ensemble during the 1970 World Expo in Osaka. Ranta's resume also includes recordings by Helmut Lachenmann, Herbert Brün, Toru Takemitsu, Josef Anton Riedl, Mauricio Kagel, among others. Throughout his extensi…
Saba developed ‘world music’ beyond its jazz label remit, the eclectic ‘Jazz Meets The World’ series brought together artists from Japan, India, Tunisia, Indonesia and Brazil. Producer Joachim-Ernst Berendt travelled to Rio in 1966 to create SABA’s first Brazilian release with a giant of the scene, guitarist Baden Powell. The resulting album, one of Baden’s greatest, bore two deeply rhythmic, spiritual titles found on this 45. ‘Sarava’ is a trance-like ritualistic number designed to whip dancers…
Nathan Davis recorded ‘The Hip Walk’ in 1965 alongside his school mate, trumpeter Carmell Jones (who a month later went on to record the Song for My Father album with Horace Silver). The quintet is backed by the tightest of rhythm sections: Francy Boland on piano, Jimmy Woode on bass and Kenny Clarke on drums. One of the most beautiful, swinging jazz pieces ever captured on tape, ‘Carmell’s Black Forest Waltz’ is presented in all-analogue richness on 45 single format for the first time. On side …
Although considered to be the greatest jazz singer the world has ever known, Mark Murphy remained underground with a cult status. Perhaps the pinnacle of his recording career was Midnight Mood released by SABA in 1968, aligning his unique vocal skills with the Clarke-Boland Octet. With the arrangements of Francy Boland, Kenny Clarke playing offbeats and between-beats, and individualists like Sahib Shihab and Ake Persson, the backing on this date provided a unique dialogue for Murphy. After the l…
A major discovery and first recording of an important Cage piece from 1944. In 1944, John Cage was invited to participate in “The Imagery of Chess” exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York City. The artists included Calder, Noguchi, Motherwell, Breton, Duchamp, Ernst, Man Ray, Tanning and other leading surrealists.Cage contributed a painting entitled “Chess Pieces”. It was purchased at the show and went into a private collection. For decades it was deemed lost and was (almost) forgotten…
Vocalion presents The Zodiac Variations / The $1,000,000 Collection by John Dankworth His Orchestra & Guests. John Dankworth: Most of the world knew John Dankworth best as Cleo Laine’s longtime husband and accompanist, but he was a steady player for many decades. He started his career in a novelty and traditional ensemble called the Garbage Men, led by Freddy Mirfield. Dankworth studied at the Royal Academy of Music from 1944 to1946. He began the Johnny Dankworth Seven in 1950, and from 1953 to …
Gabor Szabo's Faces, recorded for Mercury in 1977, is a distinctly jazz-fusion album. It was produced by trombonist and former Crusaders member Wayne Henderson, with the rhythm section coming from the soul-jazz-funk band Pleasure, with whom Henderson was working for the Fantasy label at the time. Built on gripping rough funk grooves, the music leaves plenty of room for Szabó's elegant guitar lines and meticulously constructed solos. The album, which was rather neglected when it was released, can…
Prior to co-founding the Incredible String Band, Clive Palmer had already made a name for himself as a versatile instrumentalist from his teenage years busking around London. Just after the first ISB album was released, he would quit the band and seemingly vanished from the scene, traveling around Europe, India and Afghanistan. He resurfaced with his banjo a few years later under the guise of COB, Clive's Original Band, with instrumentalists and songwriting partners Mick Bennett and John Bidwell…
Considered one of the masterpieces of seventies psychedelic, his second album, released in 1973, is the result of a partnership with Tibério Gaspar (author of: "Sá Marina", "BR-3" and "Teletema"). The album was recorded at Rádio Gazeta Studios in São Paulo, with the participation of musicians already known as: Wagner Tiso on synthesizer, Luiz Claudio Ramos on arrangements and conducting, Lanny Gordin on guitar, Oberdan Magalhães on flute and Guilherme himself playing guitar and piano. Guilherme …
**Much needed repress.** Often, when looking back over the history if experimental music in France, easy divisions can be seen to emerge. There are the pioneers of improvised music, usually associated with jazz, and there are the pioneers of electronic music, including tape, synthesis, and electroacoustic practice. This separation is convenient and serves historians well, providing simple answers for the what and why of what occurred, but, in most cases, fails to represent the true spirit of any…
Constructed like an invented tarot deck, De Mòrt Viva explores the idea of a contemporary paganism in ten jubilant, humorous and spiritual odes. The Auvergne Occitan imposes itself at the spittoon, deploying its metaphorical and polysemic network, with the particular candor of a newly acquired language. The melody is born from the word, the poem gives birth to the song, in a form that could recall from afar and without erudition, the trobar, the art of the troubadours. In this game-album each pi…
300 copies Available now is the much belated debut album of SnoOks, a selection of No Wave Synth Beat with spoken word and vocals, by Eric Svensson and the late Jim Shepard. In the early 80's, when Jim was composing for his bands Vertical Slit and Skullbank, he got in touch with Eric (aka Doktor Liborius) who inspired him with his fresh experimental music and Jim suggested it could be a vehicle for his lyrics. They started exchanging recordings via mail, between Sweden and the US. Jim was ambit…
This is a reissue of a now out-of-print album from live trio date by the legendary LA-based pianist, composer and multi-bandleader, Horace Tapscott. Pianist Horace Tapscott is always at his best when he is leading a trio. Born in 1934 in Houston, Texas, Horace came from a musical family centered around his mother, Mary Malone Tapscott, who worked professionally as a singer and pianist. When Horace was nine, the family moved to Los Angeles. As a teenager in the late 1940's, Horace was surrounded …
** Edition of 500 **Quartet Records, in collaboration with Handmade Films, is proud to present a remastered LP reissue of an early masterpiece from legendary composer John Williams (The Towering Inferno, The Cowboys, Jaws, E.T., The River) for Robert Altman’s 1972 psychological thriller-drama starring Susannah York. The film inspired one of Williams’ most fascinating and avant-garde scores. The composer based his ideas on two different musical styles: one more classical, almost childlike, the ot…
Deluxe Edition housed in a cloth-bound clamshell box with reproductions of LHI-era artifacts including press photos and a reproduction plane ticket used by Lee Hazelwood back in '70. But the true icing on the cake is three data discs which include just about every 45 single and every LP ever released on LHI in both WAV and MP3 formats. At around 17 albums and 72 singles (totaling 305 songs!), that's a whole lot of Lee. 2013 five disc (four CDs + DVD) book/box set. This landmark box set is the ul…