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Nathaniel Adams Coles, known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American jazz pianist and vocalist. He recorded over one hundred songs that became hits on the pop charts. His trio was the model for small jazz ensembles that followed. Cole also acted in films and on television and performed on Broadway. He was the first black man to host an American television series. Cole was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame and the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame. He was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990. He was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame in 1997 and the Hit Parade Hall of Fame in 2007. A United States postage stamp featuring Cole's likeness was issued in 1994. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000, as a major influence on early rock and roll, and the Latin Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2013, for his contribution to Latin music.

Niki King and Marcus Ford have become established as one of Scotland’s most high profile jazz duos with sell-out concerts at both the Edinburgh and Glasgow International Festivals. They have also performed internationally including concerts in Germany, Japan, Switzerland, China and Italy. Niki King won the Perrier Jazz vocal award 2001 and was further nominated for the prestigious spirit of Scotland Award and International Young Jazz Vocalist in Brussels 2005. As a solo artist she has supported Al Green and the Average White Band and with her incredible vocal range and stage persona she is considered one of the UK’s most exciting new vocalists.

Niki King and Marcus Ford have become established as one of Scotland’s most high profile jazz duos with sell-out concerts at both the Edinburgh and Glasgow International Festivals. They have also performed internationally including concerts in Germany, Japan, Switzerland, China and Italy. Niki King won the Perrier Jazz vocal award 2001 and was further nominated for the prestigious spirit of Scotland Award and International Young Jazz Vocalist in Brussels 2005. As a solo artist she has supported Al Green and the Average White Band and with her incredible vocal range and stage persona she is considered one of the UK’s most exciting new vocalists.

Niki King and Marcus Ford have become established as one of Scotland’s most high profile jazz duos with sell-out concerts at both the Edinburgh and Glasgow International Festivals. They have also performed internationally including concerts in Germany, Japan, Switzerland, China and Italy. Niki King won the Perrier Jazz vocal award 2001 and was further nominated for the prestigious spirit of Scotland Award and International Young Jazz Vocalist in Brussels 2005. As a solo artist she has supported Al Green and the Average White Band and with her incredible vocal range and stage persona she is considered one of the UK’s most exciting new vocalists.

For a brief period at the end of the 1960s and the start of the '70s, Blood, Sweat & Tears, which fused a rock 'n' roll rhythm section to a horn section, held out the promise of a jazz-rock fusion that could storm the pop charts. The band was organized in New York in 1967 out of the remnants of the Blues Project by keyboard player/singer Al Kooper and guitarist Steve Katz of that group, and saxophonist Fred Lipsius. The rhythm section consisted of bassist Jim Fielder and drummer Bobby Colomby, and the horn section was filled out by trumpeters Randy Brecker and Jerry Weiss and trombonist Dick Halligan.

Little Girl Blue is an artistic statement by jazz virtuoso Nina Simone that reinvents a wide variety of compositions. Simone's combination of classical training, smoky-alto vocal delivery and the influence of modern jazz make her a novel and inspiring jazz singer and instrumentalist.

The album range from pop standards like Kurt Weill’s "Mack the Kinife" and Nat Cole’s "Straighten Up and Fly Right" to soul classics like Rev. Al Green’s "Love and Happiness" and Marvin Gaye’s "Sexual Healing". Speaking of "sex", Alexander lays down the funk on an extended "soul/yard meeting" of James Brown’s "Sex Machine". Speaking of special guests, in addition to the younger Cole, another famous son, John Pizzarelli, takes his turn at the mike for a Jamaican-tinged zephyr through Johnny Mercer’s "Summer Wind", and Kevin Mahogany does the honors for the Ray Charles classic "Hallelujah I Love Her So". That is not to say that this is strictly a standards and soul album, however. In tribute to his early cowboy heroes, Alexander opens the set with Cole Porter’s jaunty "Don’t Fence Me In", and in honor to the country he is now proud to call home, he closes with a triumphant build into "Battle Hymn of the Republic".

Abraxas remains the consummate Latin rock album. The confident sound of Santana stretching out and carving out a distinctive new genre, the 1970 set is daubed with psychedelic accents and Afro-Latin grooves. This reissue becomes available as a multi-channel quad SACD Hybrid edition for the first time by Sony Japan. Converted from the original 1974 Quadraphonic master to DSD, plus the stereo mix mastered from the latest remastering.

In the course of his long career as a bassist, Bill Crow has rubbed elbows with such luminaries as Gerry Mulligan, Marian McPartland, Stan Getz, and Duke Ellington. On this release for Japanese Venus Records, Bill Crow, who is an accomplished soloist when he chooses to take a chorus or two, is joined by veteran tenor saxophonist Carmen Leggio, guitarist Joe Cohn (son of tenor sax legend Al Cohn), and drummer David Jones.