Prayer

Deutsche Grammophon is proud to release the world premiere recording of Jóhann Jóhannsson’s A Prayer to the Dynamo. This major orchestral work was inspired in general by the composer’s fascination with technology, and in particular by field recordings he made at Iceland’s Elliðaár power plant and the writings of Henry Adams.

Herbie Hancock - Hear, O Israel: A Prayer Ceremony In Jazz (1968) {Jonny Records JBH025CD rel 2008}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 212 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 91 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 6 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1968, 2008 Jonny Records / Trunk | JBH025CD
Jazz / Post Bop / Modal Music / Soul Jazz / Modern Creative

In 1965, encouraged by his rabbi, the 17-year-old Jonathan Klein wrote a selection of jazz themes for a Jewish Sabbath concert. Originally recorded in 1968 by an all-star cast of musicians that included Herbie Hancock, Thad Jones, and Ron Carter, the collection is a unique, free-flowing series of pieces that perfectly complement the accompanying Jewish Sabbath prayers, and provides a rare opportunity to hear these talented musicians performing in a unique setting that's at once creative and intensely devotional.

Yusef Lateef - Prayer to the East (1957) {Savoy Jazz Japan SV-0210 rel 1993}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 222 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 107 Mb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (jpg) -> 132 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1957, 1993 Savoy Jazz / Nippon Columbia Japan | SV-0210
Jazz / Hard Bop / Post Bebop / Flute / Saxophone

A half-a-century following its original release, Prayer to the East by Yusef Lateef remains a seemingly blessed moment of creative interaction between American modern jazz and the music of the so-called Arab East, the latter evoked in essences ranging from snippets of traditional musical scales to picture postcards of Tunisian nightlife. The second half of the '50s was a busy period for Lateef, at that time under contract to the Savoy imprint. This album as well as three others were all cut in October of 1957, establishing as much documentation as could ever be needed of a transition from a player in the swing context of bandleaders such as Lucky Millinder and Hot Lips Page to a bold adventurer.

Playing piano-style single-note lines on his Hammond B-3 organ, Jimmy Smith revolutionized the use of the instrument in a jazz combo setting in the mid-'50s and early '60s, and arguably his best albums for Blue Note during this period were the ones he did with tenor sax player Stanley Turrentine. Recorded on February 8, 1963, at Van Gelder Studio in New Jersey, and featuring Quentin Warren on guitar and Donald Bailey on drums in addition to Smith and Turrentine, Prayer Meetin' is a delight from start to finish. Forming a perfect closure to Smith's trio of albums with Turrentine (Midnight Special and Back at the Chicken Shack were both released in 1960), Prayer Meetin' was the last of four albums Smith recorded in a week to finish off his Blue Note contract before leaving for Verve.

"A Maiden's Prayer" (original Polish title: Modlitwa dziewicy Op. 4, French: La prière d'une vierge) is a composition of Polish composer Tekla Bądarzewska-Baranowska (born 1834 in Warsaw, died September 29, 1861 in Warsaw), which was published in 1856 in Warsaw, and then as a supplement to the Revue et gazette musicale de Paris in 1859. The piece, which is still recorded, is a medium difficulty short piano piece for intermediate pianists. Some have liked it for its charming and romantic melody: others have described it as "sentimental salon tosh."

And here we have another winner in BIS's magnificent series of the symphonies and piano concertos of Alexander Tcherepnin. The music is marvelous, and the performances very good. To start with the two purely orchestral works, the Symphonic Prayer and the Magna mater are stylistically similar yet imaginative and written in a rather personal idiom. Both are based on chorale harmonies, but the music is nevertheless overall full of energy. No, there are no immediately memorable themes here, but both works are of the kind where you immediately appreciate every move and magnificently wrought detail…….

G.D @ Amazon.com

‘Whatever meaning my life has is to be found in the music itself’, declared William Schuman of his extraordinary career as a composer and artistic catalyst in the fertile and evolving environment of 20th-century America. His single-movement Symphony No. 6 stands as one of his most intense and integrated, its somberness enlivened with intricate rhythms and startling counterpoint. Prayer in a Time of War and New England Triptych highlight Schuman’s abiding sense of patriotism, the former written soon after America’s entry into World War II, the latter based on hymns from the time of the American Revolution.