Wooden Tomasz Stańko Quintet

Track 1 recorded at SuperDeluxe, Tokyo, November 26 2018. Tracks 4-5 recorded at Tokuzo, Nagoya, November 27 2018. Tracks 2-3, 6 recorded at takutaku, Kyoto, November 28 2018.

The Pacific Quintet’s debut album on Fuga Libera is a reflection of the diversity of its members and core focus; it also offers a nod to the composer who inspired the ensemble: Leonard Bernstein. Going beyond the standard classical repertoire, the prize-winning quintet (clarinet, horn, flute, oboe and bassoon) presents music from their home countries of Japan, Honduras, South Korea, Germany and Ukraine/Turkey in a programme which transcends all differences of culture, language and tradition. Two pieces, one by the Honduran composer Jorge Santos and the other by the South Korean female composer Soeui Lee, were commissioned especially for this album, which also includes Fazil Say’s quintet Alevi dedeler rakı masasında and a medley of Japanese folk songs; Hanns Eisler’s Divertimento represents Germany, the Pacific Quintet’s home city. The album ends with an arrangement of music from West Side Story, an homage to its famous composer who founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo where the players first met. As this project shows, they are truly United in music.

Eva Alcaide, in addition to having collaborated with a large number of artists over time and having great live experience, has a remarkable academic record to her credit, consolidating her training at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland by completing a master's degree in Jazz Guitar Performance.

With a playful interplay and energetic presence, the BLISS Quintet has in a short time made its mark as an up-and-coming band within the Norwegian jazz scene. The band released their critically acclaimed debut album "Dramaqueen" on Jazzland Recordings in the spring of 2022. The album was mentioned in Ballade (NO) as album of the year, and by Selwyn Harris from Jazzwise (UK) as "an impressive-sounding young Norwegian band for the future". The band went on an extensive Norwegian tour to coincide with the release, and won the international 7th Virtual Jazz Competition for the title track "Dramaqueen - live". The results of the competition opened up new opportunities for the quintet, through concerts in Italy, Denmark, and Jazzahead in spring 2023. Bliss Quintet will release their second album "Glasshouse" on 29 September 2023 on Jazzland Recordings with a subsequent tour in Norway and Europe.

Brahms' Clarinet Quintet is a cornerstone of late Romantic chamber music, and this is the only period interpretation of the work using period instruments curently available. Jean Claude Veilhan plays a late C19th clarinet with a fine mellow sound that is more refined than a classical instrument but still more delicate than a modern one would sound. He is well supported by the string players (members of Quatour Turner who record for Harmonia Mundi), who use gut strings and a historically correct technique, ie:- they aim for a transparent sound with limited vibrato.

Known during his lifetime as the 'French Beethoven', on this SACD Markus Becker teams up with the Ma'alot Quintet for a closer look at Onslow's virtuoso side. Functioning as virtuoso concertos for the salon, both the Wind Quintet op. 81 and the Sextet op. 30 fully satisfied the discriminating taste of Parisian high society. George Onslow was five years old when the French Revolution began and completely disrupted the life of his noble family with British roots. The young Onslow spent the next two decades travelling throughout Europe, received instruction from Dussek in Hamburg, Cramer in London, and finally from the famous Antonín Reicha in Paris after his return to France.

Largely forgotten now, composer August Klughardt was active during the last half of the 19th century, a time of much diversion and expansion of musical ideas. Rather than following any one of these emerging schools of composition, Klughardt incorporated concepts and trends from a variety of sources into an eclectic but unfocused compositional style. This MDG Gold album begins with his Piano Quintet in G minor, Op. 43. Spun, singing melodies of Schumann can be heard, along with sometimes rich harmonization of Brahms and folk-like idioms of Dvorák.

Guitarist, composer, arranger, and songwriter Doug Sahm was a knowledgeable music historian and veteran performer equally comfortable in a range of styles, including Texas blues, country, rock & roll, Western swing, and Cajun. Born November 6, 1941, in San Antonio, TX, he began his performing career at age nine when he was featured on a San Antonio area radio station, playing steel guitar…