Very Interesting 2021

Tenor saxophonist Bob Cooper's only Contemporary album is a near-classic and one of his finest recordings. Cooper, along with trombonist Frank Rosolino, vibraphonist Victor Feldman, pianist Lou Levy, bassist Max Bennett, and drummer Mel Lewis, performs colorful versions of five standards (best are "Confirmation," "Easy Living," and "Somebody Loves Me") that show off his attractive tone and ability to swing at any tempo…

Over the past 15 years, German electro act Solar Fake has been on the scene, releasing five albums and a handful of EPs full of their brand of aggressive yet melodic music. Enjoy Dystopia comes three years since the last studio album, offering a solid follow-up to 2018’s You Win. Who Cares? with a bit more aggression added into the industrial/electro-pop mix.

Those who still think of Wagner’s Tristan as quintessentially erotic music should definitely reconsider: in the list drawn by The Most Erotic Classical Music of All Time, an album with a provocative cover featuring a woman’s derriere and suspenders, in good company with an obvious Bolero and a punctual isottesque finale and a less-obvious Moonlight Sonata or a Good Friday Spell (all by the German from Leipzig), one finds the Centone di Sonate for violin and guitar by Niccolò Paganini (Genoa 1782 – Nice 1840) and precisely with the opening movement of the Sonata in A minor placed in the opening of the present collection.

The repertoire for violin and piano is among the richest in the panorama of classical chamber music. History of this repertoire dates back to the origins of the piano in the eighteenth century with its features evolving in parallel with instrumental modifications and aesthetic taste.