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Florence, 19th October 1587: Francesco de Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany dies with his wife under suspicious circumstances. His brother Ferdinando inherits the title, leaves the monkhood for worldly aspirations including finding a wife. On 2nd May 1589, he married Christine of Lorraine, granddaughter of Catherine de Medici, mother of the King of France. As was the custom at European courts, the wedding was accompanied with splendid festivities, each one outshining the last, to convey the image of the new monarchy.

Hard Time Killin' Floor isn't the first Skip James collection, and one could bet it will not be the last. But Hard Time Killin' Floor makes a pretty good argument for itself: the hour-and-six-minute album holds all of James' early work, and it's been remastered. James' soulful vocal style, like Robert Johnson's, has often been noted, but his quick picking style is also distinctive. "I'm So Glad" is performed at an up-tempo, breakneck pace, and the finger work will leave the listener dizzy. The title cut, on the other hand, has a slow, lazy quality, with the blue notes of the guitar matching the singer's mournful cry. James was somewhat unique among blues guitarists in that he also played piano. His spunky gospel style is on full display on songs like "How Long Buck" and the bizarrely titled "Little Cow and Calf Is Gonna Die Blues"…

Many genuine psychedelic enthusiasts feel like heading for the hills when the phrase "psychedelic pop" rears its head in reviews, especially when used in connection with British bands of the late '60s - one gets sonic images of tinkling harpsichords and trippy pop/rock tunes. Skip Bifferty's self-titled LP is one of the notable exceptions - oh, they're cheerfully spaced out, and their music is heavily ornamented with bells, echo, and all manner of sound effects, but at its core, this was a ballsy, hard-playing band that recognized the need for a solid rock & roll base to this kind of music. They might not exactly have been the Rolling Stones but they could have given the Idle Race or the Creation a run for their money. "Guru" is the trippiest number here, a tabla-laden piece of minimalist psychedelia that's all voices chanting and pounding percussion, and it works…

Even by the supremely high production standards of Alpha recordings, this issue is especially splendid. Entitled Versailles, L'ile enchantée, it fully lives up to its name. As directed by Skip Sempé, the widely varied program features music written for Louis XIV's pleasure palace, performed by the Capriccio Stravagante Orchestra with mezzo soprano Guillemette Laurens and bass violist Jay Bernfeld. Each work is superbly selected, and every performance is absolutely idiomatic and wonderfully alive. There is wit and tenderness and elegance and, yes, nobility to their performances, which taken together form as much a portrait of the Sun King as the palace of Versailles itself.

The numerous instrumental pieces or 'Symphonies' found in the dramatic works of Rameau are remarkably effective on the harpsichord: the composer himself, with his transcription of 'Les Indes Galantes' invited other musicians to continue this tradition.
Seizing on the formidable array of material available in his operas: Platée, Zoroastre, Dardanus, Les Paladins, Pygmalion… Pierre Hantai and Skip Sempé, our finest exponents of this repertoire, take obvious pleasure in revealing, through the two harpsichords, the immense richness of this music, full of surprises and imagination.

Skip Sempé, distinguished for many years as a master interpreter of the French classical harpsichord repertoire, has recently been hailed as the quintessential ambassador of French Baroque music. With his ensemble Capriccio Stravagante, Sempé presents a fascinating collection of orchestral repertoire from the seventeenth century. La Belle Danse revives the tradition of the 24 Violons of Versailles the most celebrated orchestra of seventeenth century Europe. The album transports the listener to Versailles at the time of Louis XIII and Louis XIV with a dazzling tour of ouvertures and suites by Lully, Marais and Muffat. A selection of rare repertoire that influenced the first generation musicians of the 24 Violons is also included, with dance and theatre music by Michael Praetorius, William Brade and Luigi Rossi.

Fans of harpsichord music are likely to be enchanted by A French Collection, which includes 17 pièces de clavecin from the Baroque repertoire, performed by Skip Sempé. Each piece, from Duphly's lovely Les Grâces to Balbastre's turbulent La Suzanne, is charming in itself, and taken together they form an attractive cross-section of French harpsichord music from the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Sempé has been a prominent early music interpreter, both a soloist and ensemble leader, with a long line of recordings dating back to 1990.

Today! is Skip James’ second album, originally released in 1966. The album features James solo on all but one track, “How Long,” which includes Russ Savakus on bass. This 180-gram LP pressed at QRP includes an obi with notes by Scott Billington, a paper-wrapped jacket and (AAA) lacquers cut from the original master tapes by Matthew Lutthans at The Mastering Lab. AllMusic asserts, “wonderful vocals, superb guitar and a couple of tunes with tasty piano make this essential.”