Boxing Music

This CD contains selected themes from five of Chaplins brilliant films. The Kid (1921), The Gold Rush (1925), The Circus (1928), City Lights (1931) and Modern Times (1936). If you love the music from these films then you will love this album. Carl Davis has been very sensitive when rerecording the original scores. The music sounds amazing and he has remained true to Chaplins own styles and tempo's. The thing that will strike you more than anything is how amazing these scores really are in Stereo! They really do sound very good indeed. It also fully demonstrates just how good a composer Chaplin really was, and his talent for marrying music to film. As music it is beautiful from the harshness of "Gold Rush" to the haunting "Modern Times" and not forgetting the swinging "City Lights". Magical stuff! 5 out of 5, 10 out of 10 etc… But if you are planning on listening to this 80 minute album from beginning to end, you'd better make sure you have some Chaplin films close to hand because you WILL want to watch them all again. Nostalgia at its very best.

Boxing Gandhis is a retro-funk band formed in 1993 by lead singer and guitarist David Darling. The sextet released its second CD, "Howard," on Atlantic Records in 1996. The album has a classic-funk feel, reminiscent of Sly and the Family Stone, Stevie Wonder, Prince and George Clinton's P-Funk. The group's debut music video won Billboard Magazine's 1995 Video Award for Best Jazz/Adult Contemporary video.

This double album is devoted to the exceptional match between African-American musicians and boxers who all packed a punch in carrying the hopes of their people. Selected by Monique Pouget and Jean Buzelin from material that has all the passion of the ring, these emblematic pieces evoke a people’s admiration for its champions… with some unexpected bouts with fighters who were heroes. A bonus is the tribute paid to the exboxers who shelved their gloves before going on to vibrate, body and soul, and with great talent, in the arena of blues and jazz.

The three full-length ballet scores that Dmitry Shostakovich wrote between 1925 and 1935 remain among his least known works. The Golden Age revolves around the visit of a Soviet football team to a Western city (referred to as 'U-town') at the time of an industrial exhibition, only for its heroic sporting and social endeavours constantly to be undermined by hostile administrators, decadent artistes and corrupt officials. Even before its premiere Shostakovich had prepared a suite, including the famous Polka (Naxos 8.553126), which barely hints at the dissonant harmonies and intricate contrapuntal designs to be found elsewhere in the ballet. This recording is the first to present the work complete with all repeats observed, enabling listeners to assess the ballet in all its exhilarating and, at times, anarchic intensity.

The three full-length ballet scores that Dmitry Shostakovich wrote between 1925 and 1935 remain among his least known works. The Golden Age revolves around the visit of a Soviet football team to a Western city (referred to as 'U-town') at the time of an industrial exhibition, only for its heroic sporting and social endeavours constantly to be undermined by hostile administrators, decadent artistes and corrupt officials. Even before its premiere Shostakovich had prepared a suite, including the famous Polka (Naxos 8.553126), which barely hints at the dissonant harmonies and intricate contrapuntal designs to be found elsewhere in the ballet. This recording is the first to present the work complete with all repeats observed, enabling listeners to assess the ballet in all its exhilarating and, at times, anarchic intensity.

Due likely to his other careers as a pop artist, producer, classical composer, actor, and fashion model, Ryuichi Sakamoto the film scorer has averaged less than one film a year since his delightfully melodic debut, Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence in 1983. But the Academy Award winner (The Last Emperor) has clearly eschewed quantity for quality, and his often-chilling music for Love Is the Devil (the first feature by vidoegrapher John Maybury–a disturbing portrait of artist Francis Bacon and his dark, obsessive relationship with his model/lover, George Dyer) is no exception. Sakamoto has long resisted composing mere musical narration for his film assignments; here he gets inside the characters by using the diverse palette and electronic techniques gleaned from his often cutting-edge pop work. This masterful melange of samples, treated piano, electronics, and white noise plays like a modern horror masterpiece, an eerie techno-concerto that owes more to Sakamoto's days as a student of electronic music and the avant-garde than to his sunny turn as leader of the Yellow Magic Orchestra. Think Bernard Herrmann displaced by an ocean and half-a-century of technology.