Ray Russell has had quite the glittering career. Setting off at age 15 with the John Berry Seven, the guitarist went on to play with the Graham Bond Organisation and then Georgie Fame & the Blue Flames. Eventually, Russell would lend his talents on-stage and/or in the studio to a plethora of performers, from Tina Turner to Lulu, the Bee Gees to Phil Collins, and branching out in the '70s to compose for the small screen. Amidst this busy career, Russell also put together the odd band, like the Running Man, whose sole, eponymous album was released with little fanfare in 1972. The core trio of Russell on both guitar and bass, vocalist/organist Alan Greed, and vocalist/drummer Alan Rushton was supplemented by Harry Beckett on trumpet and flügelhorn and the late Gary Windo on tenor sax.
Composed over wide time intervals, Hans Werner Henze's three Violin Concertos represent key stages of his development, and mark his early efforts in twelve-tone composition, his mature phase of experimental political theater, and his late, emotionally charged programmatic style. The Concerto No. 1 (1948) is similar in some respects to Alban Berg's Violin Concerto, particularly in Henze's blending of the row with tonal features; yet in its comparative leanness and transparency, this piece is less like Berg than the complex Concerto No. 3 (1997), which, in its intense evocation of Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus, shares much more of the passionate and disturbing colors and textures of Wozzeck or Lulu.
For the majority of American listeners, Lulu's career began and ended with "To Sir with Love," the theme song to the 1967 box office hit, though she enjoyed considerably greater success in the United Kingdom, and not without reason. Lulu had a solid, spirited voice that could handle an admirable range of material, and she tended to get good songs that she made the most of with the assistance of some very talented studio help (John Paul Jones arranged much of the material on her 1969 set Lulu's Album).
Little Soul In Your Heart is an album of soul covers by the British pop singer Lulu.