Andy Audate

MelodicRock Classics is pleased to announce a partnership with English singer, songwriter, composer and musician Andy Qunta to deliver a Deluxe Edition of his one and only solo album 'Legend In A Loungeroom', originally recorded in 1989.

Mia Brentano’s Hidden Sea. 20 songs for 2 pianos. That’s the title of a CD released in 2018 by a hitherto unknown newcomer, containing works made available for the first time. The album was surprisingly successful, and in the USA, the classic magazine Fanfare rated it as one of the best albums of the year. The catchy music from the “no-man’s-land between classical, jazz, pop and minimal music” seems to have struck a chord, especially as it was played by two wonderful young pianists who could easily handle the virtuoso pieces.

The Superb New Studio Album By Grammy Award Winning Pink Floyd Engineer / Co-Producer Andy Jackson. This eagerly awaited follow up to Andy Jackson's acclaimed album 'Signal To Noise' (2014) and '73 Days At Sea' (2016) sees this original musician and producer explore new musical ground to great effect. 'Twelve Half Steps' is a purely instrumental album; a fascinating collection of compositions in modal scales. As one would expect of a musician, engineer and producer of the pedigree of Andy Jackson, this new album is once again nothing short of impressive, both sonically and musically.

A great deal of today's Celtic music has ventured far from its roots, adding a wash of new age keyboards and heavenly harmony. Fortunately for hardcore traditionalists, singers and musicians like Andy Irvine stick closer to their acoustic roots. Even when Irvine writes his own songs, they retain a strong flavor of traditional music. Way Out Yonder is a lovely album comprised of a number of ballads and jigs, and filled with good singing and fitting arrangements. Irvine adds words to the "The Girl I Left Behind," a song of love, betrayal, and reborn love. An American version of this piece, "Forsaken Love," ends in suicide, so this more upbeat version, while still melancholy, is refreshing. "Gladiators" covers the biography of one Tom Barker, a radical union worker (a Wobbly) from Australia who fought against conscription during WW I. "They'll Never Believe It's True/Froggy's Jig" conjures up Irish folklore in the form of faeries dancing, while the title cut is a lively Bulgarian jig with some nice harmonica work by Brendan Power. Many of the songs on Way Out Yonder are long because Irvine likes to spin a yarn, and fortunately for the audience, he's good at it. The acoustic guitars and whistles underline the music perfectly.

It took decades for Andy Bey to become an overnight success, but in the mid-'90s he was finally recognized as a premier talent, and recorded a handful of finely crafted discs. A true jazz singer avoiding monochromatic crooning, his style is deeply blue-hued, silky smooth but never slick. This live club date at Birdland in New York City was recorded in 1997, around the time of his overdue success, but not released until a full decade later. The pacing of the program is a little up-and-down, which is atypical of the normally mellow Bey. He does sing more than his share of balladic material, and when he does, there is no more patient virtue expressed in all of jazz, his slight vibrato ruminating and tripping heartstrings. The title track and "Hey Love," the 4:00 A.M. mood for "On Second Thought," and the solo closer "Someone to Watch Over Me" dip into this dynamic, as drawn-out slow and steady as a daily sunset. To play this way may be the most difficult thing to do in music, but Bey is absolutely masterful. Like his parallel performing shadow Nat King Cole, Bey is also an excellent pianist, and a true player of the instrument.