Edgard Winger

Edgar Varèse is regarded as one of the pioneers of New Music, and with good reason. His piece “Ionisation” was the first-ever composition written exclusively for percussion ensemble to be performed in a traditional concert hall setting; and he explored and searched intensely for sonic experiences. Varèse integrated first the world of sounds, then electronic instruments into traditional orchestras, thereby opening a door to a new awareness of listening. His work substantially influenced those generations of composers that came after him: a link between the beautiful, the exciting and the musically unfamiliar. The 2009 Salzburg Festival dedicated its “Kontinente” series to this brilliant New Music pioneer – and we are delighted to present these excellent recordings to you! (Col Legno)

More or less contemporary with Mozart, Grétry wrote more than fifty quintessentially Classical operas which enjoyed phenomenal success during his lifetime (this one was produced as far afield as New York in 1787). On the basis of this recording, made in 1974 in Brussels (Grétry was born in Liège but was dead by the time the state of Belgium was created, making him an honorary, if not actual, famous Belgian), it seems a shame that his work – or this comic reworking of ‘Beauty and the Beast’ at any rate – has latterly been overlooked. The music, brightly performed by the Belgian Radio and Television Chamber Orchestra, is attractively melodic, if hardly profound, and the drama affords fantastical possibilities for an imaginative producer: a table decked with food appearing from nowhere, a magic moving picture in which the heroine watches her family after she has left them; and the transformation of the monstrous hero into a handsome young man.

Gretry's "Richard Coeur De Lion" (1784), a rousing tale about the rescue of the crusader king Richard the Lionheart by his faithful troubadour Blondel, is a minor masterpiece, the greatest French opera comique of the Ancien Regime. Gretry wasn't an eighteenth century composer of the calibre of Mozart, Rameau or his contemporary Gluck, but his music seduced audiences with its charm and tunefulness and in this opera he provided a great deal more. Blondel's stirring aria of loyalty to his king, "O Richard, oh mon roi", was so powerful it was used as an anthem by the royalists in the 1790s and promptly banned by the revolutionary authorities.

In celebration of their 35 years as a touring and recording act, multi-platinum artist Winger have announced the release of their seventh studio album, the aptly titled "Seven" on May 5th. The 12-track album, produced by vocalist/bassist Kip Winger and recorded in Nashville, TN, will be distributed worldwide by Frontiers Music Srl. It is the band’s first new album since their 2014 release "Better Days Comin’".
Winger is one of the only bands formed during the late '80s that still features all of their original members: Kip Winger, Reb Beach, Rod Morgenstein, and Paul Taylor. Guitarist John Roth was added in 1992. To support the new album, Winger will partake in extensive touring, beginning with a UK tour with Steel Panther in May followed by a U.S tour with the Tom Keifer Band in June. Additionally, the band will do a number of headline shows throughout the summer.

Pull is the third studio album by American rock band Winger. The album was released in 1993 by Atlantic Records…

Here is a collection on the indie Wounded Bird Records that was once one of the linchpins of the Columbia Masterworks LP catalog, yet it has never been issued by anyone on CD: The Varèse Album. Issued in 1972, CBS's The Varèse Album was in itself a reissue, consisting of the albums Music of Edgar Varèse (1960) and Music of Edgar Varèse, Vol. 2 (1963), both featuring pickup groups led by Robert Craft and the first volume including Varèse's own realization on tape of Poème Electronique (1958). In 1972, The Varèse Album was thought to contain near to all of the works of Varèse, and since then that short catalog hasn't expanded by much.

Songs from the Ocean Floor is the third solo studio album by American rock artist Kip Winger. The album was released in 2000. According to Kip, the lead track "Cross" is an extremely personal song and he opens every solo show with it…