Studio Masters

Tobias Bigger – Leschetizky: Piano Works (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/176,4kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 8, 2023 · Comments off

Theodor Leschetizky is a towering figure in the history of piano playing. Born in 1830, he studied in Vienna and began his career as a piano teacher when he was just fourteen. Having moved to St. Petersburg in 1852, he enjoyed great success as a pianist which in turn boosted his popularity as a teacher. After returning to Vienna in 1878, he concentrated increasingly on teaching, becoming an internationally renowned and sought-after mentor to a large number of pianists.

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Tobias Becker Bigband – Life Stream (2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 8, 2023 · Comments off

Jazz orchestra, big band, or large ensemble the differential in terminology is in direct proportion to the number of members and the arrangements involved. I have heard some fine big bands here in the United States, perhaps too many. Three bands in two years have been almost flawless while the rest are simply above average.

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T.G. Copperfield – Talkin’ Shop (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 8, 2023 · Comments off

Tilo George Coppperfield is a Rock and Roll songwriter with roots in Americana and Blues. Also known as the driving force behind southern rockers 3 Dayz Whizkey where he honed his skills as guitar player and highly-talented song-architect. 2017 gave birth to his first solo record (T.G. Copperfield) and the ambitious successor The Worried Man, a concept album and Rock and Roll Dystopia based on the thrilling story of anti-hero Evil Eye, also released in 2017.

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T.G. Copperfield – Sweet Honey (2018) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 8, 2023 · Comments off

The magic of the first take – this is the motto of songwriter and guitarist Tilo George Copperfield’s new EP “Sweet Honey”. The album was completely arranged and recorded in one day in best Muscle Shoals style with a strong band in the background. Spontaneity and creativity as well as musical skill and feeling characterise “Sweet Honey”, which could easily have come from the 70s.

In addition, Copperfield has invited some terrific guest singers, which should make this disc a very unique cross-section of the alternative country and blues rock scene in Bavaria, far from the mainstream. From the wailing country of “June Bugs” to the Tom Petty homage “Poet of the Highway” to the pounding Southern rock of “Godforsaken Place”; every note here is honest and makes a remarkable statement of Copperfield as a songwriter who feels completely at home on this terrain.

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T. Rex – Electric Warrior (1971/2012) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 8, 2023 · Comments off

The album that essentially kick-started the U.K. glam rock craze, Electric Warrior completes T. Rex’s transformation from hippie folk-rockers into flamboyant avatars of trashy rock & roll. There are a few vestiges of those early days remaining in the acoustic-driven ballads, but Electric Warrior spends most of its time in a swinging, hip-shaking groove powered by Marc Bolan’s warm electric guitar. The music recalls not just the catchy simplicity of early rock & roll, but also the implicit sexuality — except that here, Bolan gleefully hauls it to the surface, singing out loud what was once only communicated through the shimmying beat. He takes obvious delight in turning teenage bubblegum rock into campy sleaze, not to mention filling it with pseudo-psychedelic hippie poetry. In fact, Bolan sounds just as obsessed with the heavens as he does with sex, whether he’s singing about spiritual mysticism or begging a flying saucer to take him away. It’s all done with the same theatrical flair, but Tony Visconti’s spacious, echoing production makes it surprisingly convincing. Still, the real reason Electric Warrior stands the test of time so well — despite its intended disposability — is that it revels so freely in its own absurdity and willful lack of substance. Not taking himself at all seriously, Bolan is free to pursue whatever silly wordplay, cosmic fantasies, or non sequitur imagery he feels like; his abandonment of any pretense to art becomes, ironically, a statement in itself. Bolan’s lack of pomposity, back-to-basics songwriting, and elaborate theatrics went on to influence everything from hard rock to punk to new wave. But in the end, it’s that sense of playfulness, combined with a raft of irresistible hooks, that keeps Electric Warrior such an infectious, invigorating listen today. – Steve Huey

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Sviatoslav Richter – Tchaikovsky & Rachmaninoff: Piano Concertos (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter March 20 [O.S. March 7] 1915 – August 1, 1997) was a Soviet and Russian pianist who is frequently regarded as one of the greatest pianists of all time. He is known for the “depth of his interpretations, his virtuoso technique, and his vast repertoire.”

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Sven Wunder – Wabi Sabi (2020) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

After taking inspiration from Anatolian music on his previous work Eastern Flowers, the Swede Sven Wunder looks toward the Far-East for his new album. Wabi Sabi borrows its name from an aesthetic and spiritual Japanese concept which involves an appreciation and cultivation of simple and modest things, the acceptance of imperfection in the world and respect for the passage of time. For all that, this record is no less luxurious. Jazz-rock rhythms wrapped in progressive and pulsating funk tinted with East-Asian sounds. Wabi Sabi features wah-wah guitars, bass, percussion, Wurlitzer piano and Moog synthesisers which flirt with Japanese shakuhachi bamboo flutes (Hanami, Blanket Fog Descends…), Chinese zithers, guzhengs, violins and marimba’s on Bamboo Rocks. The final North Wind Rattle the Leaves, which begins and ends with the sound of a tanpura points us towards India. Perhaps an indication of the composers next destination. – Benjamin MiNiMuM

