Detail April 2020

Imagine the cave where music was born. In the introduction to their 9th studio album "HUMAN. II: NATURE.", NIGHTWISH take us all the way back to this ancient place and time when bashing rocks became rhythm and voice turned into harmonies. In the course of the millennia, this amazing cultural achievement evolved via Bach and Beethoven into blues, rock and heavy metal – a mental journey that the Finns trace in their upcoming full-length’s first song, ‘Music’.

The Cologne-based historical-performance group Compagnia di Punto has mostly specialized in Baroque and Classical-period music, but here, perhaps due to the fact that the ill-fated year of 2020 marks Beethoven's 250th birthday, they offer arrangements of Beethoven's first three symphonies for a small orchestra. The group includes 13 players: four violinists, one each of viola, cello, and bass, two flutes, bassoon, and three horns. By now, most listeners realize that 19th century listeners, unable to just download the latest Beethoven symphony, relied on arrangements of this kind to hear new music, but the idea needs repetition and new recordings like this one.

Kamasi Washington scored the new Michelle Obama documentary Becoming, which premiered on Netflix today (May 6). The film follows Obama on her tour in support of her best-selling memoir Becoming: A Guided Journal for Discovering Your Voice. Washington’s score for the documentary will be released on May 15 (via Young Turks).