Tony Awards

With the great Tony Furtado, a fantastic musician on plenty of stringed instruments, Blue Rose have signed a spectacular artist of international renown. After a four-year break from recording, The Bell is his brand-new studio album. It is a worthy successor to Golden, an album that won numerous awards and accolades, yet it also covers new ground and expands the artist’s musical landscape. The Bell is Furtado’s 16th album since the early 90ies, including some projects with musical friends of his. With its striking, genre-bending mix of folk/roots, indie rock, newgrass, acoustic rock, westcoast pop and singer-songwriter stylings, it is certainly one of the important Americana-and-beyond releases that will be talked about in 2015.

David Liptak, longtime composition faculty member of the Eastman School of Music, releases this compilation of his music for wind ensemble, written for and inspired by the august group at his institution. Featuring soprano Tony Arnold in the four movement "Folgore's Months" based on 14th century Italian sonnets, Liptak's broad sources of inspiration and sensitivity to lyricism and orchestration pervade this release. David Liptak’s music has been described as “luminous and arresting,” “richly atmospheric,” and having “transparent textures, incisive rhythms, shimmering lightness.”

While there was a certain "mystique" surrounding TJ White in the USA, it was in Europe where he gained legendary status. In 1991 he signed with Remark and debuted Closer To The Truth and spent the next two years touring Europe with Eric Clapton and Joe Cocker, among others. He cut two more albums for Remark, 1993s Path Of A Decent Groove and '95s Lake Placid Blues, the latter garnering the first of two nominations for "Best R & B Album" from the Nashville Music Awards, (the second being, The Best Of Tony Joe White, a 1996 retrospective of his work on Warner Bros.).

Sheryl Lee Ralph is a very successful actress, singer and philanthropist who has appeared in many Broadway musicals, Hollywood films and television shows since the beginning of the 1980's. Ralph first came to prominence having created the role of Deena Jones in the incredibly successful and award winning Broadway musical Dreamgirls for which she was nominated as Best Actress at the 1982 Tony Awards. This role was recently reprised on the silver screen by Jennifer Hudson who won an Oscar for her efforts. Ralph has since secured both Tony and Drama Desk best Actress awards for her performances in subsequent Broadway shows. As a result of the success of Dreamgirls Ralph ventured into the recording studio in 1984 to provide us with her acclaimed debut album In The Evening. Produced by Trevor Lawrence (Im So Excited) , In The Evening immediately struck a chord with the U.S. music buying public who helped the title track and lead single peak at #6 on the Billboard Dance charts.

Small-time thief Colin Smith thinks he's outfoxed the law, but he's caught with money stolen from a bakery and sent to do time in Ruxton Towers Reformatory for criminal youth. The prison seeks to reform its charges through a punishment-reward system: rebels are beaten, broken and passed up for release. The Governor is only interested in competitive sports and singles out Colin for his ability to run. This gives Colin a number of privileges, including the right to train for the marathon while running free and unsupervised. But the more Colin broods about injustice -the Governor is keen on winning a track match against some privileged public school boys- the less he wants to contribute to the hypocrisy.

Colin Smith es un joven de clase obrera que vive en un suburbio de Nottingham y que acaba de vivir una experiencia traumática tras la muerte de su padre. Es un adolescente rebelde y falto de afecto que rellena su monotonía y falta de objetivos robando y delinquiendo, lo que le conduce al reformatorio Ruxton Towers, que imparte una educación represiva y punitiva. Allí, su talento para correr destaca notablemente, un talento que hace que se convierta en el favorito del régimen y se gane la enemistad de los alumnos recluidos menos favorecidos. Las cosas se agravan cuando el director hace que Colin participe en la carrera anual contra un importante colegio privado. Durante sus carreras solitarias, los ensueños de su vida anterior a su encarcelamiento permiten al espectador conocer la situación de Colin, así como permiten al propio personaje reflexionar sobre su estado privilegiado como el corredor favorito del Director. Narrada en un sobrio y austero blanco y negro y estructurada a base de flash-backs nos sorprende con un final inesperado, expresión de la ira de los jóvenes descontentos con la sociedad que les rodea.