Andrew Nethsingha, Choir Of St John’s College, Cambridge – John Sheppard: Gaude, Gaude, Gaude Maria – Sacred Choral Works (2013/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:10:05 minutes | 751 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Chandos
Not much is known about the English composer John Sheppard. When he was born, and where he grew up, is lost to history but most scholars place his birth at somewhere between 1515 and 1520. This places him in one of the most turbulent periods in English church history, something that can be heard on this disc in the wide stylistic range he used in order to adapt to the quickly changing politics of the day. The sophisticated six part texture of Gaude, gaude, gaude Maria suggests the influence of Queen Mary who encouraged elaborate sacred composition. It is one of Sheppard’s most thrilling and ambitious works.
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Choir of Merton College, Oxford & Benjamin Nicholas – Ian Venables: Requiem, Herbert Howells: Anthems for Choir & Orchestra (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:17:28 minutes | 1,23 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Delphian Records
Conductor Benjamin Nicholas draws parallels between the familiar English choral sound of Howells and that of contemporary composer Ian Venables. Venables’ Requiem has already been warmly received by critics in a 2020 recording with just organ accompaniment. Now, Nicholas and his Merton College choir present it in an orchestrated version made specially for this recording. The Howells items here are also premiere recordings: new instrumental accompaniments to two of his Four Anthems, in arrangements by Howells scholars Howard Eckdahl and Jonathan Clinch, illuminate and intensify his rich choral writing like back-lighting on a stained-glass window, and they are complemented by the first recording of Howells’ original orchestration of The House of the Mind – a chance to hear one of his major underperformed works, introspective yet dramatic.
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Choir of King’s College Cambridge & Stephen Cleobury – Traditional Christmas Carols from King’s (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:12:44 minutes | 1,18 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Kings College Cambridge
The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, is one of the world’s best-known choral groups. Founded in the 15th century, it ranks among the oldest of its kind, and, while originally created for singing the daily services in the college chapel, now enjoys an international tour schedule that has seen it perform all over Europe and beyond. Every Christmas Eve, millions of people tune in to watch the choir’s A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s – a service which has been continuously broadcast since 1928.
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Chino Corvalán – Endless Era (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 50:48 minutes | 522 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Urban Waves Records
Hailing from Paraguay in South America, Chino Corvalán is a talented young musician, composer and producer. For this gem of an album titled “Endless Era” he invited a lot of his musician friends from all around the world to perform and record the songs that he wrote. The album represents an age of spiritual elevation in the form of contemporary, modern, free jazz. As a live performer and stage musician Chino learned a lot of different instruments and express himself with music in a natural way. Endless Era is his most ambitious project to date including 18 songs that will impress and please all the fans of the genre. The album sounds like it will be a cult piece of the Jazz culture in the years to come.
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Chihiro Yamanaka – Today Is Another Day (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 44:21 minutes | 872 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © UNIVERSAL MUSIC LLC
CHIHIRO YAMANAKA ist eine der aufregendsten Jazz-Pianistinnen und Komponistinnen ihrer Generation und der Kopf des CHIHIRO YAMANAKA TRIOs.
Ihre aktuelle CD “Reminiscence” (Emarcy/Universal, 2012) erklomm, wie auch ihrere anderen Alben, im Handumdrehen die Spitze der Japanischen Jazz Charts. Zu ihrer langen Liste an internationalen Konzerterfolgen zählen so renommierte Speilstätten wie die Carnegie Hall, das Kennedy Center, das JVC Jazz Festival New York, das Umbria Jazz Festival, Tokyo Jazz Festival und die Wiener Staatsoper.
So gefeiert wie Chihiro in den USA und Europa ist, noch gefragter ist sie in japan, wo sie eine erstaunliche Reihe von Erfolgen, mit ausverkauften Tourneen und #1 Platzierungen sämtlicher Alben verzeichnen kann. Ein verheißungsvoller Start in eine Karriere, die mit erster weltweiter Aufmerksamkeit begann, als sie 2005 mit dem Preis “Best New Artist” im Swing Journal Magazine geehrt wurde.
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Chiaroscuro Quartet – Mozart: The Prussian Quartets (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:26:38 minutes | 1,57 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS
After their exciting interpretations of Haydn, Beethoven and Schubert, the Chiaroscuro Quartet now turns to Mozart’s Prussian Quartets, his last compositions for this formation. These quartets were written for Friedrich Wilhelm II, King of Prussia and amateur cellist, and offer that instrument an unusually prominent role. The first of the three was composed fairly quickly, in June 1789, but the next two were not completed until the following year, and in the end Mozart’s plan for a set of six came to nothing.
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Chet Baker – A Lonely Winter (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 48:24 minutes | 830 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © RevOla
Chesney Henry “Chet” Baker Jr. (December 23, 1929 – May 13, 1988) was an American jazz trumpeter and vocalist. He is known for major innovations in cool jazz that led him to be nicknamed the “Prince of Cool”.
Baker earned much attention and critical praise through the 1950s, particularly for albums featuring his vocals: Chet Baker Sings (1954) and It Could Happen to You (1958). Jazz historian Dave Gelly described the promise of Baker’s early career as “James Dean, Sinatra, and Bix, rolled into one”. His well-publicized drug habit also drove his notoriety and fame. Baker was in and out of jail frequently before enjoying a career resurgence in the late 1970s and 1980s.
