In 2002 the Transatlantic Radio label fortified their catalog with a 26-track anthology of historic sides by the Jean Goldkette Orchestra. Victor Recordings 1924-1928 neatly samples some of the group's best works by beginning in March 1924, a good nine months before Bix Beiderbecke first sat in, and ending in December 1928, more than a year after Bix had joined the ranks of Paul Whiteman's Orchestra, along with some of Goldkette's most capable players. During the mid-‘20s the Goldkette band played its best music in front of live audiences, using arrangements by Bill Challis. Studio recordings captured some of the magic in the form of sweet and hot dance music punctuated by period pop vocals. Rather than packing in a lot of alternate takes (which may be found on other equally fine collections), the folks at Transatlantic chose to lay out a sensible selection that accurately embodies what the Goldkette band was all about.
Limited three CD edition. Digitally remastered and expanded edition of the 1975 live album from the Italian Prog band. Features the original live album on Disc One plus an additional two CD live set recorded in Central Park in 1974…
This album marked a continued maturing of both PFM's style and their presence in the Anglophone market. It benefits from Premoli's high-speed Hammond organ and synth runs on such all-out prog assaults as the conclusion of "From Under," as well as Mussida's gentle acoustic guitar lines on slower numbers like "Harlequin."…
The Complete Victor and Columbia Album Collection reflects Arrau’s textually scrupulous yet highly personal mastery of many styles had matured and ripened, while retaining the fire and ardency of his youth. Arrau’s Mozart, Weber and Chopin probe beyond the music’s surface charm, as do the luminous and full-bodied Spanish and French Impressionist selections. Cumulative momentum and thoughtful detail characterize Arrau’s Beethoven and Schumann while the extraordinary technical finish of his Liszt transcends mere virtuosity and bravura.
The studio and live recording sessions that Thelonious Monk cut during his six-year stay at the Riverside label are compiled over the 15 discs in the Complete Riverside Recordings. This middle era – between his early sides for Prestige and the final ones for Columbia – is generally considered Monk's most ingenious and creative period. The sessions are presented in chronological order, accurately charting the progression and diversions of one of the most genuinely enigmatic figures in popular music. The Complete Riverside Recordings explores Monk's genius with a certain degree of real-time analysis that simply listening to each of the individual albums from this era lacks.
Benny Goodman's formidable work in front of the big band made him one of the world's most popular musicians, but his work with these "chamber jazz" groups made him one of the world's most respected musicians. Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Jimmie Noone's Apex Club band, to name two, had prospered in the 1920s as small groups playing traditional New Orleans-style fare, but until Goodman's forays beginning in 1935, the small band had been limited to blues, Dixieland, and the group improvisations of the New Orleans style. Goodman applied the small-group concept to the steady 4/4 rhythm and the repertoire (mostly standards) of swing. Instead of being dance music, this small-group swing showcased the individual and collective talent of the musicians involved–and the talent and telekinetic interplay of these men were considerable to say the least.