Kantele

Lead guitarist Esa Holopainen and drummer Jan Rechberger formed the band Amorphis in Finland in 1990. To complete their lineup they recruited vocalist/guitarist Tomi Koivusaari and bassist Olli-Pekka Laine. They released a demo in 1991 called Disment of Soul. The demo was so successful in getting attention for the group that they acquired a record deal and released an EP the same year…

Wolf Rune, a solo album, casts a new light on the highly personal idiom of Sinikka Langeland, kantele player and folk singer from Finnskogen, Norway’s “Finnish forest”. Sinikka integrates her own songs among folk hymns, shamanistic rune songs and traditional dance pieces, draws texts from multiple poetic sources, and expands the expressive range of her instruments. Few artists embody the spirit of place as comprehensively as Langeland, and her music ruminates upon the wildness of the natural world and the interrelationships of its inhabitants. Wolf Rune, recorded in December 2019 in Oslo’s Rainbow Studio, is an absorbing addition to Sinikka’s ECM discography, which has featured critically acclaimed projects including Starflowers, The Land That Is Not, Maria’s Song, The Half-Finished Heaven and The Magical Forest.

Famous among Progressive rock fans worldwide for being probably the classiest (and most complete) publication in this style, the Finnish magazine Colossus had the great idea to ask thirty bands of the whole world to illustrate the national Finnish epic: "Kalevala". It is made of old ballads and traditional songs, but is also part of a huge group of legends, which has inspired both J.R.R. Tolkien for his mythic "Lord Of The Rings" and composer Sibelius, among others. The idea that contributed to the creation of "Kalevala - A Finnish Progressive Rock Epic" was to use exclusively instruments of the Seventies, in order to obtain the "Aging" that the story needed. The result is absolutely stunning: three albums included in a box-set designed as beautifully as the famous Colossus covers. As for the music, the listener won't be disappointed! He'll be delighted to hear about four hours of sumptuous and rich (Vocal or instrumental) Progressive rock…

CANTINA SOCIALE is a new Italian group. The line-up is: Rosalba Gentile (keyboards), Elio Sesia (guitars, bass, violin), Iano Nicolo (vocals), Gianni Grasso (bass, saxophones), Carla Viarengo (saxophones, background vocals), Marina Gentile (guitars) and Graziano Viola (drums). The music is mostly similar to the seventies groups but there are some modern influences as well. They have more Mediterranean feel in the music than an average Italian symphonic group…

To stand out in a field where the obvious signifiers are the most common, and therefore the most clichéd, elements, one has to know when to try something different. Amorphis had already shown itself to be a more than competent end-of-the-century Scandinavian black metal outfit, but there were plenty of others equally able to say the same. The inspired turning point had two points of origin - recruiting another lead vocalist, Pasi Koskinen, to sing with Tomi Koivusaari, and deciding to record an album infused with earlier Finnish folk influences, both musically and lyrically. The choice of lyrical inspiration, Finland's national epic The Kalevala, isn't necessarily surprising given how often metal of all kinds has favored tales of dungeons and grue…

David Roth - More Pearls
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 387 MB | Full Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Stockfisch # SFR 357.6041.2 | Country/Year: Germany 2006
Genre: Rock, Folk | Style: Acoustic, Singer/Songwriter

Günter Pauler recorded David Roth performing a collection of famous and not so famous "evergreens" of the Anglo-American songwriting: "Song For You Far Away" (James Taylor), "I Will" (Lennon/McCartney), "Blowin' In The Wind" (Bob Dylan), "Streets Of London" (Ralph McTell), "American Tune" (Paul Simon), "You've Got A Friend" (Carole King) and 8 other pearls. The beautiful arrangements are vitalized by some well-known Stockfisch studio musicians. Among others: Chris Jones (guitars), Fiona Simpson and Roger Nicholls (backing vocals), Hans-Jörg Maucksch (fretless bass) as well as multi instrumentalists Siard de Jong and Beo Brockhausen.