Little Dead Rotting Hood (2016)

The first disc here includes the group’s performance at the intimate Ebbets Field venue in Denver Colorado, recorded on 19th July 1973, just a few months after the release of Dixie Chicken, arguably Little Feat’s most cherished album. Next up comes the 1974 in-studio recording they made for transmission at New York’s Ultrasound Studios on 19th September that year, shortly after Feats Don’t Fail Me Now came out, another favourite LP among those in the know. Finally, the set concludes with one of the most famous gigs they ever performed, the 1975 Halloween show from Boston’s majestic Orpheum Theatre, a recording made a month before The Last Record Album was issued.

Exorcizing the ghost of a failed relationship via the time-honored tradition of the breakup album, Norah Jones luxuriates in beautiful misery on Little Broken Hearts. Liberated by the separation but not quite ready to let it go, Jones achieves a curious subdued tension here, dressing unadorned confessionals in softly stylized studio noir created with the assistance of producer Danger Mouse, who collaborated with her the year before on the collective Rome. Seeming opposites – the classicist meets the futurist – Jones and Danger Mouse are well matched, as both artists are not as set in their ways as their individual reputations would suggest.

Of the three Bang on a Can founder composers, David Lang’s music has always been the glassiest, the sparest, and for some listeners the most precious. In recent years, his aesthetic has become leaner still, paring down already simple material to gaunt extremes in something approaching neo-plainchant. The national anthems (note the lower case; nothing vainglorious here ) takes fragments of text from the anthems of all 193 United Nations member states and unfolds at speaking speed, with plenty of room for breaths between phrases and plenty of clarity to the words. It has the feel of sad and eerie intoning. The Los Angeles choir clinches the right sound for Lang – unflinching, spellbound – while the Calder Quartet gives sleek accompaniment. Also on the disc is a new choral version of Lang’s little match girl passion, the piece originally for four voices that won him the Pulitzer prize in 2008 and which, in the mouths of many, becomes a sort of collective prayer in the congregational tradition of Bach’s chorales.

Forty-five years after her death, Mahalia Jackson remains the world's most famous gospel singer. "Moving On Up A Little Higher" explores Mahalia's roots, as she performs hymns of her childhood and reunites with her mentor, Thomas A. Dorsey. These performances date from 1946 to 1957, when Mahalia's voice was at it's golden best. Highlights include the only known recording of Mahalia, accompanied by Thomas A. Dorsey, two live versions of her first and greatest hit, "Move On Up A Little Higher" and two of her most important concerts: a 1951 symposium that introduced her to a larger, interracial public and the 1957 Newport Jazz Festival concert.