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Chen Leiji – The Sound of Guqin (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 58:18 minutes | 845 MB | Genre: World
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Naxos World Music
Chen Leiji studied guqin at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music and was the first student of the guqin master Gong Yi. The seven-stringed fingerboard zither is an instrument of Chinese classical music that is essentially played as a solo instrument. The art of Guqin music is a UNESCO cultural heritage and has existed for more than 3,000 years. The original repertoire included several thousand compositions, of which a few hundred are still preserved today and are played and performed regularly. Leiji travels the world as a solo guqin player and was chosen in 2008 to play the most famous guqin piece – “Lost Sound of Antiquity” – at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Beijing.
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Chelsea Lane – Suspensions (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 48:39 minutes | 386 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Better Company Records LLC
Chelsea Lane’s debut album Suspensions, released through Better Company Records, draws on contemporary, minimalist-inspired works to explore the theme of “suspensions,” both literal and figurative. Pairing newly commissioned works (by Ellis Ludwig-Leone and Molly Joyce) with Lane’s new transcriptions of existing works by contemporary composers (Thomas Adès, Nico Muhly, and Chris Cerrone), and a few staples of the solo harp repertory (by John Cage and Kate Moore), Suspensions is a delicately balanced, thoughtful debut. The album is a result of Lane’s interest in broadening the harp’s contemporary image: “I sought out new works for this album in order to cast the harp in a new light as a modern, versatile instrument capable of myriad colors, which I hope will ultimately increase its representation in both mainstream and more experimental performance spaces,” says Lane. She emphasizes that this requires a change in emphasis and interpretation as a performer: “I aim through releasing this album to contribute to the redefinition of ‘virtuosic’ pieces by shifting listeners’ attention to the smaller subtleties of musical phrasing and timbre.” While primarily a solo harp album, Lane is joined on piano by Ludwig-Leone (of San Fermin) for his work “Processional,” as well as Nathan Schram (of the Grammy-winning Attacca Quartet) on viola for Ludwig-Leone’s eponymous “Suspensions.”
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Cheick Tidiane Seck – KELENA FÔLY (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 44:21 minutes | 413 MB | Genre: Contemporary Jazz, Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Komos
Cheick Tidiane Seck placed his hands on a keyboard for the first time in the late 60s, on a harmonium of the Catholic convent in Sikasso, where he was a boarding pupil preparing his junior high diploma. From the age of 12 onwards, he would compose pieces by singing them to his mother, a,famous singer. Realizing he had talent, one of the nuns instructed him in music theory during his 3 years at school there. Diploma in hand, he that studied fine art at the Bamako National Arts Institute, tinkled the keys at night, playing with the Rail Band at the Buffet de la Gare hotel, moonlighting like his idol, Jimmy Smith,. He also made the most of his free time by playing on the Art Institute’s piano when the music students had gone home.
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Chas & Dave – Chas & Dave’s Christmas Carol Album (1986/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/44,1 kHz | Time – 51:02 minutes | 568 MB | Genre: Christmas
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Crimson
Chas & Dave present Chas & Dave’s Christmas Carol Album, a 20-track festive offering from the cockney duo featuring top knees-up renditions of some of our favourite holiday classics!
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Charlie Parker – Parker Plus Strings (1983/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 46:33 minutes | 824 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Charlie Parker Records
The legendary Charlie Parker fronts the Charlie Parker Quartet for Parker Plus Strings, recorded live at the Apollo Theatre, Aug 22nd, 23rd, 1950 & The Rockland Palace, Sept. 26, 1952. The album features jazz standards by the be-bop great with backing by orchestral strings!
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Charlie Parker – Charlie Parker (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 24:29 minutes | 189 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Music Manager
Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed “Bird” or “Yardbird”, was an American jazz saxophonist, band leader and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuosic technique, and advanced harmonies. Parker was an extremely brilliant virtuoso and introduced revolutionary rhythmic and harmonic ideas into jazz, including rapid passing chords, new variants of altered chords, and chord substitutions. Primarily a player of the alto saxophone, Parker’s tone ranged from clean and penetrating to sweet and somber.
Parker acquired the nickname “Yardbird” early in his career on the road with Jay McShann. This, and the shortened form “Bird”, continued to be used for the rest of his life, inspiring the titles of a number of Parker compositions, such as “Yardbird Suite”, “Ornithology”, “Bird Gets the Worm”, and “Bird of Paradise”. Parker was an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat Generation, personifying the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual rather than just an entertainer.
Charlie Parker – Bird With Strings: Live At The Apollo, Carnegie Hall & Birdland (1977/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 43:56 minutes | 894 MB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Columbia – Legacy
Charles Parker Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), nicknamed “Bird” or “Yardbird”, was an American jazz saxophonist, band leader and composer. Parker was a highly influential soloist and leading figure in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuosic technique, and advanced harmonies. Parker was an extremely fast virtuoso and introduced revolutionary harmonic ideas into jazz, including rapid passing chords, new variants of altered chords, and chord substitutions. Primarily a player of the alto saxophone, Parker’s tone ranged from clean and penetrating to sweet and somber.
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Charlie Parker – A Treasure of Immortal Jazzmen (1961/2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:08:44 minutes | 1,17 GB | Genre: Jazz
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Charlie Parker Records
Sax giants Charlie Parker and Lester Young let loose on A Treasure of Immortal Jazzmen, which collects 15 tracks of the duo’s favourite jazz standards in a stunning legacy programme. This recording has been transferred from its original analog sources to high-fidelity digital formats for modern listening!
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