Duo Biao 2008

This release contains John LaPorta's complete recordings as a leader for Charles Mingus and Max Roach's Debut label. This is the first time the master takes ever appear on CD. Not only that, "Saxidental" and twelve alternate takes included here have never been previously released on any format. As a bonus we have added the two complete sessions that follow in John LaPorta's discography as a leader.
At one point in time, John LaPorta looked like he was going to be one of the leading clarinetists in modern jazz. His cool tone and very advanced style (influenced by Lennie Tristano) seemed to be making him the Lee Konitz of the clarinet. He had played with the big bands of Bob Chester (1942-1944) and Woody Herman (1944-1946), but more importantly, he recorded with Lennie Tristano in 1947…

Smokin' Joe Kubek and Bnois King have been slinging out no-nonsense, bar band-approved Texas blues-boogie since 1991. Between nonstop touring and about a dozen similar-sounding albums, little has changed for the duo besides the label affiliation. Bullseye Blues, Blind Pig, and now Alligator have helped put their music in front of a wider audience, but since the discs are pretty much interchangeable, it's little wonder their audience hasn't expanded beyond a core of hardcore fans. That's something of a badge of honor in the business they are in, though, and the very fact that King and Kubek have survived nearly two decades in the blues trenches without altering their basic approach is impressive. As you'd expect, that holds true on the duo's Alligator debut…

Abélard will release an album "Rammstein on Piano" on 9 June. The French piano duo Héloïse Hervouët and Emilie Aridon-Kociolek have signed with Decca Records, a label of Universal Music. They will be supporting Rammstein on their Europe Stadium tour 2023.

Following their superb Dussek album (5 stars in BBC Music Magazine), Duo Pleyel’s Richard Egarr and Alexandra Nepomnyashchaya explore the seminal role a musical father figure can play in shaping another composer. From Mozart’s first meeting with Johann Christian Bach (the ‘London Bach’) as a young boy in England in 1764, an extraordinary musical bond and mutual respect was forged between the two great composers. The life-long influence of the older musician on Mozart is often seriously under-appreciated, yet Mozart quoted musical fragments and themes by Christian throughout his life, none more poignantly than in the slow movement of his A major piano concerto K. 414, written shortly after Christian’s death. The programme on this recording brings their four-hands music together to show both the influence and individuality of these wonderful composers.

Duo Arcos releases their new album Autre Temps. The duo is made up of harpist Paola Baron and violinist Edgar Leite, who have been active in chamber music for eight years. They are also members of the São Paulo Municipal Symphony Orchestra and lecturers at FASM (Santa Marcelina College), the Baccarelli Institute and EMESP (São Paulo State Music School). The programme features the Sonata in G minor by C.P.E. Bach and the Sonata BWV 1016 by J.S. Bach, in an exclusive performance of the harpsichord part. It also features works by French impressionists, including three pieces by Lili Boulanger (rarely performed in Brazilian programmes) and transcriptions of works by Claude Debussy for the formation.

In the folk tradition: The Duo Ausma – comprising Vizma Zvaigzne (mezzo-soprano) and Theduardo Prasetyo (guitar) – interprets songs by Franz Schubert, Manuel de Falla, and Xavier Montsalvatge on their new GENUIN album in their unique way. The two musicians explore the boundaries of the concept of "homeland": In the songs of the great Catalan composer Montsalvatge, who mixes Caribbean sounds with the music of his homeland and the tonal languages of the 20th century, as well as in those of Schubert. The early Romantic treasures of the latter, accompanied by guitars, take on an unusual color, evoking the intimacy of the Viennese Schubertiades in our mind's eye.

Not all the singles are here, but The Singles does include 18 of Daryl Hall & John Oates' best-known songs. It covers the mid-‘70s (beginning with 1974’s “She’s Gone”) through the late ‘80s (ending with 1988’s “Everything Your Heart Desires”) and contains 15 of the duo’s 16 Top Ten singles; “Did It in a Minute” is the lone omission in that respect…