Having a famous last name may have gotten him in the door, but James McMurtry has built his own proud career. "South Texas Lawman" is the kind of finely detailed, electric guitar-led midtempo rock tune that the exceptional storyteller is an expert at catalyzing. He tells the story of an old school cop who's up on charges for roughing up suspects and eventually decides on suicide. "I used to be young, I used to understand/ I used to be strong as any man/ I used to be bold, nobody bothered me/ I can't stand getting old, it don't fit me." Recent history and current events provide fertile ground for a pair of effective protest songs:

Few contemporary composers have enriched the choral repertoire quite like Gabriel Jackson, and this recording from the Choir of Canterbury Cathedral is a luminous testament to his singular voice. Rooted in the grand traditions of English sacred music yet infused with a distinctly modern harmonic palette, Jackson's writing revels in soaring treble lines, shimmering textures, and a deep affinity for space and resonance. Under the direction of David Newsholme, the Choir delivers these works with a compelling combination of precision and fervour, illuminating the rich polyphony of Ave maris stella, the jubilant energy of Praise ye the Lord, and the grandeur of the Coronation Canticles. The Cathedral's organ, resplendent in Canterbury Concertos, emerges as a protagonist in its own right. This is music that both honours tradition and expands its boundaries, performed with eloquence and authority.

In the Baroque era, European society turned its gaze to foreign countries in the Orient, with Persia exerting a particular fascination that was not necessarily anthropological in nature.Foreign countries and figures made it possible, for example in Montesquieu's famous Lettres Persanes (1721), to express and disseminate the new Enlightenment ideas, such as criticism of absolutism, under the guise of the exotic. However, music was less philosophical or anthropological; Persian themes tended to provide a special "kick" in opera or instrumental music.

wiss pianist Kathrin Schmidlin specialises in works by female composers. In 2021, she released the album Frauenstimmen, followed by Opus 1 feminin in 2022, both with Claves Records. These recordings earned her international recognition: Frauenstimmen was included in New York classical radio station WQXR’s list of The Best Albums of the Month. Opus 1 feminin was named Album of the Week by MDR, among other accolades.

With the first Rammstein album you hear, it's hard not to be slightly amazed by the sheer chutzpah of it all. The German lyrics, the prog rock tendencies, the classic metal guitars, and the ridiculous basso profundo vocals - you either fall for it, spurn it, or are utterly bemused by the extremeness of it all. Unless you're a fanatic, it wears a little thin the second time around. And for most listeners, Mutter, the group's third album and sequel to their inexplicable commercial breakthrough Sehnsucht, will be the second time around since it's their first release since becoming a high profile act. Thing is, if you've heard that record, you've pretty much heard Mutter, since all the trademarks are in place, without much noticeable variation. Yes, there are slight differences, chief of which is the cleaner production, which streamlines everything so the guitars don't seem as heavy, the songs not as epic, and the whole enterprise not as ridiculous…

Sir Arthur Bliss (1891 – 1975) was an excellent conductor of his own music, but he sadly made only a limited number of commercial recordings. SOMM celebrates the 50th anniversary of Bliss’s death with a 2-CD set of important archive performances, all but two of which he didn’t record commercially, making them of particular interest.These live performances, mostly recorded at the BBC Proms and not previously made available, are skilfully remastered by long-time SOMM collaborator and executive producer, Lani Spahr. At the invitation of Edward Elgar, Bliss wrote a new work for the Three Choirs Festival in 1920. He was inspired by a book on heraldry to compose a full-scale symphony incorporating symbolic meanings associated with primary colours. Hence, the four movements of A Colour Symphony are Purple, Red, Blue, and Green. The performance issued here is with Bliss conducting his 70th birthday concert at the Proms in 1961. For his 75th birthday concert at the Proms in 1966, Bliss conducted his Piano Concerto, commissioned by the British Council in 1939. Bliss and his younger brother served during World War I, and Kennard was killed at the Battle of the Somme.

SOMM Recordings is pleased to release Clarinet Concertos, four works for solo clarinet and wind orchestra, including two world-premiere recordings. The soloist is the English clarinettist, Peter Cigleris, who enjoys a wide and varied career and is in great demand as a soloist and chamber musician. His burgeoning career as a clarinet soloist has taken him to Festivals in Spain, France, the Netherlands, and the U.S. Recently, he was invited to perform in Győr, Hungary for the European Clarinet Festival, which led to a special invitation from the Győr Symphonic Band to record four hugely enjoyable concertos for clarinet and wind orchestra. These are conducted by László Marosi, the world’s foremost authority on Hungarian wind music, and Ferenc Szabó, the founder of the Györ Symphonic Band.

This 4CD set brings together eight of jazz vocalist and pianist Sarah Vaughan's finest albums from the 1950s, a period often regarded as her best.

