Adam Liaw's Asian Cookery School

Adam Faith, born Terry Nelhams in Acton, London, on June 23, 1940, was second only to Cliff Richard as Britain's teenage idol in the early Sixties. His first ambition was to be a film editor and after school he worked as a messenger boy at Rank Screen Services. But caught up in the skiffle craze, he became vocalist with the Worried Men, a group formed by workmates at Rank, until after a year, Jack Good, the scholarly ombudsman of English rock'n'roll, suggested that Nelhams go solo as Adam Faith.

Adam Golka's third album for FHR begins a wonderful journey in which he records all of Beethovens 32 Piano Sonatas. This first volume, released in Beethovens 250th anniversary year, includes one of the composers most celebrated works, the Pathétique Sonata in C minor, alongside the contrasting Sonatas, Op. 10.

"Ascanio in Alba" K. 111 came about through the good offices of Count Firmian, who had shared the Milan audience's enthusiasm for "Mitridate" and exerted his influence on the Empress in Vienna. He suggested entrusting the young Mozart with the composition of a festa teatrale for the wedding of the Empress's son, Archduke Ferdinand, and Maria Beatrice d'Este of Modena. Mozart began working on the score in late August 1771.

Bass-baritone Adam Plachetka presents Molieri, a programme of opera arias by Mozart and Salieri, together with the Czech Ensemble Baroque under the baton of Roman Válek. Thanks to fictional works such as the film Amadeus, Antonio Salieri is often scapegoated as the man who allegedly caused Mozart’s untimely death out of professional envy. Despite the fact that this is obviously not true, Salieri’s popularity has suffered from this popular myth-making, and most of his operas have sunk into oblivion. Molieri brings the two composers together, focusing on bass-8 baritone arias from their opera buffas. Famous arias from Mozart’s Da Ponte operas are heard in a completely different light when paired to excerpts from Salieri’s Falstaff, Axur, La grotto di Trofonio and La scuola de’ gelosi. It also makes clear why Salieri enjoyed such success, as well as why great composers such as Beethoven, Schubert and Liszt all wanted to study with him. Given the importance of Prague for Mozart’s operatic successes, the music fits the players of Czech Ensemble Baroque like a glove, and Plachetka possesses the optimal combination of vocal authority and agility to sing these buffo roles.

Smoking Popes - It's Been A Long Day (2010) {Asian Man Records AM-192}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 380 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 120 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (png) -> 73 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2010 Smoking Popes / Asian Man Records | AM-192
Rock / Pop Punk / Alternative Rock / Indie

The Smoking Popes have been banging out their peculiar brand of poppy punk (distinct from the official, claustrophobically codified pop-punk designation) since the start of the ‘90s, with some time off in the first half of the 2000s. They've become something of a punk institution over the years, and It's Been a Long Day offers a look back at their beginnings, with a track list consisting mostly of songs from their early-‘90s EPs, which were cranked out before their first full-length took them one step closer to cult hero status. Admittedly, it shares many tunes in common with the earlier Popes anthology, 1991-1998, but where that collection spent much of its time on tracks from the debut album, this one concentrates on pre-album material.

The classy interpretation of Mozart's Così fan tutte concluded Claus Guth's Mozart-Da Ponte opera trilogy at the Salzburg Festival. Hosted in the intimate surroundings of the Haus für Mozart, the comic tale of fi ancée-swapping is fl irtatiously retold by a dynamic cast and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra under Adam Fischer. Guth's imaginative production maintains the opera's musical drama and humour in a contemporary setting, where young men test their lovers in an entertaining game of seduction and temptation.