Messiah

The guitar wizard Roy Buchanan is in incendiary form on this live set, which features astonishing re-workings of rock and R&B standards such as "Green Onions" and "Peter Gunn," as well as a tribute to Jimi Hendrix with "Hey Joe" and "Foxy Lady," both of the latter providing an opportunity to compare the two guitar maestros' styles…

Messiah became a favorite on the club/dance charts in 1994 with the sassy single "Temple of Dreams." They were already mainstays in the London acid house scene throughout the early '90s; however, their pulsating decor on 21st Century Jesus escalated into a full-out rave party.

This recording of Messiah by the Dunedin Consort is based on a reconstruction of the original version premiered in Dublin in 1742. The Dublin version is rarely performed because the composer had simplified parts in deference to the vocal limitations of some of the local soloists, because it is not as complete as later versions of the score and because revisions Handel made after the first performance have become standard. This recording also seeks to duplicate the original performing forces as authentically as possible by having the soloists perform the choruses, as well, using a total of only 12 singers. The result is remarkably and refreshingly intimate. In spite of the modesty of scale, conductor John Butt leads a reading that never sounds small or limited; the performers convey the full extent of the work's wide emotional range.

As the notes to this welcome release make clear Stokowski had never conducted The Four Seasons before the Phase Four series of LPs of which this is so engaging an example. He, soloist Hugh Bean and the New Philharmonia went to the BBC’s Maida Vale studios and taped it for later broadcast (in the end it wasn’t until 1968 that it hit the airwaves), recording it the following day. The late Hugh Bean has recalled that it was in the can in one session – Stokowski remaining the professional to his batonless fingertips.