Music in The Castle of Heaven

Rhino's first box set of doo wop classics was obviously successful enough to bring about a second, four-CD set. This time around, with all of the hits covered on the first box, the compilers have dug deep into the genre's history to put together a selection of some of the music's great sides, lesser-known hits, and rarities.

In the monastic life of the Cistercian order, as in the case of the female monastery of Santa María la Real de Las Huelgas (Burgos), a royal pantheon, the seat of coronations and the epicentre of a very intense musical life in which singing played an extremely important part, the nuns were called upon to live a life of simplicity, silence, prayer and contemplation. Flavit auster, which is part of the Las Huelgas Codex, is a Marian text inspired in the Song of Songs in which the most powerful symbols of femininity appear, such as the honeycomb, milk and honey, and protectiveness described as “mother of mercy, port of hope for the shipwrecked and virgin mother purified.”

Andre Rieu and his Johann Strauss Orchestra along with 6 powerful soloists perform the most beautiful Holiday melodies in this magical two-hour spectacular recorded in and around a winter wonderland setting: Andris fabled castle in Maastricht, the Netherlands. The Modern Maestro presents 26 classics like the heartening "Silent Night," "Ave Maria" and "O Come All Ye Faithful", as well as unforgettable renditions of all-time favorites like "Jingle Bells" and "Go Tell It on the Mountain"

This double-disc comp of Bonnie Tyler's early chart-happy period ranges from her first charting single, "Lost in France" in 1977, to 1981, when she was still a force at the beginning of the MTV era. It's a slew of A- and B-sides, and album tracks that give a solid picture of Tyler's career as a fine interpretive singer and an individualistic, if idiosyncratic, voice in pop. Her delivery is rugged yet vulnerable, assertive yet tender. She is capable of anthems such as her monumental worldwide smash "It's a Heartache," to the most lithe of love songs, as evidenced by her read of "Goodbye to the Island." There are some very compelling covers here as well, including Stevie Wonder's "Living for the City," the Goffin & King classic "You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman," Gary Brooker and Keith Reid's "A Whiter Shade of Pale," and even Jerry Ragovoy's "(Take a Little) Piece of My Heart" so closely associated with Janis Joplin.