Before And After

If you know the great orchestral works of English modernist composer Gerald Finzi – his cello and clarinet concertos, his Eclogue, and Grand Fantasia & Toccata for piano and orchestra – you don't know the half of Finzi. And even if you know his great setting of Wordsworth's "Intimations of Immortality" for tenor, chorus, and orchestra, you still don't know the best of Finzi. For the best of Finzi, try this two-disc set of his five-song cycle to poems by Thomas Hardy. Like Schubert with Müller, Finzi had a particular affinity for Hardy and his special brand of pantheistic pastoral pessimism and his settings have a depth of understanding and an authenticity of utterance that make them especially effective and affecting.

Charlie Brooks - Before And After Workout (DVD) … Brooks’ Before And After Workout finds fitness trainer Dee Thresher putting the former soap star through her paces with a series of five ten minute workouts. Brooks herself claims to have lost a couple of stone using the routines on the disc already, and it’s easy to believe why. And rather than, as some in the genre choose to do, focusing heavily on the celebrity, this fitness discs puts its firm emphasis on the workout routines. They’re explained clearly, are straightforward to follow, and there’s enough variety to ensure you don’t get bored.