Cirque du Soleil

Josh Groban is among the most popular singers straddling the classical and pop genres. It can be said his voice does some straddling as well, ranging from upper baritone well into the tenor range, making classification somewhat problematic. What is not problematic for the listener is the warm, mellifluous sound produced by it, the chief reason for Groban's meteoric rise. His first solo album, the eponymously titled Josh Groban, was released in 2001 and was an instant hit, auguring international stardom. He has had a number of gold and platinum recordings… This collection includes the albums: Josh Groban (2001), Closer (2003), Awake (2006), Illuminations (2010), All That Echoes (2013).

Discovered by veteran record producer David Foster, 21-year-old singing phenomenon Josh Groban began his meteoric rise after a last-minute appearance as a stand-in for Andrea Bocelli at the 1999 Grammy Awards dress rehearsal.

Nguyên Lê’s "Overseas" – the great guitarist brings jazz, traditional Vietnamese music and hip-hop to the music for “Cirque-Nouveau”.

In 2006, the Beatles coaxed producer George Martin out of retirement to remix and rearrange several of their iconic songs for Cirque du Soleil’s Las Vegas stage production Love. Martin, though, had a worry: At age 80 his hearing had turned difficult, and so he brought in a collaborator: his son Giles. The younger Martin had produced classical music, as well as recordings by Kula Shaker, Jeff Beck, Elvis Costello and Kate Bush. “He’s my ears,” George Martin said. What ears they turned out to be: Giles recombined parts of many of the Beatles’ songs into a mash-up of the band’s audio history, sometimes encapsulating much of it in a single song. “Get Back” opened with George Harrison’s memorable thrum from “A Hard Day’s Night” and Ringo Starr’s drum prologue from “The End,” caught sight of an overpassing jet from “Back in the U.S.S.R.,” pulled in part of the audience’s expectant murmur from “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” and borrowed a bit of the orchestral swell from “A Day in the Life,” landing on John Lennon’s “Glass Onion.”

Kodo is a Japanese group that has become an international phenomenon, based on the island of Sado, that has taken the world by storm with their new stylings on semi-traditional taiko drumming. Founded in 1981, the group's name has dual meaning; according to the group, it translates both to "heartbeat – the primal source of all rhythm," and "children of the drum, a reflection of Kodo's desire to play their drums simply, with the heart of a child".

NES can't be tied down to a specific location. Their music is between traditional Arabic and world music, jazz and pop. These three superb musicians originally met in Valencia in Spain. Percussionist David Gadea is from the region, and was already touring with Flamenco greats such as Ximo Tébar and Josemi Carmona; Matthieu Saglio is a French cellist “with a thousand tone colours” who has performed in more than 30 countries; the singer/cellist Nesrine Belmokh had worked with legendary conductors such as Lorin Maazel and Daniel Barenboim, and performed with Cirque du Soleil on international tours. Placido Domingo has called Nesrine “an exceptional artist, a wonderful voice.”

Conducted by Laurence Equilbey and featuring the renowned Accentus choir and Orchestre de Chambre de Paris, this new recording of one of the French masterpieces of the mid-19th century is a real discovery. French composer Félicien David spent 4 years in Egypt and Algeria before returning to Paris, where he composed this romantic 'ode symphonie' which pandered to the popular orientalist trend and was a huge success throughout Europe. Born in 1810, Félicien David's voyage took him to Egypt and Algeria between 1831 and 1835.

After Les Danaïdes and Les Horaces, Les Talens Lyriques concludes the group’s cycle of Antonio Salieri’s French operas with the world premiere recording of Tarare. Often unfairly overshadowed by his brilliant contemporary Mozart, Salieri here composed a genuine masterpiece on the only libretto ever written by Beaumarchais.

Built around the young soprano Katherine Watson and suggested by the conductor and flutist Alexis Kossenko, supported by the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles, this operatic program revives the splendor of Versailles.