Marie Flore Intimes

Popular throughout the 1960s and '70s, Marie Laforêt is a French pop singer who garnered fame initially as a film actress during the early to mid-'60s. Born Maïténa Doumenach to parents of Armenian heritage on October 5, 1939, in Soulac-sur-Mer, Aquitaine, France, she made her film debut in 1960 in the René Clément drama Plein Soleil, a big-screen adaptation of the Patricia Highsmith novel The Talented Mr. Ripley. Plein Soleil not only launched the acting career of Laforêt; it also made a cinema star of actor Alain Delon. In the wake of her showbiz breakthrough, Laforêt was offered one role after another, notably beginning with Saint Tropez Blues (1961) and La Fille aux Yeux d'Or (1961).

Popular throughout the 1960s and '70s, Marie Laforêt is a French pop singer who garnered fame initially as a film actress during the early to mid-'60s. Born Maïténa Doumenach to parents of Armenian heritage on October 5, 1939, in Soulac-sur-Mer, Aquitaine, France, she made her film debut in 1960 in the René Clément drama Plein Soleil, a big-screen adaptation of the Patricia Highsmith novel The Talented Mr. Ripley. Plein Soleil not only launched the acting career of Laforêt; it also made a cinema star of actor Alain Delon. In the wake of her showbiz breakthrough, Laforêt was offered one role after another, notably beginning with Saint Tropez Blues (1961) and La Fille aux Yeux d'Or (1961).

Rene Marie's second CD for MaxJazz is, for the most part, a very enjoyable CD. This extremely gifted singer has a very appealing voice and is a talented arranger as well. Her playful arrangement of "Them There Eyes," with bassist Robert Hurst and drummer Jeff "Tain" Watts, is very refreshing, with some fine scat singing, too. Her unusually deliberate and rather sexy take of "The Surrey With the Fringe on Top" adds pianist Mulgrew Miller and also has some fine scat singing, too. Her Latin chart for "I Only Have Eyes for You" proves catchy, with some tasty guitar playing from John Hart. "It's All Right With Me" is slowed to a snail's pace with Chris Potter's noodling bass clarinet and Hurst's brooding bass backing her powerful vocal…

Microcosm and macrocosm, might and focus: On her new GENUIN CD, pianist Marie Rosa Gunter combines Ludwig van Beethoven's late "Hammerklavier Sonata" and his "Bagatelles" op. 126 with Anton Webern's aphoristic Variations op. 27, as well as the world premiere recording of Variations on "Jerusalem" by Braunschweig composer Ulrich. The CD is an insight into magnificent later works in a highly demanding pairing born out of the silence of the pandemic. Once again, the pianist, who teaches at the University of Music and Drama in Hanover, brings out a CD with profundity at the highest level following her production featuring Bach's Goldberg Variations!

A baroque harp called arpa doppia (meaning double harp). It was an instrument that strongly fascinated people, coloring all kinds of music, including vocal, instrumental, religious, and secular music. Although much of its history is ambiguous, it was written by V. Galilei (father of astronomer Galilei and a music theorist). Shortly before 1580, his double-stringed harp (corresponding to the white and black keys on a keyboard) containing semitones arrived in Italy. It seems that it was conveyed. In the early 17th century, he devised an instrument with three strings (corresponding to white keys, black keys, and white keys). All six of his composers included here are from or have ties to Naples. Although they are rarely mentioned in the ``Harp'', they ushered in a new style of keyboard music and greatly expanded the possibilities of the harp.

On her third album for both Fat Possum and Loose Records, Courtney Marie Andrews has pulled in to one package all the songwriting skill, vocal prowess, and musicianship displayed on previous albums, into one career defining statement. A break-up record for sure, though due to Courtney's extraordinary storytelling gifts, more of a modern day coming-of-age tale of love won, love sustained, and unfortunately, love's inevitable dissolution.