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SUUNS – The Witness (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Critics say that each Suuns album is just another one-way trip into the darkest and most obscure corners of the human soul. Led by Ben Shemie, the Canadian quartet (now become a trio since the departure of keyboardist Max Henry in 2018) would sink ever deeper into a protean rock’n’roll mixing sick psychedelia and experimental explosions, all wrapped up in saturated guitars or electronic beats. Can and Neu!’s krautrock, the shoegaze of My Bloody Valentine, post punk from The Fall, and Warp’s electro have been Suun’s energy source for years. But that was… before? In 2018, Felt, as disturbing as much as it was exciting, was the more soothing fourth album where the Canadians let themselves go a little and brought into the world a less clinical recording, more organic and handmade, but no less oppressive for all that. Three years later, the lethargic feeling is more noticeable and above all, more fascinating. A disk in a weightless state, The Witness sometimes flirts with post-rock and even experimental jazz. Suuns have burst out of their straitjacket, filled their lungs with (almost) fresh air and are starting to leap from cloud to cloud! The recesses of the human soul are always in their sights, but they at last allow themselves to be playful, melancholic, even optimistic. And the light was? – Marc Zisman

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Mika Kares, Szilvia Vörös, Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra & Susanna Mälkki – Bartók: Bluebeard’s Castle, Op. 11, Sz. 48 (Live) (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Mika Kares, Szilvia Vörös, Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra & Susanna Mälkki – Bartók: Bluebeard’s Castle, Op. 11, Sz. 48 (Live) (2021)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:00:30 minutes | 1,07 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © BIS

Composed in 1911, Bluebeard’s Castle is Béla Bartók’s only opera – a radical masterpiece which has secured a place alongside the other innovative music dramas of the same period, from Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande to Berg’s Wozzeck. Planning to write a one-act opera, Bartók settled on a libretto by Béla Balázs with the kind of surreal and/or macabre themes that would soon feature in his two ballets, The Wooden Prince and The Miraculous Mandarin. The main source for the libretto text was a play by Maeterlinck, a retelling of Perrault’s gruesome tale of Barbe-Bleue, the sinister yet strangely seductive wife-killer.

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György Kurtag – The Edge of Silence: Works for Voice by György Kurtág (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

”The Edge of Silence” finds American soprano and contemporary music specialist Susan Narucki firmly in her element performing iconoclastic vocal works by Hungarian composer Gyorgy Kurtag.

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Supersonic Blues Machine – Road Chronicles: Live! (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/48kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Supersonic Blues Machine will be releasing their brand new live-album, ‘Road Chronicles’ on 12th July 2019 via Provogue/Mascot Label Group. ‘Road Chronicles: Live!’ is their first live album, after two acclaimed studio records, ‘West of Flushing, South of Frisco’ (2016), ‘Californisoul’ (2017) and it follows them on their first European headline tour. It was recorded during their show in Brugnera, Italy on 20th July 2018, capturing the band in a triumphant and joyous mood. The show was the final one of a 10 date tour that started at the O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London and took them through Switzerland, Poland, The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Spain and finally bassist Fabrizio Grossi’s native Italy. The legendary Billy F. Gibbons joined the band throughout the tour putting in the stunning performances that you would expect from such an icon and it was the first tour to feature fast-rising UK blues-rocker Kris Barras on lead vocals and guitar.

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Toundra – Hex (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Toundra - Hex (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Hex is the eighth studio album of Spanish post-rock outfit Toundra. Like many bands all across the globe, 2020 forced a new and unexpected reality upon the Madrid natives, who found their touring plans cut short due to the pandemic and would begin shifting their focus towards recording new material under unusual circumstances. Frequently traveling between Madrid and the Cantabrian Coast in 2020, the band would grow to embrace these uncomfortable conditions, and ultimately use them as inspiration to make a record unlike anything previously found in their catalog. Their newest effort is decidedly an album that is divided into two sides. Side A consists of a single, 22-minute-long track, titled “El Odio” (Hatred), and Side B is made up of four new tracks.
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Alexander Ullman – Soundscapes (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Alexander Ullman - Soundscapes (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Movements in time and sounds in space: while visual art and music share inspirational sources, they often flourish in different realms. This recording circles around the idea of bringing (back) visual elements into the musical experience. The term “soundscapes” refers to acoustic environments created by contingent phenomena. Sounds create scapes, evoking visual experiences. The compositions on this recording are capable of creating landscapes and seascapes in their own right. The three sonatas by Edward Elgar, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and Robin de Raaff originate environments that allow juxtapositions, pairings with three short pieces by Florence Price, Felix Mendelssohn and Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco.
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TORRES – Thirstier (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

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TORRES - Thirstier (2021) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download

Recorded at Middle Farm Studios in Devon, UK, Thirstier marks a turn towards a bigger, more bombastic sound for TORRES. The anxious hush that fell over much of Scott’s previous music gets turned inside-out in songs tailored for a new chapter of life. Scott co-produced the album with Rob Ellis (best known for his stunning work with PJ Harvey) and Peter Miles. Also contributing parts on multiple songs is Portishead’s own Adrian Utley (synth) & multi-instrumentalist Ben Christophers (Bat for Lashes, Anna Calvi). Guitar-driven walls of sound, reminiscent of producer Butch Vig’s work with Garbage and Nirvana, surge and dissipate like surf in high winds, carrying Scott’s commanding voice to the fore.
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Tony Gallardo – Tony Gallardo: Selected Works (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz]

Studio Masters By admin · October 7, 2023 · Comments off

Tony Gallardo - Tony Gallardo: Selected Works (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/44,1kHz] Download

Rigged from Gallardo’s well-loved run of EPs released between 2008 and 2013, “Selected Works” aims the spotlight at an artist who’s almost impossible to pin down. His best-known work is the album’s closer, ‘Club Negro’, a sluggish canned dembow beater that wedges Gallardo’s spooky vocals between awkward detuned synths and a plasticky beatbox rhythm with essential Salem-esque half-speed trickery. But that’s only scratching the surface: Gallardo is just as adept at crafting sparkling, sleazebag electro – think The Knife at a Mexico City fetish party – as he illustrates on the crooning ‘Bruja’ and Justice-adjacent ‘Mi Pesa’.
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