The title track employs "Shaft"-like guitar licks, but the similarity ends there: It's a lame attempt at disco done in by Ike's lazy singing and irritatingly banal lyrics. But it's the LP's only sore point. Ike returns to his roots on "Your Loving Is Much Too Strong," a slow, romantic ballad that he and his girls, Hot Buttered Soul Unlimited, make you feel. "Rock Me Easy Baby," a slinky, syncopated shuffle, has more groove appeal than the vaunted "Groove-A-Thon," mainly because Ike constructs it for maximum soul appeal by running it for more than eight exquisite minutes. The uptempo happy-in-love ditty "We've Got a Whole Lot of Love" showcases HBS' sterling voices. Ike shows a different side on the soft, longing "Wish You Were Here," whose horn arrangements and backing vocals are simultaneously enticing and titillating. After a weak opening, the album settles into a comfortable groove, ending splendidly with "Make a Little Love to Me."

Recently awarded the prestigious Brahms Prize of theSchleswig-Holstein Brahms Society, Kent Nagano andthe Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra, of which hewas principal conductor from 2015 until 2025, performthe last two symphonies by the Hamburg-borncomposer, recorded in concert.The most personal of Johannes Brahms's foursymphonies, the Third is both heroic and deeplytroubled; moreover, all four movements end quietly.After the heroism of the First Symphony and thepastoral flavours of the Second, the Third Symphonyreveals Brahms at a crossroads: the youthful impulsesare now reined in and the mood is more one ofprofound reflection on life and death. The theme of theslow movement has been adapted many times and evensung by Frank Sinatra under the title of 'Take My Love'.

Following the chart-topping success of his Bach Sonatas and Partitas and equal acclaim for his recording of Walther's Scherzi da violino, Bojan Cicic now turns to Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber's collection of sonatas from 1681 - among the most ambitious and inventive violin works of the seventeenth century.Using unorthodox tuning and bold harmonic invention, Biber expands the instrument's capabilities, and his improvisatory style, layered textures and intricate counterpoint demand of the player not only virtuosic technical brilliance but an acute sensitivity to affect and sonority.With his Illyria Consort, Cicic brings a clarity and depth to this music, uncovering the sonatas' rich interplay between intellect, devotion and instrumental theatre. Restless in imagination and profound in expression, the sonatas - here recorded complete - are illuminated by Cicic's unmistakable artistry.

Susannah McCorkle, one of the finest jazz-influenced vocalists to emerge during the 1970's and 80's, sings a wide variety of music on her Pausa disc. In addition to some prebop material (including Cole Porter's "At Long Last Love," a vocalese version of "All Of Me," "I Get A Kick Out Of You" and Johnny Mercer's title cut), she also tackles tunes by Paul Simon, Oscar Brown Jr, Antonio Carlos Jobim and Leiber & Stoller. No matter what the style (she is essentially a swing singer), Susannah McCorkle uplifts each song. She is assisted by the Ben Aronov trio, and occasionally guitarist Gene Bertoncini and tenor-saxophonist Frank Wess.

The Flower Kings' tenth studio album happens to be one of their most adventurous, captivating, dynamic and front-to-back relentless works of theirs, a 75-minute-long album contained just within six tracks, 'The Sum of No Evil' from 2007 is a gorgeous and expansive symphonic prog record full of bold and unexpected turns, strong melodies and overall excellent, soulful playing; briefly put, here are all the elements of a TFK album delivering all the goods, in spades. Narrowing things down to a single-disc set (in contemporary terms) seems to have allowed the band to organize a rather focused work, and a surprisingly accessible one, too, thanks to the myriad of fantastic and highly memorable hooks and melodies. Needless to say, Stolt's guitar work here is driven and flamboyant, with the experienced Swedish axe-man delivering some of the most delightful and appealing riffs of the entire back catalogue of the The Flower Kings.

Originally released in the early 80's on cassette only, this timeless and legendary album is finally available on CD! Re-mastered and re-edited by Klaus Wiese himself, this masterpiece rediscovers one of the finest moments in Wiese's discography and his entire music career.

The Haim sisters—Danielle, Alana, Este—have said their fourth album is focused on the freedom of letting go of all kinds of things: worrying about what other people think, shame and guilt, overthinking, facing the music industry's "good for girls" sentiment. But, more than anything, I Quit is clearly a break-up record. Opener "Gone" heavily interpolates George Michael's "Freedom" with a mischievous smirk, swirling in a Stonesy guitar solo and engineer Dave Fridmann's signature super-crisp high-hat and gated snare as Danielle adds her own thoughts: "You can't shame me for what I done/ You can't make me disappear … You don't see me/ It's what I want!" Notably, this is the band's first album without producer Ariel Rechtshaid, Danielle's long-term (now ex) boyfriend. And the production hasn't suffered a lick. Rostam Batmanglij, who was a major multi-instrumentalist on Haim's last two albums, co-produced this one with Danielle—and the result is warm, fresh and idiosyncratic.