Airboss II (1998)

EMI invited Daniel Barenboim to record the complete series, with the English Chamber Orchestra, as conductor and soloist. The recordings were made at London's Abbey Road Studios between 1967 and 1974.

Malcolm Bilson once gave a lecture-demonstration in which he said that of all the composers he played, Schubert gained most from being heard on an antique piano. According to Bilson, Schubert's phrases are designed for instruments whose notes die away more quickly than they do on the modern piano. Whatever the reason, Bilson, here playing on a colorful-sounding Graf fortepiano from 1835, gives extremely effective and convincing performances of both of these major Schubert sonatas, which gain in transparency from the early instrument without losing their emotional force. Very highly recommended.

Metallica formed in 1981 by vocalist/guitarist James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich. The duo first met through an ad in a Los Angeles-based music newspaper. At the time, Ulrich had little musical experience and no band but managed to secure a slot on an upcoming compilation record called “Metal Massacre”. Metallica’s contribution, “Hit The Lights”, featured Hetfield, Ulrich and lead guitarist Lloyd Grant…

Christoph Willibald Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice is an opera whose historical value is as great as its musical worth. It stands as a starting point for what is often referred to as the “Gluck reform” of Italian serious opera, and the first performance of Orfeo, which took place in Vienna on the 5th of October 1762, is considered to be one of the key moments in the history of music in the eighteenth century.